A short "tail" about taking walks!
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St Louis Trip- The Dogs
Our St. Louis getaway was great! Did you see the post about the FREE Zoo Trip? We did lots of walking around with Tyler and Emily, and one of the places we frequented most was Lafayette Park (the same park where we worked out at on Saturday!) Lafayette Park was beautiful indeed, and it had the most perfect space for the doggies to run around! We loved the “dog community” that Ty and Emily have in St. Louis!
Isn’t Apollo a handsome dog? He’s almost 9 months old, purebred German German Shepard. He kept Silas busy all weekend!
Traveling with Dogs is Fun!
Red River Gorge
This is a post to recap our weekend trip to Red River Gorge in Slade, KY.
We decided to travel to RRG for a group camping trip. We decided to stay at Koomer Ridge Campgrounds, located off of highway 15 in Campton, KY
Koomer Ridge is a great campground featuring multiple single and double sites. There aren’t electricity hookups, but there is a shower-house which has showers (duh), toilets and sinks. Here’s a great link to all of the Koomer Ridge Campground information! And yes, they are dog friendly!
When you get to your campsite, start a fire. It’s really helpful to have a husband who knows how to start a fire.
It’s especially helpful if your husband has a Bear Grylls knife which contains a flint. After a few good strikes, Daniel got the fire roaring!
We had a gourmet campfire dinner (thank you Harrison’s for bringing a can opener!) We had delicious black beans, Fire Roasted “Salsa Style” Tomatoes, cheese and yummy cabbage slaw.
It was THE PERFECT TEMPERATURE to camp outside. In our rush to get ready to get to the Gorge, we forgot several important things, feel free to use this 2-item list as a MUST PACK list for any camping trip:
- Bring a sleeping bag. Or use your husbands and hope that your friends brought extra blankets (Thank you Penningtons!)
- Bring a thick blanket or thin inflatable camping pad- otherwise, you WILL have gravel imprints in your hip.
We had a rather restless night of sleep, but we had a great time hanging out around the campfire making s’mores! We woke up in the morning, had some delicious coffee and oatmeal around another roaring fire, and got ready to hike.
It’s also a great idea for your friends to bring their dogs. It’s always more fun with the pup around! Daniel and I have a two person tent. It works perfectly for us because we’re a little on the “small” side. However, a two person tent with two “smallish” people and one 50lb dog isn’t very comfortable. Especially when the dog wants to sleep alongside you, taking up any excess width of the tent. Silas didn’t understand that there was PLENTY of room at our feet to sleep.Anyways, after our bellies were filled with breakfast, we met up with our friends Kristen and Michael who live in Louisville. You might remember Kristen, my best friend who got married just a couple of months ago! Kristen and Michael also brought their dog, Scuba, and the pups had a GREAT time riding in the back of Michael’s truck!
We hiked to Gray’s Arch, this is a brief excerpt about Gray’s Arch:Gray’s Arch Trail #204
Distance 1-1/4 mi (one way)
Rating: Easy in…Strenuous out
Gray’s Arch is a must see. It is a huge buttress arch. The hike in is mostly ridgetop walking on a well worn path. The descent to the arch includes several wooden steps (hence the difficulty coming out). Once you reach the last step instead of taking Rough Trail # 221 to the left, follow the path that goes straight. It will lead you to the arch. Read the note at the bottom of the arch about the poor fellow who fell to his death there.
(Didn’t know about that death part). Humans and dogs alike had a wonderful time hiking along the trail. After a few flights of stairs leading us down into the gorge, we looked up and BAM, there was the beautiful arch.
The whole group!
After we had a snack, we snapped some couple’s photos:
Head on over to the Harrison’s blog for a special post!
Pups on the hike
Anyways, after a long hike, we downed our lunch (and multiple bottles of water), and headed out to the Sheltowee Trace trailhead for some swimming! If you haven’t ever been swimming at the Gorge, you should absolutely go. I found this article which gives great descriptions and directions to two of the Gorges’ hottest swimming holes.
I didn’t take any photos of the swimming, we were hot, tired, and the dogs were COVERED in sand. It was awesome. We drove home later that day and absolutely passed out. We had a wonderful time spending the weekend with friends, and we WILL be trekking out to the Gorge again soon! We plan on climbing soon too! And of course, a few more photos from the weekend adventures!
Happy Camping!