Project Prep: Hiking In The Blue Hills
Sinister tree
Last Sunday, I had a problem. I’d spent a lot of time sitting around, and I needed to move my body. Zoodle wanted to work on our blog. I found a project we could work on together, a cute craft that required a lot of sticks. We probably could have found them in the yard, but I took us for a short hike in the Blue Hills instead.
The Blue Hills holds a ton of hiking trails, suitable for folks of all abilities. I used to take my dog, Yogi, there when he was a young pup. The section to which I brought Zoodle is smaller, and *almost* impossible to get lost in. It’s also not too steep or dangerous for little legs and feet.
Light on a trail
Zoodle isn’t the biggest fan of walking, so I figured she’d hate it. I was wrong. We didn’t get more than five minutes down the trail before the beauty of the park sucked her in.
Zoodle saw a ton of things she fell in love with. She demanded I take pictures of the way the light hit the trail, or of pretty rock formations. The proximity of the park to the city struck her with awe.
She did have a job to do. Zoodle found a ton of sticks to collect for
Collecting sticks
our project. I dropped the ball when it came to stick collection. All I gave her to carry them with was a plastic shopping bag, which ripped. She got frustrated as the sticks tore through the plastic, but she soon gave sticks to dogs we encountered on the trail.
When I was a little kid, I loved to go out hiking in the woods with my dad. It was special time, just for us, and it meant everything to me. I still remember some of those outings and the sense of wonder that came with it. Watching that same joy and thrill come over Zoodle’s face was the greatest joy imaginable.
We’ll do the project for which we needed the sticks sometime in the next couple of weeks. It might work out, and it might not. The memory of that hike will last forever, and that’s what’s important to us.
