A Promise To A Very Special Police Dog
A Promise To A Very Special Police Dog
&
One Rather Mad Adventure
From Somerset - To The Mediterranean
It All Started with a Promise to Karma ❤️ In January 2024, our darling Karma, a retired Avon and Somerset Police German Shepherd, became terribly ill.
There were moments when we genuinely didn't know whether she'd make it.
Simon and I promised her that if she pulled through, we'd take her to swim in a beautiful, warm sea and enjoy life to the full. Well, our darling girl fought her way back. And a promise is a promise. There was just one small complication: how to get Simon, me and two enormous German Shepherds to a warm sea?
Clearly, the sensible thing would have been to book somewhere lovely and straightforward.
Naturally, we did the exact opposite.
We went to a caravan shop, got totally overexcited and bought the largest touring caravan they had. We had never owned one. In fact, we'd never even stayed in one.
As we drove home, thoroughly pleased with ourselves, we remembered a rather important detail: we live up a very narrow lane. So back we went to exchange it for the next size down. We still weren't entirely sure that one would fit up the lane, let alone through our gateway.
Our plan (if you could call it that):
✅ Pack ourselves — a middle-aged couple without a clue about caravanning — and our two large, hairy GSDs: one retired Police Dog, the other an ex-Security Dog.
✅ Travel around France, where between us we spoke approximately two words of French.
✅ Disappear for six weeks or so, from early May to mid-June. Quite a long time when you run a hospitality business.
❌ Overlook the fact that I am a total princess who whinges, whines and goes on strike when not utterly comfortable, and who cannot bear public toilets.
❌ Overlook the fact that Simon, having spent over 20 years in the Army, had sworn never to rough it or camp again.
So did we do it?
Of course not. That would have been completely mad and a very silly thing to do. Actually, that's a lie.
We absolutely did it. And my goodness, we had some adventures — not least getting the blinking thing home in the first place! The story began on the hills of Somerset, where Mr Amazon was extremely busy delivering exciting glamping-type things, and took us through Normandy, the great châteaux of the Loire, Provence and eventually to the Mediterranean, where we swam with our girls. There was wonderful food, glorious scenery, more than a little wine and, unfortunately, two German Shepherds with exploding diarrhoea in a caravan. What could possibly go wrong
Yippee, we got the caravan up the lane - Just
The Getting Ready
From losing the caravan off the back of the car to sorting out the dogs' paperwork for travel & everything else in between
We had just five weeks between buying the caravan and leaving the country for more than six weeks.
There were troubling erection issues (the caravan awning, obviously), and we managed to lose the bloody caravan off the back of the car halfway down our lane on the way to our ONE and only practice night at the salubrious Minehead caravan park.
Quite how we thought we could make it out of the village without losing the caravan or the extended wing mirrors — which we managed to lose twice on that trip — let alone cross France, is anybody's guess.
First, the girls. 🐾
✅ We had to change their food. Post-Brexit restrictions meant we couldn't simply take our usual supply of animal-based dog food, so we researched kibble they would a) eat, b) keep down and c) hopefully be able to buy in Europe.
✅ We packed all their medication, with letters from our vet explaining what they needed.
✅ We assembled a full canine first-aid kit and researched unfamiliar bugs, viruses, waterborne nasties and some quite terrifying caterpillars.
✅ Rabies vaccinations? Sorted.
✅ Animal Health Certificates? Eventually sorted. Our vets quoted £275 per dog. Not a chance! We found specialists who charged £180 for both, although it meant a trip to Bristol within the permitted window before departure.
Then, us. Or rather, the military operation.
✅ We organised everything for the cottages: handwritten invitation cards, personalised plaques, detailed team briefings, guest bedding preferences, which dogs were reactive and approximately a million other things. The downstairs of our house looked like one of Simon's old Army operations rooms. Our home team were brilliant.
✅ We attempted to learn how to keep the caravan attached to the car. A fairly key skill, I would have thought.
✅ We worked out how to pack a car when two enormous dogs required the entire boot and everything else — awning, chairs, kitchen, you name it — had to fit on the back seat.
