It’s been a very busy couple of weeks. We now have our beautiful Border Collie puppy April Blue and she has really injected all of our lives with lots of energy. (Sorry Bailey.) She’s exceptionally good natured and has stolen everybody’s hearts already.

She’s a Blue Merle, which is quite an unusual colouring and lots of Italians we’ve met have asked me if she’s a husky!

I thought it was strange at first, but we’ve been asked so many times now that I was really impressed yesterday when someone came up to her and said, ‘I love Border Collies’.

On Friday I drove down from Milan to Rome with Bailey and April in the car and April was introduced to the boat for the first time. The only tricky thing was that Nocturne was on the hard! So we had to think of a way to get a wriggly puppy up and down the ladder…

We ‘borrowed’ one of Bailey’s back pack travel cases and she thought it was great fun getting in and out of it. The boat yard isn’t a very puppy friendly place however, and I had to watch April like a hawk because in true puppy fashion she wants everything she can find in her mouth. Luckily by Saturday afternoon we were back in the water and April had her first floating experience.

She was asleep as we left the slip in the boat yard, and after a 20 minute sail around to the marina…

she was still asleep! What a perfect boat dog! She’s a natural!

Bailey is tentatively curious about her, but he keeps well out of her reach when she’s having a hyper moment.

I was worried that bringing April to the boat would be too much for her and might upset her housetraining, but actually she’s very happy and is still progressing with the housetraining well. She has a smaller surface area in the boat, of course, which might actually be helping her to learn. She’s not mastered asking to go out yet, but I’m getting better at realising when she needs to go so we’re learning together. Once we’ve both got the hang of it, I will try and train her to relieve herself on the deck. That way if we do any long passages when she’s older she won’t have to cross her legs!

Naturally, she’s the darling of the pontoon here in Rome. She had her second vaccination yesterday, so in a week we can leave the pontoon freely and go exploring and socialising with other dogs.

She might even get the chance to have sandy paws soon!