Cassandra and her lady bits!

Having had the awful worry with Cassandra and flystrike, we are as you can imagine extra vigilant with all our animals at the moment. We were still putting cream on Cassandra and then noticed another swelling, the "ladybits" again, but on the other side, we did nt know what it was, so the first thought was to phone our vet. It was nearly 10pm on a Saturday evening, plus we knew he was very soon going on holiday, if he had not already left. Luckily he had not gone, but we suggested we took a photo, and emailed it to him, so he could have a look and see if he could diagnose the problem. He said sure no problem. We got there and him and his wife were all dressed up to go out, but as ever he was more than happy to help. He felt she could have been stung, or just had an inflamed area. Nothing too much to worry about. he gave us a prescription for a steroid cream. So off we trot to the out of hours pharmacy, As we turned into the main high Street, we were met with a policeman, blowing away at his whistle, directing the crowds away from the town centre, and the away from where we wanted to go. It must have been a religious festival that we did n't know about, and there was a beautiful effigy being carried out of the church, with the locals all in their finery watching . We followed the road round in the direction we were hastily pointed to, and found and got stuck in a wedding party,just as they were coming out of the church. Weddings are very often held during the late evening here as the temperature tends to reach at least 40 degrees most summer afternoons, so the locals enjoy the slightly balmy evenings. Nightmare upon nightmare we then had to take the tiny roads around the town. When we first moved here we had a little drive round some of the tiny streets, and after driving round for about half an hour, we were approached by a man on a motor bike and shown the way out... how embarrassing! We had actually had guests do the same thing and been guided out too! Well surprise surprise we came out at the first church and the effigy had hardly moved, so we decided to call it a night, and make our way home. Cassandra's cream could wait until the following morning. This we did and got caught up in a local cycle race, never a dull moment here hahaha!

Our lovely little town of Montoro

Rafas poorly foot returns, with avengeance :(

All our alpaca problems all seemed to happen within about a month, and seemed to flit from one problem to another so I am sorry if this part of the blog seems a little disjointed.

Well the grey boys had been moved and caused a mini orgy, but the other three boys Rafa, Galaxy and Santa missed the other boys so much, we moved them very soon afterwards. On reflection we should have given Rafa's foot a little more time to heal, however obviously we thought we had. So the boys all had access to a huge open space, basically three paddocks, where at least we thought they could have space. Not on your Nellie they are all still joined at the hip, and still as blooming frisky!

Of course we kept an eye on Rafa's foot. We made up a small pen to feed the boys in at dinner time, to we could keep an eye on it, and for a couple of days it seemed fine, it actually looked like it was healing nicely. He was n't limping, just bouncing along with all the others, usually first, when we came in through the gate, shaking our bucket to let them know it was dinner time. A few days past and we thought we should get hold of him and have a good look, when to our horror we saw a little maggott between his toes. FLYSTRIKE AGAIN! We were devastated!!!

Alan had watched Andres deal with Cassandra's flystrike problem, and was confident who could deal with it, and he did, extremely well. Poor Rafa was obviously in a lot of pain and discomfort whist Alan one by one removed the pesky little blighters! At one point Alan had gone to get fresh water and Rafa tried to jump a hurdle and I got a rather nasty bruise and scratch from his nail as I think I may have caught him, mid jump. Poor little fella. For days we checked it two or 3 times a day and treated it with antibiotic cream. A few days later you could tell it was feeling a lot better as he would let Alan lift his foot, and have a good look without him struggling. I was very proud of Alan, I'm not sure I could have dealt with it!

Rafa going for a walk one day!

Alpaca Orgy!

