Last night, I gave Lily one of her lastest nicknames. For some reason, the name Obi Wan Kenobi seemed to fit her as Beagle Wan Kenobi. I think it sounds cool and so does she. Now, she has about a dozen nicknames including Lilypup, Water Lily, Tiger Lily, Miss Beagles, her beagleness, Franken-Beagle-Stein and a bunch of others that I can't think of at the moment. Oh ya, and Lily loves her Lily Pad.
Yesterday we went on a daytrip to Alexandria. Spent a good part of the day touring the Glacial Ridge area where the advancing gracier fromn N Dakota and Canada snowplowed rocks, dirt, sand southward tens of thousand of years age. When the gracier retreated it left behind mounds of earth, rocks, ice behind. When the ice melted the flowing water left valleys and crevices. Where heavy huge chunks of ice etc sank and left a depression there were "kettles" formed when the ice melted. Many of these depressions became our present day lakes and ponds. This area is called the "Alexandria Moraine" and is beautiful with rolling hills upon hills upon hills with lakes, ponds, and streams. Jim and Lily hiked up and down some of these hills which can be quite steep. Mostly you could just see the tip of Lily's white tail above the tall grasses. Lily had a ball. Jim said she climed the steep hills easily digging in her fron claws and usinf those fine, study beagle leg muscles. Part of this area also is proteced original prarie grass with Bluestem etc.
Today, Lily's weatherproof beagle coat is coming in handy because it's a cool rainy fall day in Minnesota. Luckily, Lily doesn't have to spend too much time in the rain because even with her added beagle hair she doesn't like getting wet. It has stopped raining now and it looks like the clouds are going away and blue skies are coming soon.
Lily had a good time on on annual North Shore trip. Our first stop was Lake Milac at the source of the Rum river. Lily had her nose to the ground and sniffing all the wonder nature smells I guess. She was busy taking it all in. Fine autumn weather and the warm colors of the foliage, grasses along with the blue of the lake and river with the colors reflected was quite beautiful The Rum river flows 145 mile zig zagging its way to Anoka where it joins the Mississippi just a few blocks from our house. Lily's next favorite spot usually on the trip in the lake walk in Duluth. But this year there were a loy of other dogs on a walk at the same time and she encounted a large German Shepard which gave her the evil eye and piddled in the trail and she got spooked and didn't want to gor on the wooden walkway anymore. She was somewhat satisfied with the paved road. But again when beginning the walk to the lighthouse she put her brakes on and wouln't proceed. Maybe she didn't like the enclosed feeling the high walls on both sides gave here along with the previous dog encounter. We turned back and cut the walk short. She never had a problem here before. But her most favorite spot is Gooseberry Falls and she was her old adventuresome self hiking up the trails, up and down the stairs, jumping over logs and climbing on rocks. She was really tukered out and took a long nap at days end.
Yesterday, Lily went for a walk along Duluth's Canal Park boardwalk. She had a lot of fun walking on the beach and amongst the large rocks but she didn't like walking on the boardwalk. Also, the fences and walls along part of the boardwalk and near the lighthouse gate made her feel very nervous and she put on her breaks. She didn't want to walk to a lot of the places she usually likes to investigate.
We're not really sure why she was so scared and hesitant but we believe it had something to do with all the other dogs out for walks in the same area. She probably felt trapped and threatened by bigger dogs. She'll never forget the "attack":http://www.terhurne.com/lilypup/news/archive/000441.html that just occurred five months ago.