Memorial: Memorable Moments

Well well well,

What have we here?

Unfortunately, I have no pictures to prove today’s escapade with The Adventures of Manly & Babe on the river, in a canoe, with two dogs, one of whom was nearly a drowned rat.

But you probably don’t want to hear about that adventure….

Actually, you probably do. Here are the highlights:

We set off around 3pm with a borrowed canoe from our good friends around the corner (thank you, Richards family!). With two flustered flighty labs hanging out the gate, we breezed to the outskirts of town to drop off one vehicle at a dock upstream and then took the Jeep to the dock downstream. Arriving back at the dock upstream, the dogs had become anxiously excited about our little trip to the river. Of course, a 5 month old puppy can hardly contain her excitement so she dashes out of the car, down into the river, up on the bank, out into the field, flirtatiously pouncing on any bystander, sprinting round us in circles; that does it for me, and I’m completely annoyed with her frantic playfulness. Somehow, we oriented ourselves due course, flopped wet dogs into the canoe, plastered ourselves in sunscreen, and giddily anticipated a lazy Sunday ride down the river.

HA!

For whatever reason, we did not anticipate Molle’s incessant need to jump in and out of the canoe every 10 seconds, her boundless energy that kept the canoe rocking to tipping, and her near death experience in small rapids. I about flipped the canoe myself when I jumped up screaming at Molle to swim out in the frothy rolling waters; some kayakers further behind fetched her in shallow water and brought her back safely to us. After that puppy-mommy scare, I was nearly in tears, trying to remember why we’d decided to spend the afternoon family-bonding on that Sunday lazy river getting a lobster burn and cramped legs from sitting too long.

To top off our adventure – after three hours of coasting the gentle current, crashing into numerous low hanging branches, and coaxing a hyper puppy to chill out – we finally docked where we’d parked our Jeep….. only to discover that I’d left the keys in my purse which was in the car at the dock upstream. Ian had no choice but to run all the way across town, up the big hill, unlock the house to grab the spare Jeep key, then run all the way back through town so that we could drop off the canoe, pick up the other car, and put those flippity labs into bed by 10pm.

What a lazy.sunday.ride.down.the.river.

We’ll just chalk it up to another day in The Adventures of Manly & Babe.

——

Though we do not have pictures to prove that escapade…..

We do have pictures that prove a different sort of escapade…..

Our future adventures are going to include another adventurer! And that is what this post is actually about, hahaha!