Climbing to Total Exhaustion

Last weekend I went on what can hardly be described as a hike with my parents. I was home for the weekend, the weather was relatively nice (partly cloudy with sunbreaks...typical Seattle), so my dad & I decided it was perfect for a walk up in Lord's Hill Regional Park, situated just up the hill from my parent's property. We informed my mom & then headed out to round up the dogs. Or at least one of them. My parents have a golden retriever and a St. Bernard. Madison, the retriever, is a great walking dog. She could walk all day and night if you allowed her to. Shenzi on the other hand, is large. Very large. 120 lbs large. She may act like she's the size of a terrier, but she's not. She'll bowl you over in a heartbeat. But she also hates being left out of things. So when she saw us loading Madison into the back of the Subaru, she became slightly jealous. She eyed the car, then made a clumsy dash to the trunk and flung her girth into the trunk with Maddie. My dad and I looked at each other and attempted to pull Zee out...but she turned those glistening, sad eyes on us and we melted. Zee was coming on the walk. If we had known how things would turn out, she wouldn't have come. Unfortunately, God didn't give us the ability to see the future. :( So she came.

Lord's Hill Park is basically a trail system through the woods that accommodates walkers, runners, mountain bikers, and horseback riders. There are no grassy areas with picnic tables and barbeques. It's pretty natural as far as parks go. So, we entered into the trail system and decided to do the long loop down to the river and then back up and around Temple Pond and back onto the main pipeline trail. It was long, but not too arduous. However, there were a few steep climbs on our way up from the river and halfway through the walk, Zee began to pant. I take that back. Zee pants after taking about 10 steps. But there are several categories of panting when it comes to Zee, similar to a hurricane or tornado. Her panting was about a category 3. Not too bad, but definitely dangerous. We ignored her cries for water and forced her onward for another hour or more. None of us really took notice of her condition until we were about 15 minutes away from the entrance to the park. By this point, Shenzi's tongue had grown several inches longer, was dangling precariously out of her mouth - it looked like a roll of bubble tape had unrolled out of her - she was foaming uncontrallably, and her eyes were glazed over. We could tell she was in trouble. Somehow we made it up the final hill to the car. Shenzi collapsed to the ground and began breathing extremely fast. I was worried. I didn't want anything serious to happen to her, but I think we were already to that point. She had heat exhaustion. My dad found 2 bottles of water in the car and began pouring water into Zee's mouth. Not much made it down her throat though, as her tongue had swelled to match the size of her mouth. My dad and I had to lift Shenzi into the back of the car because she didn't even have strength left to stand up. We zoomed down the hill to home. The race to save her life was on! Zee wobbled out of the car on her own accord before crashing to the cement in the shade. My dad began spraying her down with the hose to cool her body temperature and eventually, after several hours, Shenzi began perking up.

I guarantee Zee won't be so eager to hop in the car next time.