LGO 2013 here we come (almost!)

4 days to go and counting!!!!

Milos and I (Gaynor) arrived in Slovakia yesterday (Sunday) to a warm welcome from his brother Pavol and his wife and daughter, Ajka and Marina. I had a relatively easy journey taking a flight from London Heathrow via Warsaw to Poprad having spent a great two weeks with my family in England. Milos however, had a much more tiresome and long journey driving from the North of Sweden all the way through Europe. It took 3 days and 2 nights of constant driving. Yawn.

All the dogs are now resting in the back yard. They're in good shape, although after a thorough check today (checking feet, clipping toe nails, cutting paw hair etc) we've noticed a few cuts on their feet from training. These cuts are normal and usually heal within a few days but it's a good reminder that we should use booties in any last minute training we do with them here, especially as the snow is much wetter than in Sweden.

We were training a team of 18 dogs this year so we could pick the best 14 for the race. Fortunately we haven't suffered from injuries as the conditions in Sweden have been really good with early snow so it was quite hard to choose which 14 would go! In the end, Milos took 15 with him so we have a 'spare' incase anything happens over the next few days. The final team are:

Old favourites from LGO 2010/2011 (all around 5/6 years old):  Balto, Toby, Foxy, Sonnie, Falco, Gina, Heineken, Spendrup, Wuf and of course Waf (Golden harness wonder-dog!)

A very special lady from our young dogs at LGO 2011:  Grony (also known as an escape artist - she's often found wandering around the race 'camp' saying hello to other dogs having slipped her collar)

A few "rookies" and our young team for this year:  Patch, Cliff, Leepey

Last but not least, one dog we bought from Radek after the race last year (part of his 2011 LGO team):  Slash

If we can find some snow in the next couple of days I hope to post some pics of training, otherwise it's just to wish us luck!!

The race starts on Sunday 13th January. Follow on this Blog as well as on our Tera Tours Racing page on Facebook, or the LGO's official website.

Gaynor.