As you may have read, in my last blog, because of the fighting due to being a little frisky we decided we needed to move the boys, that have been in a rather small area since shearing, hence the fighting I'm sure, so we walked Marcus and Eduardo around on leads, having of course penned the girls in through the girls paddock, and another small paddock to a large area with some grass and weeds, and our plan was to give them a few days on their own then bring round the other three boys. So we did that and went shopping. A couple of hours later we drove up our little track and turned the corner where we can see the girls, usually sunbathing and we were faced with a bloody alpaca orgy!!! There were the three girls sitting in a row all facing the same way, the two outside girls Cassandra (typical) and Lily with a male on top and Bermuda sitting in the middle of them waiting for her turn. BLOODY HELL! So who knows, we may have babies next year. Never a dull moment here eh haha!

Rafa and the start of a poorly foot!

After shearing at the beginning of May, the boys were in a small paddock closest to the house, and the girls nearby, although not too close to cause any excitement or to be able to see each other. It was just the way they had finished up after the upheaval of shearing, besides we like to move them around a bit, musical alpacas, and it stops them from being bored. In time they would all be back in their normal places. Meanwhile it was great to have the boys near us again. They are far more sociable than our girls, and particularly like to come to the fences and have a sniff and a good look when we take the dogs out for a walk. Only a few days after the incident with Cassandra I happened to notice Rafa lying with one leg stretched out in front of him, and he had blood between his two toes, he had probably caught his foot on a stone, although now we are on high alert, always on the look out for blood. Luckily the boys being in the smaller paddock meant we could keep an eye on him easily. For three days at least we cleaned it thoroughly and put the same cream on it that Cassandra had and sprayed him 3 times a day with the same insecticide spray.

The boys had been in the smaller paddock for a couple of weeks and as much as we loved having them there, they needed to be moved, it was just too small for them and they were getting a little frisky, there was a lot of piggy backing around then green spit flying through the air. It seemed to be that our two handsome grey boys Marcus and Eduardo were causing the friskiness so a decision was made to move them round to a larger paddock, just for a couple of days, to give the others a little more space, then we would take Rafa, Galaxy and little Santa round to join them. That was the plan. The plan however did not quite go to plan. Dum dum dummmmm! The next instalment to come... possibly tomorrow!

A slightly younger Rafa, loving Arthur!

Dreaded Flystrike! An alpaca owners nightmare!

We were feeding the girls one morning and for some reason noticed that Cassandra's tail was slightly raised, luckily it allowed me to see she had blood around her bottom and vaginal area. My first thoughts were that maybe she had suffered a prolapse. It was around 8.30 am so I phoned our vet. I asked him if Alan could come and get him, you may remember he does n't drive, he sounded a little hesitant and said errr around 11 am I can come. That was fine with us, Cassandra did not seem to be in any pain or discomfort and she was tucking into her food.... nothing new there, so that was fine. As summer here can be particularly flyey, (how on earth do you spell flyey?) we decided to spray around the area with an insecticide, that we always keep in case an animal gets a cut or graze. One of the fears when you are an animal owner is the dreaded flystrike!

Alan collected Andres at 11 as arranged he explained he had been watching his little daughter in her end of term show of Grease, we now had his full attention though! Whilst we were checking on Cassandra, spraying her with insecticide etc we did notice the infected area seemed very swollen. We could not understand what she had done, if it was an internal problem or a cut on the outside, we just knew there was a lot of swelling! We could also see some minute white things, our fear was that they were fly eggs that would turn into maggots!!!

OK it get's nasty now, put your noodles down! I held Cassandra, as now when we do treatments on the alpacas sometimes I struggle with doing injections, their skin is like a tight drum and some antibiotics are very thick and I have to admit there are a few jobs in life that Alan can do better than me and so I do the holding/ cuddling. Andres knew exactly what he was dealing with and as he went to his Black & Decker box, also known as his medical box, I did n't want to look in case a scalpel was involved. A scalpel was not involved but a blooming big pair of tweezers were. Sadly what we thought may have been eggs were in fact the tails of maggots that were already inside her. We were totally devastated, although Andres was not at all perturbed, I guess he is used to dealing with it. I learnt a lot about maggots during that morning, whilst he took about 20 out of the cut, and the swelling seemed to reduce with every one he removed. He explained to us that the maggots were only 2 or 3 days old, which he could tell from their size and all from the one egg as they were all the same size too. We also learnt that as they eat dead and infected tissue or skin whilst they are inside the body they actually breathe out of their rear end, so what we could see was their tail which they breath of out. I still hate the little blighter's but it was interesting to learn about it.

