s e v e n i s a j o u r n e y

It seems the last few weeks (months?) everything alpaca-related I have done has involved trauma, sadness, and death. I really needed some fun. Today seemed like a good day. The builders were not here, and the constant grey weather was finally breaking out into brilliant sunshine. So I walked out into the paddock, stuck a halter on Nazani, and loaded her on the ute.

Two and a half hours later, we were done. We walked up and down main street in Tawa. People stopped their cars to look and chat. People came out of shops to pet her. The garbage truck stopped so the madly-grinning driver could get a better look. Everywhere we went, Nazani brought people unexpected happiness. It was nice to see so many people walking away with giant s**t-eating grins on their faces! We even got roped into a little kindergarden visit by a teacher, as the parents were taking away their kids about 15 came up and looked/patted her.

And Nazani was brilliant. Occasionally spooked by big noisy trucks, and a bit wary when the little children got too fast or too loud, but otherwise calm and collected. I think she was getting more confident as we went.

At one point, while walking down the street, a man with a giant cardboard box full of fruit just walked up and shoved it all under her nose while asking “is she hungry?” Nazani has only once ever had some apple, and that was just 3 days ago. But she clearly must have liked it, as she chomped down on one of the apples in the box. Yum! I didn ‘t know alpaca could so efficiently demolish an intact apple, as we have only ever given cores before.

We also popped into the community center so she could have her photo taken for the next town newletter.

Everyone, including Nazani, had a grand time.  This sort of experience and training is great, I really hope we can train her into becoming a top-notch PR animal, capable of rest home and school visits. That would be fun.