✅ We learned how to work the endless exciting glamping packages that somehow kept leaping into my Amazon basket.
Everyone knows you cannot possibly go caravanning without: 🛍️ An air fryer; hair dryer; portable Starlink (we still had guests to keep in touch with); Dyson heater for cool days; cooling unit for hot days; lots of Tupperware; pop-up outside kitchen; outside cupboards, drawers and carpet; quick-drying Lycra things; smart pots, pans, knives, plates and cutlery; a full cleaning kit and Shark hoover (two GSDs, remember); fabulous lounging chairs with trays for wine, glasses and phones; beautiful high-thread-count linen; the deepest mattress toppers; and — naturally — an iron and ironing board. Can't be having creased bedding.
And then there were the really important creature comforts: Floris room sprays, heavenly reed diffusers, scented candles, mosquito candles, matches for the barbecue... The lists went on and on.
Basically, we were setting up another luxury self-catering cottage, only this one had wheels.
✅ French autoroute toll tag? An absolute winner.
✅ Eurotunnel booking? Nearly forgot that rather vital detail amid all the excitement.
We booked an open return because, given our recent history with caravans, there was every chance we'd make it to Calais and head straight home with our tails between our legs.
We later discovered the local community had run a sweepstake on how long we would survive. Four days was the favourite. Well, to those doubting Tommies: we lasted just under seven weeks.
Somehow, by 4 May, we were packed and ready to rock and roll. Would the caravan survive its first proper motorway journey? Would I enter a shared shower block? Could we fit the blinking thing onto Le Shuttle? And — most importantly — had we got the dogs' paperwork right?
The pre-hol bath!
Getting The Girls Export
Vet Health Checks & Paperwork
Chapter 1
Somerset - Dover - Normandy
✅ We kept the caravan attached to the car.
✅ We made it to Dover in one piece.
✅ We found Le Shuttle. Do not blindly trust the satnav.
✅ We found pet passport control and had all the correct paperwork for the girls. Huge relief!
✅ I drove the car and caravan onto Le Shuttle without running over, or into, anyone or anything.
✅ We successfully drove on the other side of the road. A British car, an enormous caravan and our first experience of towing abroad. What could be easier?
❌ We found our first campsite. God, it was horrible. Run-down, supposedly four-star and with a shower and loo block that nearly finished me off. No loo seats. Not one. And you had to bring your own loo roll. BOB no longer meant Bring Your Own Bottle. It was Bring Your Own Bog Paper.
❌ Our caravan had a lovely bathroom with a separate shower, but there was one small technical problem: we'd turned the shower into my hanging wardrobe. So, no shower for two nights. What were flannels and baby wipes invented for?
✅ We visited Jumièges Abbey, founded in the seventh century, and it was simply stunning.
✅ We visited Château d'Ussé, said to have inspired Sleeping Beauty. We chose it because the girls could accompany us around the gardens and into the château.
✅ We enjoyed our first classic French pavement-café lunch in a lovely little town. Simon ate snails - yuck!.
✅ And the girls had their first swim in a foreign land. ❤️
We discovered a wonderfully clear lake near the campsite. The sun was shining, and after the stress of getting away, the terror of towing and my near-death experience in the shower block, watching Star and Karma swimming and having fun made the whole trip worthwhile.
Even if we only lasted another day. We genuinely weren't sure we would — and Simon was having serious doubts after my reaction to the toilets!
❌ We still hadn't attempted the awning or outside kitchen. Another day, another campsite.
❌ We were getting worried about dog food. Royal Canin had assured us it would be easy to find in France, but after hours of searching we hadn't found any. We'd brought a small emergency supply and were hoping to locate a shop before it ran out. Eek
Oh God - The first campsite toilets & shower block was even worse than I could imagine
Chapter 2
The Loire Valley, Châteaux & Farmers Markets
🏰 Leaving Normandy, we headed into the Loire Valley.Total happiness.
