It's Amazing What You Can Find At The Dump!!!

I have a few friends that I swear take more home with them from the dump then they drop off!! Our dump (or more correctly - the Waste Management Facility) at Perryvale actually has a 'Take it or Leave it' section which is like a giant free garage sale!

'Dump Days' here are Wednesday and Sunday. Today is Wednesday and this is what I picked up  -

I know, shocking that you can find a Group Placing, Champion, Iditarod Finishing, main 'gee/haw' leader Siberian Husky at the dump. But I did!!

Here's the story!

Simone and I were having a nice run with the team this morning. I had Bang and Beauty in lead and decided that rather then go looking for 'steak on the hoof' this morning, we'd head up the driveway and do a loop over to our neighbours road and back home.

We stopped for our water break..

See has her own technique for getting water!

..and then headed towards the driveway...

Now that we have neighbours down in the valley, I have to worry more about traffic coming over the hill then in the past, so halfway up the hill when I was having issue with Bang and Beauty 'Geeing over' (running on the right hand side of the road) I decided to put Dasher in lead. She has a rock solid 'Gee Over' - I'd work with the others at a better time (like when I could see what was coming down the road).

When we were switching dogs around, Dasher's tug line somehow came undone. That usually isn't a big deal. It happens occasionally and I just call the dog back to me, rehook them up and we are underway again. However, this morning Dasher decided that wasn't how she wanted to play the game and off she went.

The last I saw of her she was heading towards the highway.

I'm sure I don't need to tell anyone how sick I felt. The next 4 hours were a nightmare of making phone calls and driving around in the van and on the ATV searching.

I had finally decided to feed the kennel in hopes that if Dasher was still in the area that would lure her back home.

We were just about finished when the phone rang. It was Rhonda from the Perryvale Store telling me that Dasher was at the dump!!!
I yelled at Simone to finish feeding and bolted for the van.

When I pulled into the dump I didn't see my errant little lead dog, but as soon as I spoke a little grey fur ball ran to me from the 'empty can' section.
I buried my face in her burr filled ruff and hugged her as tight as she would let me.
Apparently her harness was tangled around her neck and the dump manager cut it off her and shared his lunch with her.
He told me at first she scared him half to death 'cause he thought she was a coyote, but figured out she wasn't when she ran straight to him.

It is probably worth noting that the dump is night next to the Perryvale cemetery, which is a normal stopping place for our teams later in the season. It is about 5 miles from the house - 3 of those mile in the ditch of a major highway.

So many things that could have gone wrong - but that thankfully didn't.

Dasher is sleeping at my feet right now.

She was stuffed with cookies and just about any other treat she wanted. After she is done napping, I will sit down and groom burrs out of her - that is if I can stop hugging her.

It was a very scary morning.