Saturday, we stepped away from real life for just a bit to take our first hike of the season. Lilly isn’t quite as good as KB’s labs at posing for photos upon chosen peaks or rock outcroppings, but she tries.
My verbal cues and hand gestures didn’t help. I was going for regal girl atop mountain, but Lilly’s body language tells another story.
After hiking more than an hour to this summit, during which time we only saw one runner, we headed back the way we came.
Clearly, if we want to hike on weekends, we’ll need to get up earlier to avoid both the heat and other park visitors. It wasn’t terrible, though.
We saw the runner again. We saw one guy with two dogs. We saw one family strung out upon the trail, with several young, blonde girls poking along.
We managed to get a good 15-20 feet off the trail when Lilly spotted the two dogs pulling their dad up the trail. She sat. She ate. She didn’t give them a second thought.
The family turned out to be a bit harder since we came up on them around a bend and had less time to make our escape. The first spot I picked had too much cactus, so we ask for a couple seconds to cross back over and get up on a more meadow-like flat spot.
Trail-side conversations crack me up. After asking if they could pet Lilly, which I declined, one of the little girls asked, “What are you doing with her mouth?”
I guess it looked weird to her that I kept handing Lilly pieces of food as they passed. So, I explained.
Then, the last girl in the family chain, who toddled along with a pacifier in her mouth. Smiled, and smiled, and smiled at us as she poked along. Then, just as she passed us, she pointed a tiny pink finger at us and said (around the pacifer), “CUTE!”
It made me laugh.
Lilly’s terrific trail manners continued from last summer, despite the hiatus. She observed my OFF TRAIL cues, when we needed to yield the singletrack to others. She didn’t seem nervous, even when we saw the dogs. I suspect that the wide-open spaces at the beginning of this loop help a lot.
A single doe and a skittering chipmunk posed her only temptations, along the way, and each earned just one lunge and return. It’s sort of Lilly’s version of faking the chase … like, “HA! Made you flinch.”
She feigns predator, then returns to me smiling. A leash ensures everyone’s safety in such situations.
Thanks, DK … and, KB is WAY braver than I am when it comes to potentially scary wildlife. We have bears, mtn lions and bobcats around here, but we rarely see them. And, I DON’T go looking for them.
Yes, Maery. Nature helps some. A permanent break from all the drama would help more.
Puppy/dog? All the same to me, but kids are so picky about those things.
Sounds like we are both seeking nature escapes with our dogs. I have to get Java off the trail to try and keep her from jumping up to greet people. Although, after passing several and jumping she does get better and start to just pass. Our funniest comment? A mom says to her child, “Look at the puppy honey!” The child responds in disdain, “That’s not a puppy. That’s a dog.”
Poor Java, she’s lost her puppy charm already at two.
Hey – Lilly – we think you look totally majestic on that rock. Now tell your mom to get some video of bears and mountain lions just like KB. Grins.
AC, that’s funny. Having grown up here, I don’t know how different our skies are from other places, but we do get neat clouds in the summertime.
What fun! I’m so infatuated with Colorado’s sky! I’m glad you two where able to get out on relatively quiet trails. I love the story about the family and toddler.
Kona doesn’t stand still long enough to offer a mountain girl pose, but she can scare the heck out of me because she tries to jump on every boulder or ledge she finds, even when the other side offers nothing but a canyon drop-off.
Thanks for sharing your hike. Going back to check out your pictures again!
We are lucky to be so close to a somewhat remote open space park. Back before it was open to the public, when only people in our valley knew about it, we could hike back there 5-6 hours a day, with Ginko off-leash (when he was a baby, before his knees went kerplewy), and NEVER see another soul.
Tom mountain biked back there the day after our hike. They alternate use on weekends. One day is hike only. One day is bike only, and he ran into WAY more people than we did.
If we get up early enough, especially on week days, we often don’t see anyone, even if there are other cars in the lot.
If we go during the week, we do have to watch for mountain bikers or horses, but we’ve only had one near crash, when a dude wouldn’t slow down (even though we’d yielded like 90% of the trail to him), and he nearly ran over Ginko’s tail.
If you ever visit CO, KB and I can take you girls on some pretty remote adventures, where Marge can relax.
Yeah, Marge can get a little antsy when I pose her atop rocks and whatnot, too. What a gorgeous view though.
And I’m so jealous – you passed two groups, and that was it? How I long for that solitude..
I’m glad you had a bit of time out with your girl!
I love pictures like this. I don’t know about you, but hiking with our dogs doesn’t feel like exercise. It doesn’t feel like I “have” to get the dogs outside. It doesn’t feel like I “have” to go to the gym to get a work out. IT. JUST. FEELS.
Well, Rod, it is more interesting than our other regular walks, but we were sure huffing and puffing, tired and sore, toward the end. It did feel a bit like work for both of us, but we love the time together and the relative solitude.