We stumbled across the municipal campsites — council-owned and run — and stayed on the riverbank in the ancient town of Amboise. The facilities were immaculate. I was in heaven.
✅ I had my first proper shower on French soil without fearing for my life.
✅ We finally found a pet shop selling Royal Canin. The girls' dinner was safe!
✅ The four of us explored some wonderful, bustling farmers' markets. Star and Karma took the crowds and excitement completely in their stride.
✅ We visited Château de Chambord, which was enormous, and enjoyed a medieval-style horse display.
✅ We visited Château de Villandry and its remarkable formal gardens, with vegetables arranged in beautiful patterns. Very impressive from above — although you'd have to like eating salad. A lot of it.
✅ We visited Château de Chenonceau, that extraordinary château spanning the River Cher.
✅ We explored Château Royal d'Amboise, associated with the young Mary, Queen of Scots during her years at the French court.
✅ We visited Fontevraud Abbey, where the effigies of Henry II, Eleanor of Aquitaine and Richard the Lionheart can be seen. It later became a prison.
✅ We even remembered how to put up the awning, outdoor kitchen and our little garden.
❌ I suffered the indignity of hanging my smalls on a communal washing line in full view of the other campers. Though in my case, 'smalls' might be a bit generous. More like a tent.
❌ One very hot day, when we'd planned a long château-visiting expedition, we put the girls into kennels rather than take them out in the heat. Big mistake. They were distraught. Lesson learned: we promised we wouldn't do it again. This was their holiday, after all.
❌ We were saddened by how empty some of the châteaux felt compared with Britain's furnished historic houses, having lost so much through their turbulent histories.
❌ And then the forecast turned ominous. Rain. Lots of it. Across France
Me & The Girls Outside Of Chateau De Chenonceau
Simon & The Girls at one of the many, many Farmers Markets we visited
Simon & The Girls at our first restaurant on French soil
Terrible storms hit France and there was widespread flooding. We looked at the weather map and headed for the one area that seemed to be avoiding the worst of it which is in a region called Avignon. We didn't know quite where we were going. As long as it wasn't raining, we were going!
Two hard days of driving later, we found ourselves in Provence. Who knew Provence was in Avinon? Lavender fields, beautiful hilltop villages, Mediterranean living and — not to be overlooked — very good wine.
✅ We found a fabulous municipal campsite at L'Isle-sur-la-Sorgue. The loo and shower blocks were spotless. More showers could be had! 🤩
✅ There was the greenest, clearest river we'd ever seen, fed by water from nearby Fontaine-de-Vaucluse. Bloody cold — about 14°C — but I managed a swim
✅ Star and Karma were in seventh heaven. They swam to their hearts' content. We stayed long enough for them to settle into campsite life, learning to stay near our pitch without wandering off to investigate everyone else.
✅ The hilltop villages and countryside were breathtaking.
✅ The local wine was delicious, and we even discovered lavender liqueur. 🍷🍹 Well, when in Provence...
✅ More wonderful farmers' markets, with plenty of cheese. 🧀
✅ A nearby pet shop stocked the girls' food. Hallelujah.
✅ There was a large supermarket, where I was able to rectify the scandalous lack of a tablecloth and pot plant. You can't have a pretty dining table without a flower arrangement.
✅ We stayed nine nights, our first proper stretch in one place. At last we could set up camp fully — awning, outdoor kitchen, huge new dog beds and, eventually, another gazebo because apparently the enormous awning wasn't quite big enough for Simon's expanding kitchen empire.
✅ Simon was blissfully happy: he'd found a hardware store. He gets terribly emotional if he hasn't been to Travis Perkins or a builders' merchant for a while. We also bought fairy lights for the awning. Can you imagine? We'd left home without fairy lights!
❌ Provence was busy with tourists - particularly very loud Americans. We occasionally struggled to soak up the views while listening to their complaints about the lack of Costa Coffee chains. We were in Provence, for heaven's sake!
❌ The rain had gone, but the wind was picking up. At the bottom of a deep valley, it really howled through.
