Give me a clue!

After my unfortunate case of mistaken identity involving Rabbie the Scottish sheep, I realised that I needed to do some more research. I mean, I knew that haggises are round and furry, but so are lot of creatures. So how do you distinguish a haggis from all the other highland creatures? I asked James for some advice and he said that they have a very distinctive squeak, made when alarmed, angry, sleepy, relaxed or alert.

Armed with this useful information, I set off for an extended Haggis hunt. I couldn't believe my luck when after only a few minutes I gained my first contact! I rushed around the corner, eager to meet my first ever haggis in person - and who should I meet but a very small hamster, taking some exercise in his wheel.

I have to admit to being a bit disappointed at first, but once I got chatting to young Hamish (that was the hamster's name) I realised that making a new friend is just as exciting as discovering a new species. And anyway, Hamish says that he's going to help me and Jack on our search!

Oops - my mistake!

Well, it might have big, round, white and furry, but it definitely wasn't a haggis! As soon as I tugged on a handful of fur, I realised my mistake. There was a very loud, cross sounding baaing noise, and I came face to face with the largest sheep I've ever seen. For a moment I thought James and I were in real trouble, as the ram glowered down at us with his fearsome horns and wild eyes. But then Jack, thinking quickly, said "Good morning to ye, good sir, will ye no take a wee drop of tea with us?". The ram was taken aback by the politeness of the young pig, and, although I didn't realise this, Scottish sheep are apparently very fond of tea - special sheep tea if possible. Anyway, he came back to Jack's house with us, and on the way, we became quite friendly. He explained that is his name is Rabbie, of the clan MacBleat, and he is a highland ram by birth. We told Rabbie all about our quest to find the legendary haggis, and he agreed to be our guide. So everything turned out really well in the end.

In Search of the Wild Haggis!

The most exciting adventure of my Scottish holiday started on the day that I met James. James the Hog, comes from Southern Uplands of Scotland where he helps his daddy on their sheep farm. I became firm friends with James, who was very good a telling tales about Scotland and the legends of the Scottish folk. The story that really interested me was about the wild haggis. This is a creature who lives in the high glens and, though very shy, can be lured out, if you know how. James told me that, if we were to see a haggis in his natural environment, then it was very important that I should blend in with the scenery. The best way to do this, he told me, was to wear traditional Scottish clothing. We arranged to meet the following day at James's father's farm, and I took myself straight off to a Kiltmaker's shop. The next morning, feeling very proud of finery, I met up with James, only to be told that what he had meant was a nice tweed jacket or something, and some stout shoes. I felt a bit silly, but James said that he was sure it would be fine, and so we started our search immediately.

The first thing I had to do was find out what a haggis actually looks like. James said they are thought to be round and covered in white fur, so when I saw a what looked like a big shaggy rug on legs I leaped for it and grabbed hold of it.

Do you think I had captured the legendary haggis? You'll have to wait until next time to find out!

Yes, I'm Back!

Hello again everybody! I'm sorry I haven't written anything for such a long time. I have been away on holiday in Scotland with some of my friends. We had a lovely time exploring old castles, walking in the highlands and making lots of new friends. I'll tell you about some of my adventures in the next couple of weeks - you wouldn't believe what strange animals we met. There was one who didn't seem to have any paws at all, but was very furry and had a loud squeak. Apparently he's a sort of animal you don't meet anywhere else in the world, and, to be honest I'm not surprised.

Anyway, here's a nice picture of Rebecca, Mole and I having a little rest after looking around a lovely castle. Doesn't it look peaceful and tranquil? Well, it was, for about 90 seconds after this picture was taken. That was when Mole spotted a nearby bowling green and decided to have a burrow. He thought he had made an attractive pattern of molehills to add to the challenge of the game of bowls - a bit like a crazy golf course, but no windmill. Unfortunately, the bowling club didn't agree, and we all had to leave quite rapidly!

Smugglers Ahoy!

We had our brainwave just at the crucial moment. The net was closing in on our little friend when Rebecca spotted a friend's mummy, Mrs Panda, who was having trouble her baby. The baby didn't want to be in its pram, and carrying the baby and pushing her pram at the same time was a real trial for the mummy. So Rebecca generously offered to push around the empty pram. "We'll meet you outside the museum" said Rebecca, and Mrs Panda gratefully agreed, little suspecting that we had an ulterior motive!
We tucked our new chum in the pram and pulled the frilly canopy up around to hide him as much as possible. Well, we had a few close shaves, as it turns out that dinosaurs are not over blessed with common sense, but they do have a lot of curiosity. He would keep sitting up to have a look around at all the wrong moments. But finally we managed to smuggle him out of the museum to freedom!

Now all we have to do is find somewhere for him to live. I hope he's not a meat-eating dinosaur!

Look out behind you!!

After the excitement of the volcano exhibition, and all the Museum staff running around looking for a missing dinosaur, we decided to go somewhere for a little bit of peace. We went into the Earth gallery, and I was showing Mole where Labrador is on a giant globe, when suddenly, Rebecca Rabbit tapped me on the shoulder. "Bobby!" she squeaked. "Not now, Rebecca, we can go to the shop in a minute", I replied. "BOBBY!!", she shouted in a very cross voice, "will you please look at this!"
I turned round to see a small, friendly looking stranger standing smiling up at Rebecca. We realised this must be the missing dinosaur and took him by the paw to fetch the Museum staff. But the little dino piped up,"Please can I come with you? I'm bored with sitting in that display case pretending to hatch out every 15 minutes. It's not what I call performance art". So we decided to take him home with us. But how were we to smuggle him out past the staff? We needed our thinking caps on for this one...

Learning about the power of our planet

Our next outing was to a Geological museum. At first, we weren't too sure about this, as it sounded like it might be a bit dull and "educational". After all, who wants to look at a load of old rocks, when it's sunny outside? But how wrong we were! It turns out that geology is full of exciting things like volcanoes and dinosaurs. One display combined the two things together - it was a demonstration of how volcanoes erupt and as the volcano threw out loads of smoke and stuff, the volcano itself gradually disappeared. When it had finally all gone, there was a small dinosaur. Mole said it was a parasaurolophus - but what do moles know?

Anyway, it didn't look like much else was going to happen, so we went off to look at some more exhibits. Mole saw a sign saying "plate tectonics", and he thought that sounded like food might be involved, so we headed in that direction. Actually it turned out that there was nothing edible at all, so after a while, we set off for the museum cafe, to see if we could meet up with Rebecca Rabbit. On the way, we had to pass the volcano display again, and to our amazement, the case was empty! The museum staff seemed quite bothered about this, so we offered to help find the model dinosaur for them. "Model?" they said, "It's not a model!". Ooer, I think we've got a problem on our paws again!