To this day we don't know what Cassandra had done, she could have sat on a sharp stone or caught herself on a branch, we just don't know. However she healed remarkably quickly once the maggots had been removed and she had a course of antibiotics, plus an antibiotic cream too. Thankfully she is fine now, but we are always keeping our eyes open for slightly raised tails, as I'm sure you can imagine! Poor Cassandra!

Our gorgeous Cassandra

A sneaky weekend in Brighton

My beautiful God daughter Miss Jenna Avenall now Mrs. Stringer, was due to be married in June, this was a wedding I dearly wanted to attend. Luckily for me, even during a busy time with holiday lets, I scarpered off leaving poor Alan to hold the fort, whilst I managed to get in a sneaky weekend, and see my best friend in the whole world's little girl, tie the knot.

It did of course mean I managed to spend time with my lovely kiddiwinks and their babies too. For once I had made arrangements for Frankie to pick me up at the airport and I was going to have my hair done, straight from there. Sods law I had a delay.  To cut a long story short the pilot was given three different gates to stop at, and I think he got in a huff and braked exactly where he was. About a mile away from where we wanted him to be! We got ferried out to him by buses, and we had a hysterical mum getting extremely cross as her "Baby was going to die, in the heat!" "Errrr hello, you have been in Spain, I really don't think five minutes in a bus is going to do too much harm."  The poor cabin crew!  I'm sure it can be an pleasant job when everything is going smoothly, but crikey they took some stick, that day! After we were all in, doors closed, seat belts signs on, out came the co-pilot.   He was very apologetic and said someone had nipped into their stand. A little like someone nipping into a place in front of you, at your local NCP I guess. Well he apologised and told us as we had lost our take off spot we would have to wait two hours. there was a chorus of "OHHHH NOOOOO's!" including from me. Frankie would be preparing for work, and to pick me up, and Louise was booked to do my hair. We were allowed to make phone calls to change plans, and settled down for a long wait. After all of about ten minutes, out came the "co" again, with the great news that we could be off in 10 minutes after all...... Hooray!!! He was now the hero of the day? Panicy phone calls were all made again, rescheduling for the second time! We landed approximately 45 minutes late. My hair appointment was cancelled. The lovely Louise however, did some juggling and fitted me in later that evening. We drove straight to Frankie's work, and I went off to the hairdressers from there.... phew!

Saturday 11th June, and we woke up to a glorious day, beautiful temperatures and sunshine, just perfect. I was luckily enough to be invited to the whole shin dig and Mark, Callie and Frankie were joining us for the evening celebrations. What a beautiful bride, there were of course a few tears shed, as she walked down the aisle with her very proud dad beside her, Jenna looked stunning. Jenna plus 4 out of 5 of her bridesmaids being in event management, meant the day been planned down to the final detail, in fact the weeks leading up to the special day had all been meticulously planned!

I was honoured to be sitting with the family and we had such a wonderful time reminicing, in fact I travelled up to the reception with Mandy, Wendy's sister and I don't think there was a break for a breathe for more than two seconds. Is n't reminising wonderful! We all had such a wonderful time at the wedding. I had a rather lovely rosy glow after having five alcoholic drinks in 9 hours, and boy did I dance, I have n't danced like that for years. In actual fact the dj said I was a good dancer haha. How good was that!

Wendy and Jenna, my beautiful friend and gorgeous daughter!

