We went hiking last week. We had a friend’s car for the weekend and after some relaxation out East (The Hamptons), We decided to go hiking up the Palisades.We are a family of hikers, we love to get out of the city and get our wilderness on… The Princess had just landed from Australia on Sunday early am. So Monday we swung by her place and picked her up, cruised up the Palisades, which is a risk in itself for us, to our favourite trail.
Things were going fine and we found our swings, which we often visit and then we decided to follow a new trail we hadn’t gone on before. We had Sir Lickalot with us, and he was loving the freedom!
But then it turned nasty, as we walked along the river front we began to come across rocks, rocks that had fallen from the cliff face beside us. Rocks that were huge, more like boulders. S0 we began and Sir Lickalot soon discovered the going too tough. I coaxed him and he followed, he trusts me and I can usually get him to do anything. Remember of course that the poor boy is blind in one eye and has brain damage causing motor skill issues.
So here we were clambering over rocks with great difficulty. The dog falling into gaps between the rocks at every step and we could see it was going to be a big problem. We were too far to turn back and so we had no choice but to continue on. As we passed hikers coming the other way, they told us it wasn’t far and we were nearly through it and this made us feel better but in truth they were full of shit because we continued on over 3 lots of these rocks and the dog was bleeding on all 4 legs, with scraped skin from falling down the rock holes and worn down nails and toes. Every step a possibility of a broken leg. At one point I thought he wasn’t going to make it out, that we would be leaving poor Sir Lickalot down by the river to cross the rainbow bridge.
So we trudged and trudged and coaxed and carried the wounded warrior for miles, over rocks and finally back to flat ground. He was relieved to be able to walk for himself and it’s amazing how animals will just keep going.
We found the trail back up to the top and slowly climbed about 1000 steps, stopping at each landing to rest. Total distance covered that day, 6 miles.
Comments 2
Aw, poor Sir Lickalot. Glad he made it okay. Yeah girl – over 2 thousand calories – booyah! The treacherous rocks notwithstanding, it sounds like a good day.
I am glad to read the story in all one place. Watching it moment by moment was painful. Poor Sir Lickalot. He’s a trouper with Superman arms.
The picture of him being carried will be my happy place for years to come.