The last couple of days have probably been some of the toughest days to date. It all began when Hersh, Izzie and I set off Friday morning through White Rock canyon to hike down to the Colorado River. Beautiful morning, crisp fall weather. I couldnt have asked for a better break from my studies. About 3/4 of the way through the canyon it widened and we came upon a herd of big horn sheep. Before I could catch her, Izzie bolted straight for them and she ran up the side of the canyon after them. After I realized that calling after her wasnt working I began to run and climb after her. I dont know how she managed to run so fast and scale the terrain that she did, but soon she was out of site. I called and called for her as I climbed, and I soon realized that Hersh was going to hurt herself. I was forced to tie her up and leave her. As I continued to climb I looked up above me at these massive sheer rock cliffs and at the very top were the sheep, looking down upon me. But no Izzie. I began to get frantic. Had she made it to them? Had she fallen? Been trampled? Gotten stuck? I called and I called her name. Nothing. After walking around the base of these cliffs I realized that I could not get up them by myself, with no equipment and only James knowing vaguely where I was going. As it was getting dark in the next couple of hours, with a knot in my throat I descended to where Hersh was, unfortunately rolling my ankle on the way down. I hiked out of the canyon hoping that Izzie was alive, but feeling in my gut that she was dead. There was no way she could have made that climb. And she gave me no indication that she was alive, no barking, no whining, no squealing. I got to the canyon mouth and screamed her name, hoping that maybe she made it to the top and had found an alternate way out. Nothing. I screamed louder and louder. Nothing. I made it to the car and called James. Ill bet that I scared the shit out of him when he first heard me. When I calmed down and we were able to discuss what had happened we decided that there was nothing more I could do that night. I had no more supplies, I was an hour away from home, and Hersh was in no condition to do that hike again. I drove home with a vice grip around my heart. My heart literally hurt. I couldnt just leave her out there! What if she was still alive? Hurt? James was at work and booked a $650 flight out the next morning. It was a long night. I picked him up at the airport at 0750 and we drove straight to the trailhead. I ace bandaged my ankle, damned if I was going to let a little pain hurt the chances of finding our baby. We hiked in and arrived at the base of where I last saw her. It took us about 30 minutes to get to the base of the cliffs. James climbed higher than I did so I acted as his spotter and looked around the base of the cliffs looking for her body. As we kept making our way to the left of the cliffs a few more routes appeared, and as we climbed each one with no luck, we approached the last possible route to the top. Thats when we heard it. A whimper? A cry? Not sure but we both heard it and our eyes filled up with tears. We stopped, made a promise. Slow and safe. Slow and safe. Slow and safe. As we climbed higher it got quiet again. Were we hearing things? We arrived at a spot that I wasnt comfortable doing and James went ahead. The sun was shining into my face as I was looking up and I saw a shadow. It couldnt be Izzie, this was my imagination playing tricks on me. But then the shadow moved. IZZIE!!!! She made another small whimper, it was dampened by the strong winds that had moved in. As James reached her he screamed down to me that she was ok and I broke into tears. After another 20 min or so they finally made their way down to me and we sat there, backs to the cliff, hugging each other and Izzie, crying, and in complete disbelief that she was alive. It took us about an hour and a half to climb down, and poor Izzie was petrified, so we had to hand her off to one another as we descended. We estimate that she was stuck about 2,000 vertical feet ABOVE the canyon bottom where we were hiking. How that dog ever made it up that high neither of us will never know. My point to this story is that you never really know what you have until it is taken away from you. I have the most AMAZING husband in the world, and without him Izzie would have died on the ledge that she so desperately clung onto for 2 days. Can we afford the flight? Hell no. Neither of us thought that we were going to find her alive... but we did. The love we have for each other, for our babies, literally allowed us to scale mountains. So please... give your furry kids an extra squeeze today. Think about what is really important in your life and take the time to be grateful. I absolutely know that I am.
Posted on: Mon, 01 Dec 2014 00:16:59 +0000
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