❌ I lost two days to sheer exhaustion. We'd been driving huge distances — huge for me, anyway, when my normal outing is five miles to Williton — arranging campsites, sightseeing, packing up at dawn, looking after the girls and keeping in touch with home. Eventually I went splat.
❌ We'd also forgotten to allow for the extraordinary number of French bank holidays in May and June. Campsites filled up fast. The lovely managers took pity on us when we arrived exhausted, and I was in tears (yes, wetty princess again), and found us a pitch they didn't normally rent out. Phew. But then the wind brought another change in temperature. Time to move again
Karma & Green River
Me & The Girls having a walk through the pine forest in Provence
Chapter 4
The Promise Kept But Nearly Thwarted
Finally The Mediterranean 🌊❤
With temperatures heading beyond 30°C, we left Provence and headed for the coast.
BUT. We encountered a few problems.
❌ We'd expected France to be wonderfully dog-friendly. In restaurants, even some very smart ones, it often was. But finding a beach where the girls could actually swim was another matter.
❌ We fancied a touch of St Tropez glamour — slightly difficult to achieve in a caravan, I grant you — but the tourist office told us dogs weren't welcome on the beaches we wanted to visit. The alternatives came with such restrictive rules that a proper swim looked impossible
We had promised Karma a swim in a warm sea. We were NOT breaking that promise. 😨
After a frantic night of research and emails to tourist offices, we found somewhere with a supposedly dog-friendly beach, a beautiful blue lagoon and a campsite next door. Another lightning pack-up and a three-and-a-half-hour drive took us south of Montpellier.
Naturally, it was another bank holiday and the campsite was full. More tears. Somehow, we got the last pitch.
We could hardly contain ourselves. All the planning, the driving and doing something so far outside our comfort zone were about to pay off.
❌ Except the 'beach' wasn't a beach. It was a filthy, smelly bed of seaweed. The 'lagoon' was about two inches deep, beside mussel and oyster beds. It smelled exactly as you'd imagine.
❌ We followed the path towards the real sea and found a huge NO DOGS sign. The tourist office confirmed it. The girls could visit the smelly lagoon, but not the actual beach. We were furious and desperately upset.
❌ Even the supposedly four-star campsite was filthy. The facilities were so bad that even Simon baulked at using them. And that's saying something.
NUDIST BEACH ALERT! 🙈
Back to Mr Google, aided by our trusty portable Starlink. We found one possible dog-friendly Mediterranean beach — only it appeared to be a nudist beach.
Fine. If that was what it took for our girls to swim, we'd manage. Off we set on a three-hour expedition across a marshy nature reserve, hunting for this elusive beach.
We never found it. Just swamp, clouds of mosquitoes and some flamingos. (Must be terribly uncomfortable being bitten by mosquitoes when you're in the buff.)
✅ Mr Google then suggested La Grande-Motte near Montpellier.
❌ Another long drive. The beach stretched for kilometres, but the dog-friendly section seemed to be about 100 yards long. Finding it in blazing heat, with our limited French, was quite an undertaking.
😀 At last, we found it. White sand. Blue sea. Warm water.
And there was our darling Karma, swimming in the warm Mediterranean we'd promised her, with Star beside her. ❤️🐾 Every ridiculous mile had been worth it.
❌ Unfortunately, it seemed every dog owner in France had discovered those same 100 yards. Add two bank holidays and it was absolute chaos: dogs squabbling, stealing picnics, peeing on belongings and generally behaving as if they'd booked an all-inclusive resort. Bless our Star and Karma — they were amazing.
With temperatures approaching 35°C, the sea was a godsend. We swam and swam, grateful for the slightest breeze.
❌ Back at our cramped campsite, just a few kilometres away, pitches were packed together and the air didn't move. I'm fairly certain hell would have been cooler.
💩 And then the tummies started. Both girls had swallowed too much seawater. The remedies we'd brought weren't enough, and after veterinary visits we embarked on the great chicken-and-rice operation. Never cook ordinary rice in a caravan if you can avoid it. Weeks later, I was still finding grains in the most extraordinary places.