Oopsy after a little drinkypoos

The following day we were hoping to have a lovely family day out, sadly the British weather played havoc with that so Mark and Callie coped with a house full of us, for the whole day. The babies had a great time playing together, and we finished off the day with a good old Chinese take away.... one of the few things I do miss here in sunny Spain!

"I WILL kiss my little cousin!"

My gorgeous grandgirlies - Maisie

and Kaci

Fun with balloons!

Callie and Maisie come to Spain

Just typical, Mark my son was starting training for a new job and could n't come over for a holiday, however I was over the moon when Callie said she would still bring Maisie over. That's Marks gorgeous lady and my beautiful granddaughter aged 15 months. Like Frankie had done at Christmas Callie did the journey on her own, with the cases, buggy and car chair. It sounds a nightmare, but I am so pleased they have both done it, and all for for me!

It was a hot and rather humid day, and we were indecisive as to whether or not we should stop off about 30 minutes from home, to get Maisie out for a breathe of fresh air, and a cool drink, but she seemed quite comfortable and so we continued our journey. Thank goodness we did as the moment we arrived at our gates, the heavens opened, and stair rods fell. Alan got simply drenched just opening the gates, we drove in and sat in the car for 40 minutes, whilst we waited for it to stop, even just a little.

Eventually we got out of the car and made a dash for the big kitchen, on route we noticed our gorgeous nectarine tree battered and broken from the storm In the kitchen we found flooding from the roof, nothing new there, although it was the end of May. The casita that Callie and Maisie were staying in was also saoking and sadly too so was Maisie's cot. Alan ran around like a loony and battened down what he could whilst Callie and I, and little Maisie just sort of sat in the kitchen, waiting for it to pass over..... for quite a while!

Our poor nectarine tree

The pool was in a state

and as for the track .....

The track being in this condition meant we were unable to get out for a couple of days.

Eventually a tractor came down and flattened it and scraped the huge boulders out of the way that fall from the steep sides, if the rain is torrential. When we did manage to get out, the first trip was breakfast in Cordoba, where they do this lovely "toast" or "tostadas" which is like a large flat roll, toasted with butter or as the Spanish have, and I do occasionally, with olive oil and tomatoes. Maisie was able to toddle around with nanny chasing her, to keep up with her, and then off to the zoo we went.

Our trip to the zoo was almost identical to when we took Kaci at the same age. The interest in a particular animal would last from zero seconds to possibly 30 seconds, then we were on the run again. Cordoba zoo is lovely and quiet and it so safe for little 'uns to toddle freely around. However the donkies were a major hit, Maisie loved them and stroked them without any fear what so ever.

The gorgeous Maisie and I

Maisie and a lynx rather liked each other

Throughout the holiday, Maisie met and interacted with all the dogs and alpacas too, showing absolutely no fear what so ever. Our large dogs Arthur and Blue do I accept look rather scary however they truly are gentle giants.

Callie and Maisie with Big Arthur

One of the reasons Mark and Callie were hoping to return this particular week is because it is the week long Cordoba feria. Each town in Andalucia, and probably Spain no matter how tiny has a feria, and the Cordoba one, is pretty amazing, and the highlight of their year. Of course Mark could n't be with us, but we still dressed ourselves up and had a lovely evening. Maisie looked so beautiful in her little Spanish dress.

The gorgeous entrance to the Cordoba Feria which takes months to complete, and then months to disband again.

Two of my gorgeous girls, Callie and Maisie

Maisie meets a little Matador at the feria!

Flamenco dancing in a bar

Maisie loved the lights and music

Love it :-)

and with "Grandad Alan" (he's not really, but!)

We took Maisie out onto the big courtyard one day, where the dogs live. Immediately Arthur came and lay in front of Callie and Maisie as if he was guarding little Maisie, probably from the nightmare that is Miliko! Bless him!

With Blue

The day before we left with a tearful goodbye, we thought it would be nice to take the alpacas for a walk.