For the first time in a while, St David’s Day fell on a Sunday which fitted in perfectly with our planned Springtime walk at Barry Island – or BarryBados – as us locals like to call it. We thought we’d make a special day of it and we prepared some fancy rosettes to present to everyone who turned up.

When we set out from home the weather wasn’t looking very promising – but by the time we arrived at Barry Island the skies had cleared and it looked like we were set for a lovely day. As we waited outside Marco’s cafe there were only a couple of us there – but on the stroke of 11 o’clock everyone seemed to arrive at once and in no time at all there were 25-30 Welshies all lined up to have their pictures taken outside the promenade funfair.

Before we set out, competitors in a fun run started to pass by – further investigation revealed that a local radio station, Bro Radio, was also having a St David’s celebration at the far end of the promenade – so Sue and Jan thought we ought to go and gatecrash their festivities.

So en-masse we descended upon their gazebos and announced ourselves to the interviewer and they were only too happy to give us some air time – and they did an interview with Sue alongside the Mayor of Barry. Sue told them all about our club and a brief history of the breed – of course, they all agreed what a beautiful gathering of dogs we had there and we left them all better educated about the Welsh Springer Spaniel and how they should be celebrated as a rare breed and one of only 5 breeds native to our countrty

Although it was radio, one of their team also did a video of the interview which was later posted on their Facebook page and when we shared it to our thread it quite quickly got hundreds of hits. Here’s a link to the video https://www.facebook.com/reel/1463948448850481

We then descended to the beach – probably our last opportunity before it is closed to dogs at Easter – the dogs were straining to be let loose and again it was the usual frantic meeting up of old friends with chaotic racing around and diving in and out of the waves – boy, it’s fabulous to see all these dogs enjoying themselves so much.

It was then back to Marco’s (made famous by Gavin and Stacey for those who don’t know) for a well deserved cuppa and snack before the rain set in again – and a trip home with some exhausted but very happy Welshies.

Many thanks to everyone who turned up and we hope you all enjoyed the day out – we were very pleased to see a few new faces there and hope you enjoyed the day enough to come and join us again next time and  – which will probably be our summer gathering at Craig-y-Nos Country Park (date yet to be announced) – watch this space and Facebook for more info

Please check out the gallery of photos below – and if you have any photos you’d like to add to the gallery please send them on to me at – welshspringerspaniel.csw@gmail.com

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PLEASE NOTE: The photographs on this site are all copyrighted to the photographer, they should not be downloaded, printed, used on social media or in any other form without the photographer’s permission. If you would like to use a photograph please contact me, I would rarely refuse – and anyway, it’s very rude not to.

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