Red Pennant and My Dogs !
This story happened on: 12/11/2012
Lashings of praise for the Red Pennant team - they truly deserve it!! We broke down in our Land Rover Discovery in a small town near the French/Spanish border, there was my husband and I and our two large dogs in the back. We were parked in a narrow street outside a post office and (thank you God) there was a telephone kiosk just nearby. It only took phone cards but I was able to use the Red Pennant freephone number - Brilliant! It took about two hours for the breakdown recovery man to come but he was unable to start the car. I could have happily discussed food and the weather with him but faulty alternators and dud batteries certainly don't feature in my French vocabulary, so again I used the freephone number and the RP person was able to translate. We had to wait another hour for him to return with a low loader.
During this time Red Pennant must have phoned two - three times to check on our progress which was very reassuring.
Reluctantly we had to leave our two dogs in the boot of the car and my husband and I climbed into the cab of the truck. The car had to be taken 50 miles to a garage in Bayonne and we were then to return to the campsite by taxi. I was very doubtful that a taxi driver would allow two labrador size dogs in their car, so I asked the tow truck driver if he would drop me and the dogs off at the campsite which he was happy to do. I stupidly thought he would lower the low loader down to the ground so that I could get the dogs out easily but no. He climbed up on to the back, opened the rear door of the car, grabbed the older labrador, Harry and dropped him down into my husband's arms. With that my younger dog, Ozzie, panicked and jumped out of the car, a height of some 9 to 10 feet - he crashed to the ground landing on his head and flipping over. I felt sick to my stomach. The driver was keen to get on his way. With thoughts only for my poor dog I handed my wallet and phone to my husband and off they went to Bayonne.
Poor Ozzie got to his feet and was very shaky, he made it back to the caravan okay and I put him on his bed where he just lay there licking his lips and with a big gash in the top of his head. What to do? I had no money, no phone, the site office was closed and I had no car to get him to a vet. So, I skyped my vet in England and they said to check him over and keep him quiet and watch for any signs of change, which of course I did. He was licking his lips because he'd skinned his mouth (my poor boy!) and the gash on his head didn't look like it needed stitches. About an hour later it was the dogs' tea time so I hand fed him his food and he ate it all so I took that to be a good sign!! My husband arrived back a couple of hours later feeling drained!! We all went to bed at 10pm and didn't get up til 9 the following morning so we must have been tired!! Ozzie was up for going out so I took him on a short lead walk. After a couple of days he was back to his old self for which I am truly grateful!!
I am so pleased that we took out Red Pennant insurance, we so nearly didn't because we'd just paid a fortune to have the car fully serviced so it wasn't going to breakdown. Wrong!!
justinlew72