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A week in the life of a volunteer at Galgos del Sol.

I’ve been homing the GDS Galgos that come to GIN
for the last few years and one day last year it
occurred to me that I’d never actually visited Galgos
del Sol, the rescue in Spain where they come from.
So with that thought I promptly signed up for their
Volunteer Scheme. It’s popular, with many supporters
signing up from all parts of the world. They take 3
weekly volunteers at a time,
offer accommodation and provide lunch each day.

I duly got myself to Spain for my allotted week and
arrived at the centre on time on the Monday morning.
My fellow volunteers arrived and we met for the first
time, a lovely couple from the UK.
We spent the next couple of hours being shown around
the centre and learning about the routines that we’d
be following. I also got to meet the incredible Tina Solera whose drive and
passion for helping the Galgos has resulted in this amazing place. Despite having
seen photos and following GDS online I was taken aback at how big it actually is
and of course there were dogs everywhere.
A couple of hours in we were ready to finally get our
hands on some Galgos. On the central notice board
there’s a chart where each dog’s name is recorded
against which kennel or area it’s in. On this huge site
there is everything, reception, two main blocks of
kennels, the vet’s surgery, recovery kennels, puppy block,
quarantine, campo, education centre, agility paddock,
sensory walk, quiet garden, laundry house and kitchen
area.

So my first challenge, find my name on the board and
check the list then get my first dog, Canela and take her for a walk. It takes a
bit of getting used to and its a great way of getting your daily steps in while
you’re walking to the wrong kennel block! It turned out I averaged 24,000 a
day! Second challenge of the day is identify your one dog that you are walking
from kennel 7 which has 3 in residence then extract just that one you want
whilst not losing either of the other two lovelies that want to come too! What a
joy though to give these dogs that little bit of individual attention and take
them out of the kennel chaos for just a short while. Somehow despite being in a
rescue these dogs seem to feed off the positive atmosphere that the whole
place exudes and are generally a happy bunch.
Time for lunch then the third challenge of the day, spot cleaning a kennel block.
The kennels are cleaned thoroughly each morning and then volunteers do a
freshen up in the afternoon. Sounds simple, yes it is but you are responsible for
a 30 kennel block and as I’m sure you can imagine that does amount to cleaning
up lots of wee and poo! It’s a satisfying feeling to be doing something useful
and whilst I was ‘mucking out’ their kennels the dogs got playtime in the
adjoining run.

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