When we got out of our car to walk a trail to Rooster Rock, I would have given anything to know those would be the last few minutes I'd be having with my dog. The next 6 pictures are the last we will have ever taken of her.
I love this one of her hiding in the background. A very good description of how all of our trail hikes went. Her up ahead, and coming back to check on us every few minutes...
Luna was a very charismatic dog. Loved by anyone she encountered. Only 18 months old, she still had a lot of puppy qualities. I was so excited to be watching her turn into an 'adult' dog. Saylor called her her 'Little Sister'.
We started walking up the trail after these pictures were taken. It was a very steep hike up. We reached the first switch back which had an incredible view. We took a few moments there, and then moved on. Shortly after Luna started barking, and we realized some people were coming down. When she realized we were safe, she assumed her normal position and began wagging her tail. The hikers told us it was a good 2 hours to the rock, and considering we were only wanting a leisurely walk- and still had to get to a campsite over an hour away, we decided to head back down. At that first switchback, we took another look from it's great view. We could see the road below us, and the river on the other side of the road, but it was so steep, we could not see the grade of the mountain we were one. It was too steep. Luna started walking down the mountain, where it was safe, but quickly realized it was too steep, but she fell. We didn't really know how bad of a drop it was, and we all honestly assumed that she was fine, but we had been separated. So we hiked back down to the car. Joe told us to stay in the parking lot and keep calling for her, and he would drive to where she had fallen. He said he would be 25 minutes, and if he couldn't find her, he would come back. To my excitement, he came back within 10 minutes. My excited soon turned to panic when I saw the look on his face. Still at this moment, I couldn't comprehend what had happened. I thought a car must have hit her, but Joe explained that when he saw what she had fallen from, he knew the fall had taken her life. We took her body deeper into the woods. We had a little ceremony- told her what we loved most about her, and would miss the most. We then collected sticks and began to stack them over her body. We finalized it with ferns, moss, and flowers. It was a beautiful grave.
Our family loved Luna so much. I am going to miss having someone to greet me every time I come in the door. Just yesterday I was walking outside to leave and I began to say 'Bye, Luna!' but quickly had to swallow my words, and it hurt. But she knew she was loved, and we gave her a very happy life. I hate to see it be taken from a sweet dog so young, though. After we had gathered ourselves together, Joe made the wonderful decision to keep going on our camping trip. We couldn't bear turning around to go sit in an empty house and fill it with our grief. So we went on, and had a wonderful time. It was all dedicated to Luna Loo.
We slept in our tent in the high desert near Sister's Oregon at a place called the Sister's boulders. It rained on us all night, but thankfully we had the tent fly to keep us dry (mostly).
We played on the rocks a bit, but didn't play hard enough to even get our climbing shoes on. The rocks have an intense texture that our smooth baby hands can't quite handle yet.
Here is an example of the texture. The white are chalk marks from other climbers.
We spent a lot of time sitting on warm rocks talking about Luna, going over the accident in our heads, and trying to find some peace and acceptance.
Saylor using water as 'sunscreen'.
Then we took a little mid day nap before we headed out to Bend.
We finally got to another set of boulders at Meadow Picnic Area in Bend, OR. It was beautifully placed along the Deschutes River.
Saylor had a lot of fun finding rocks to throw into the water.
After we left there, we went to get some Chinese food. We had planned on staying another night, but with getting all of our stuff wet the night before- and our mourning hearts, we decided to pack it in a day early and got home around 10:30 PM.
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