Jim's Journey

JIM previously called Panchito. Here's a letter from his loving new owners:-

He is now half a year with us, our Jim a.k.a. Panchito. But actually, we always call him Zoef: he goes from from 0 to 100 in a half seconds. One minute he is blissfully grunting, asleep on the couch and curled up like a donut. The next moment he standing in front of you with bright shining eyes. We call it "At the ready!"Always ready for action, this cheerful bouncing ball. As long as it's not too early in the morning because Mr. loves to sleep late.

We knew where he was coming from and what we were taking on : a dog from Spain ... from a killing station ... and then some time in the shelter .. naturally you expect some rough edges. A small behavioral problem, some difficulties with discipline, perhaps. He had already been half a year in Netherlands with forter parents who had taken very good care of  him, but still. We expected some difficulties.

But guess what? Nothing! From day one he has behaved well. Even on day two we dared to let him run free, he listened so well and always kept his eyes on us.  He didn't always do exactly what we wanted, but he obviously did incredibly his best to do well. Very touching. Within two weeks he had  already 

We were aware that he became a little excited when we went out in the car. And it's true, and this happened particularly when we arrived at our destination. The first few times we took him with us, he was shaking when we lifted him out of the car and he hardly dared cross the threshold and in his anxiety made puddles we didn't mke a great fuss, just had some sheets and mopped it up. Meanwhile the penny dropped and he started to associate a ride in the car with fun things. The beach, the woods, visits to people with other dogs to play with ...

He takes just as much pleasure running beside the bike. If he gets tired he will ride in the front in the basket. And recently we've got a boat and he goes into the water. As with all things he's hesitant to begin with, but within five minutes he becomes aclimatised, this brave dodo. We are more than a little proud of him, how easily he adapts and learns new things. At best one could say it's his survival instinct, but it could have been very different, he could have put up more resistance, shown more anxiety, had a slower learning process .. But really nothing of the sort happened. Nothing like it.

So yes, he is very happy but is there any downside? Well quite often he runs off wth shoes, preferably boots. He does not damage them, just dances around with such a happy wagging tail and then he leaves the object 'somewhere'. So you regularly walk around wearing one boot and searching the house for the other. Also in his enthusiasm he wants to jump up at people. This is fairly normal young dog behavior so that we'll also correct with time.

He is now half a year with us, our Zoef. And it should be clear: we are very happy with him. What a wonderful beast!

Jim in action

Cycling near Muiden

Sailing through the canals

At home