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I don’t have a car, so Erin, my IWS bitch, and I travel by public transport. The most common question we get from fellow
passengers on both buses and trains is, “do you have to pay for your dog?” (answer: no).
The most common comment is “my dog wouldn’t sit quietly like that” Erin is usually under the seat peeping
out into the aisle when they say that.
Buses in London can now apparently refuse to take your dog on board. As we boarded one bus in London, the driver said suspiciously
“how’s your dog?” I smiled, “very well thanks”. I didn’t realise he wasn’t kindly
concerned with Erin’s health, but meant “how is your dog going to behave on my bus?” Needless to say she
disappeared under the seat as usual.
She does like to keep her eye on the door in a bus or train though, which on a bus means she prefers to lie under the first
seat on the right hand side. I pray that seat is vacant, because she makes a dive for it anyway, occupied or not! If I’m
not quick enough she’s settled herself under the seat and her head appears between some elderly shopper’s ankles
before I can point out that I can’t sit down …. Hey ho! If we are obliged to sit where she can’t watch
the door, she shifts her big IWS bottom further and further out into the aisle, until she’s blocking all other passengers.
On trains she prefers to snuggle up in the spaces between the seats reserved for luggage. I have to keep a lookout that noone
slides their suitcase into her section and squishes her. She is usually so still and quiet that she causes quite a stir when
she emerges to depart, cos no one knew she was there. The railway stations though are a bit too noisy, so she makes a beeline
for the waiting room … we have ended up in a railway ‘Staff Room’ just because the door was open! But once
she’s safely under a seat, she will stay quite happily while I walk back onto the platform to check the departure board,
for example. Of course I give her a ‘stay’ command before I leave, and a ‘good girl’ when I get back.
I didn’t realise the chap reading his newspaper on the next seat thought I was talking to him, cos he hadn’t been
there when we arrived.
I do have to plan routes through London carefully because of escalators – some lines have lifts, but not all - and dogs
have to be carried on escalators. Poor Erin had to endure London underground in the rush hour one day, when I’d planned
the journey well but not well enough to avoid a long, long escalator. I had to carry her. O my gosh, what an armful!! IWS
don’t really do being carryied, do they? As we sailed ‘up’, both trying to keep some dignity, Erin wore
the same look on her face that she wears in the vets when the thermometer goes up her bottom. I was amazed at the number
of people coming towards us on the ‘down’ escalator who tried to talk to her, cluck at her as they swooshed past!
What did they expect Erin to do in response exactly from her position???
Erin is an old hand at taxis and jumps into the front seat footwell as soon as I open the door, sometimes before I’ve
even had a chance to enquire of the driver ‘do you take dogs?” As we come out of a railway station, she can recognise
a row of taxis and usually drags me over, pointing her nose at the door handle … what a lazy, lazy girl!
She has also been a passenger on the Portsmouth to Hayling Island Ferry, but didn’t show much evidence of sealegs.
The journey is only 5 minutes long though, so maybe I was expecting a bit much! To rack up the full complement of different
modes of transport, I think a holiday on the Isle of Wight is in order, so I can take Erin on a hovercraft …. Watch
this space!
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