Maggy and Max on the go

Hello everyone,

First of all, let me introduce ourselves:

My name is Heike, I am 46 years old. I am married and have a daughter with my husband Dirk. We live near Cologne with our three children. Our shared daughter is 24 and I have a 16-year-old daughter from my first marriage and my husband has an 8-year-old son from a previous relationship. In addition, we have our two dogs Max and Maggy. Max is a Hovawart-Bernese Mountain Dog-Collie mix that I adopted from the shelter 11.5 years ago. At that time, our Jack Russell dog Lina was still alive. Unfortunately, we had to euthanize her in October last year after 18 beautiful years together. It was a devastating loss, especially for Max. He stopped eating and couldn't be comforted in his grief. Since we were all working and even had two cats living with us before, the sudden adjustment to being alone was not bearable for our sensitive giant. No amount of steak or dog friends helped... so there was only one solution, which was not easy in our grief for Lina. He needed a new partner. Since we are 100% convinced of animal welfare, it should be a dog that is difficult to place. Due to our family situation, it should be a young dog. Our youngest child only learned to deal with dogs reasonably well here, and the risk of an adult traumatized dog was too great.

After looking at many websites with beautiful dogs, all of which had their own stories, my husband saw 'Fionka'. Emaciated from Sarajevo, just escaped from a dog clean-up operation for a music festival. She arrived at a foster family in Aschaffenburg on Saturday after a long journey, and we went there on Sunday. What can I say, my husband and Max fell in love at first sight, and 'Fionka' did everything to underline that she wanted to be with us. I was skeptical... my heart still carried too much grief. But when the men agree... we took her home.

'Fionka' became Maggy, and it quickly became clear why she was an emergency case. The intraocular pressure in her left eye is no longer stable due to a fight, causing the eyelid to cave in slightly. When we had this examined and listed her strange behavior (she walked into us and against Max, she was very unsure while running), it was confirmed after the examination. She has advanced cataracts on both eyes since birth. Her already limited vision is better in the affected eye... which doesn't help much.

Well, I am a trained veterinary assistant and now I know why we got her. It is a very limited, difficult, but very beautiful life with Maggy. And Max started eating again and has an interesting new partner.

We have already been on several trips with the motorhome with Lina and Max, but only in the vicinity, as Lina was already severely limited. With Maggy and Max, we have already done many tours. Including trips to Spain, France, the Netherlands, and all over Germany. We are not campers. That means camping sites are not our favorites, but parking spaces, as we want to see a lot and stay at one place for a maximum of three days. We always have the navigation system with parking space suggestions, the internet, the phone with parking space apps, and the motorhome parking space guide Europe. We have found great parking spaces... but also parking spaces whose description was a joke. I want to report on that to make it easier for others. There is a difference whether you travel without dogs, with a small dog, or like us with two big dogs. In that case, you want a little space and an environment that is not directly on tracks or a main road. Let's see where I will start.