Eventually their tummies settled. Or so we thought...
Yeah we made it to the Med!
Karma having her "promised" swim in a warm sea
Simon & Karma Keeping Cool
Simon & The Girls checking out the boats in the Marina
Chapter 5
Escaping The Heat ♨ &
Homeward Bound
Holy smokes. We thought we'd acclimatised to the heat, but France was heading into a monster heatwave. Nearly 40°C in a caravan with two double-coated German Shepherds, surrounded by crowded pitches, was genuinely alarming.
We'd planned to meander home through central France, mainly because of its excellent wine regions. 🍷 But that simply wasn't going to be fair on the girls.
Yet again, Provence came to the rescue. It was still hot, but the forecast looked kinder and, crucially, we knew where there was a wonderful cold river.
By sheer luck, we found a lovely campsite beside the river, with excellent facilities and even a swimming pool for me. Most importantly, there was a little wood beside the water
.Each day, Simon, the girls and I took a picnic and hid in the shade of ancient trees by the river. Utter heaven. 😍
This was the first time we truly relaxed. We knew the area; we didn't need to chase tourist attractions; and we had become seasoned campers. The girls were happy. We made early-morning dashes to the market for fresh food and wine. Quite how the wine kept disappearing so quickly remains a mystery!
Then it started again. 💩
Karma was first. Not ordinary diarrhoea. Explosive diarrhoea. In a caravan. On a hot night. Our poor little girl was really unwell.
Back to the vet. Again. He spoke almost no English; we spoke almost no French. You haven't lived until you've tried to mime explosive dog poo to a French vet. 🤢
We did manage to understand that several other dogs had been seen that morning with the same nasty bug. And, right on cue, Star became ill that night. Back we went for her injections and medication.
Because the girls were already taking fairly serious medication for their aches and pains, and we couldn't confidently understand every French label, we rang our wonderful vet back in Britain.
It was a Saturday evening, but she answered, checked the medications and confirmed that they could be given safely, although they were strong. Who knew dogs could be prescribed the equivalent of Imodium? Not that it seemed remotely instant. It took four days for their tummies to come right.
After the first day, both girls were actually in pretty good spirits & carried on as if nothing was wrong. The caravan, however, was not. Carpets out. Industrial disinfectant everywhere. How on earth can diarrhoea get onto a ceiling? Don't answer that.
Thank goodness I'd packed puppy training pads. TOP TIP: Always carry puppy pads, easy-cook rice and the means to get hold of chicken. Preferably the rice that doesn't end up decorating the entire caravan.
🥲 Eventually, time caught up with us. And the heatwave was closing in. Even our little riverside paradise was becoming too hot for the girls.
Another pack-up and three hard days on the road took us north to Calais, where it was cooler. We had five days before our return Le Shuttle booking and wondered what we'd do with ourselves.
We visited the beach, but after the Mediterranean, the cold Channel water persuaded the girls and me to go no further than dipping our toes. And then local beach restrictions changed and dogs were no longer welcome at the places we'd found. Grrrr.
We visited Dunkirk, which Simon, with his military background, particularly wanted to see. Standing on the beaches and visiting the museum brought home the extraordinary scale of the evacuation, the horror of what happened and the courage involved.
We also visited a German gun emplacement and found a fabulous fish restaurant in Calais. So fabulous, in fact, that we went twice.
Then it was time for the vet. Again. Fortunately, this visit was planned: the dogs needed their tapeworm treatment recorded by a vet within the required window before returning to Britain.
We became mildly obsessed with the timing. Too early and you couldn't travel. Too late and you couldn't travel. The vet had to witness and record it properly, too.
😱 At the Le Shuttle pet reception, three parties ahead of us were having problems. One was just outside the allowed time window; another had arrived too early; another hadn't had the treatment correctly certified.
Luckily Simon, who is brilliant at this sort of thing, had calculated ours perfectly. Phew! Although, thinking about it, not phew. Because now we had no excuse. We really were going home, and our Mad Grand Adventure was almost over
The "seasoned" travellers.
