Hi fellow human owners! We're Gracie and Ficelle and we love our new life in France at La Belle Vilaine in south Brittany. We have trained our humans to a very high standard. If you have very well-behaved, sensible owners like us you are welcome to bring them along on your self-catering, gite holiday. We accept multiple dog-families - up to 3 dogs can stay FOC. Terms and conditions apply - contact us for a booking form for further information.

Here we are with some other doggies who came to stay. (We immediately became firm friends, we even took our owners swimming). Our training sessions became a source of delight for the children (and parents) who were staying in our other gite.





Latest news - June 2011 - Elaine became a qualified, registered Dog Trainer in France (see above). April 2011. Elaine is a member of the Pays de Loire Regional agility team and competes at national level. Haïyla, now 2 years old and entirely home-trained, has begun her agility career with very impressive results already - see our agility page. In 2010 Cheryl and Daisy passed their "CSAU" (Certificat de Sociabilité et d'Aptitude à l'Utilisation") under a judge at an obedience competition. At their first ever competition they won 1st place for one of the courses and since then have gone on to win 1st place another three times. In 2009 Elaine was awarded the qualification of "Moniteur en Education Canine Premier Degré" - her pass mark 113/120, enabling her to teach dog training classes voluntarily in local Dog Clubs. She is also qualified to be an examiner for the Certificat d'Aptitude à l'Education Sociale du Chien (at officially-organised events within the Dog Club structure) . Earlier that year Gracie and Elaine were successful in passing their Certificat d'Aptitude à l'Education Sociale du Chien. The test was similar to the Kennel Club Good Citizen Dog Scheme Gold level standard (a bit easier, in fact!). The test is designed to confirm that the owner is capable of training a dog to the necessary standard and only needs to be taken once and not with each new dog. It involved walking to heel on and off the lead at 3 different paces, sit and down, recall, out-of-sight down stay, meeting a stranger, walking between other dogs and their handlers, allowing a stranger to look at teeth, ears etc (the dog's!) and then a test on the requirements under French law specific to dog ownership. We did several demonstrations of obedience, agility and doggy dancing in the region during 2009. Strange as it may seem to British people, very few French people have ever heard of such sports - our neighbours enjoy watching the training sessions, but I think they think we are very eccentric!

Our house and holiday cottages (or gites) are set in one and a third acres of land in the heart of the picturesque Morbihan countryside. Each self catering cottage (or gite) has its own private garden. There is a large, fenced doggy-play area also, with a Flyball run and doggy paddling pool !!!!!!

Every day we walk along quiet lanes and through the woods to the banks of the river Vilaine. We have trained Paul and Elaine to collect fir cones along the way and throw them into the river for us to swim after (during warm weather) - by the time we have walked back home through the lanes (about 20 minutes) we are clean and dry and very happy.

Some days we jump in the car and head off to walk along the coastlines and play on the beaches (restrictions apply on some beaches). If we are pleased with our owners we take them into one of the many restaurants, crêperies or cafés around which allow well-behaved humans to go in with their dogs.

One of our favourite treats is to go for a row in a boat through the marshes at La Grande Brière - followed by a long walk following the way-marked routes. There are lots of way-marked walks around here - we will let you know where they are and will do our very best to test as many out as possible (life's tough you know!).

To see some of the animals and plants we find in the garden - Click here