Waiting at Le Shuttle
Epilouge
Emma & Simon's Top Tips
As Virgin caravaners travelling with 2 large dogs
Nearly seven weeks. More than 5,000 miles. Fourteen campsites. Two enormous German Shepherds. And we came home without a divorce — or even a single argument. Here, for what they're worth, are our top tips:
1 🍷 Wine. Lots of it. To be consumed whenever the opportunity presented itself.
2. 🧭 One of you needed to be very good at navigating. Simon.
3. 🚗 One of you needed to be reasonably good at driving. Me.
4. 🧺 One of you needed to be very, very tidy and organised. Me again.
5. 🔧 One of you needed to be brilliant at sorting and fixing things. 6. Simon. Definitely not me.
6. 🧀 Fantastic food needed to be consumed at least three times a day. Preferably more.
7. A wonderfully comfortable, large caravan with fixed beds, proper mattresses and deep toppers. No faffing about turning the dining table into a bed every night.
🍾 A full-sized fridge. Obviously essential for the wine.
❤️🐾 THE WORLD'S MOST ADAPTABLE, ACCOMMODATING, WONDERFUL DOGS. I will never be able to express how proud we were of Star and Karma.
These two girls had been whisked away from their quiet, secluded Somerset home and asked to cope with rather a lot:
✅ Hours and hours of driving;
✅ Visiting countless châteaux, gardens, museums and even cathedrals; busy towns and cities; and more time on the lead than they'd ever been used to at home.
✅ Sitting quietly at our feet in cafés, bars and restaurants, and walking beautifully through packed farmers' markets.
✅ Acclimatising from cool Normandy in early May to the blazing Mediterranean sunshine in June.
✅ Learning campsite manners: staying on our pitch, without leads when safe and appropriate, instead of wandering over to introduce themselves to the neighbours.
✅ Coping with strange dogs, including some unpleasant encounters and the absolute carnage of that tiny dog beach.
✅ Being examined, poked and prodded by many different vets.
✅ Behaving impeccably at Le Shuttle's pet reception, even when other dogs were barking and lunging. They really were paw perfect. And they loved their holiday because they had something they rarely got quite so completely at home: our undivided attention. This was all abut them.
When we came back, we'd often find them sitting on the caravan steps. If the door was open, they were inside faster than greased lightning. They clearly thought it was time to go again.
What that trip brought home to us was how fast the sands of time run. Our precious dogs are with us for such a short time compared with the years we humans hope to have. If we keep putting off the holidays, the adventures and the simple days of being together, those memories never get made.
We'd spent years creating somewhere at Quantock Cottages where other people could enjoy just that kind of precious time with their dogs. Yet, being so busy running the business, we hadn't always done the same for ourselves and our own girls — or for the wonderful dogs who came before them
Star and Karma taught us to change that.
We didn't know then that the following year we'd lose both our beautiful girls. We certainly didn't know how precious those weeks — the chaotic ones, the funny ones and the blissfully peaceful ones — would become.
But we did keep our promise to Karma. She swam in the warm Mediterranean, with Star beside her. We had nearly seven extraordinary weeks together, and memories we will treasure for the rest of our lives. And the thing our dogs wanted most from us wasn't a fancy holiday, a particular destination or a perfect plan. It was simply our time. ❤️
❤️ And One Last Little Adventure…
We had so much fun that we actually took the girls back to France that September, supposedly to celebrate our 30th wedding anniversary.
There was just one teeny-weeny problem. We'd got our sums wrong. Our 30th anniversary wasn't until the following year! 😂
And unlike our glorious summer adventure, France decided to treat us to rather more rain, cold winds and grey skies than we'd bargained for. It certainly wasn't quite the same magical trip.
But do you know what? We didn't really mind.
Because once again, it was just the four of us. No work, no rushing around, no endless lists of things that needed doing. Just Simon, me, Star and Karma, all together.
And looking back now, those are some of the most precious memories we have. ❤️🐾
