We are incredibly excited and grateful to announce that Saturday was the official launch of our new company, Happy Tails Canine Adventure Tours and we kicked it off with a sold-out inaugural tour to northern North Carolina.

https://facebook.com/HappyTailsTours/videos/365669303941535/

We started the day with a great hike at Pilot Mountain State Park, followed by lunch and wine tasting at two great and very dog-friendly wineries in the Yadkin Valley – Ragapple Lassie Winery and Misty Creek Vineyards.
Tour Featured in this Blog: THE FOX – YADKIN VALLEY HIKING & WINE TASTING

Hike with dogs to Pilot Mountain Tour

When asked by Ellie Porter what was the best part of the day for me, my first reaction was “Leaving my house in the morning, knowing that our vision had become a reality!” But, the whole day was amazing! Seeing everyone have such a fantastic time with their dogs and each other, hearing everyone’s enthusiasm and positive thoughts about the tours and the concept, hearing the conversation in the bus as everyone laughed and shared their experiences and their love for their animals, were all great.

Tours with their dogs at Pilot Mountain

 

Claudia and I are blessed to be creating our vision. Besides the most important thing, which is that our guests had an amazing experience traveling with their dogs, the icing on the cake that confirmed 100% for me that Claudia and I are indeed on the right track, was that Chris McPeck, who was playing live at Misty Creek, closed his set with Wonderful Tonight by Clapton. That was the song of our first dance at our wedding and when I heard it I grabbed Claudia and we danced and we both felt such an overwhelming sense of gratitude, joy, and contentment. I am just so, so grateful to have this amazing person by my side as my partner in life.

Yadkin Valley Tour with dogs

Thank you so much to the great people who attended, including Tamara Lyn Rivera, Eric Rivera, Nicole Carpenter Adams, Jamie Adams, and from KeenDog owner Katrina Kensington and trainer Ellie Porter, as well Austin Chaney.

Claudia and I have been slowly working on this idea for several years and have dedicated ourselves full time since January to creating this amazing company that will give others the opportunity to have amazing, life-transforming adventure experiences with their dogs. It has been a lot of work, a labor of love, the culmination of which was realized Saturday, April 21st, 2018.

Thank you everyone who has been supportive of our vision in so many ways. If you are so inspired, follow and like our Facebook page @happyTailsTours and follow us on Instagram @happyTailsTours to see what amazing adventures are developing. Thank you!!

Tour Featured in this Blog: THE FOX – YADKIN VALLEY HIKING & WINE TASTING

It happened in an instant. One minute the old man was down standing in the water of the Panama Canal. He couldn’t see well and he was almost deaf. I had been calling him, yelling for him to come for five minutes. But he didn’t hear me. Maybe it was selective. He was probably just enjoying himself and at 14 and a half years old didn’t have to listen to anyone. I’m glad he did. Ten minutes later he was gone.

I just finished bathing and drying him, his body. It was clear that’s what it was. I didn’t feel anything else there. And I felt very alone. Less than alone. I feel as if part of me is missing.

On a Friday afternoon in May of 2000 I received a phone call from a woman at the Australian Cattle Dog Rescue Association. I had been speaking with her a few weeks earlier trying to adopt a dog, but their policy was to not give dogs to anyone without a home with a yard. She called me because she felt I knew the breed and what he would need, and had been told of a dog in the animal shelter an hour away in Delaware.

“They are open tomorrow, Saturday, from 8 to 12 and closed Sunday. This dog I have just found out has been there for 3 months minus a few weeks with a family that didn’t work out. Monday morning at 6 am he is scheduled to be euthanized.”

When we got there Saturday morning, they had to drag him out of his cage. He was not friendly and not to trusting. They had me go into a small room about 15 feet square and then put him in with me and shut the door. I took a chair and put it against the center of a wall away from the door. He went and sat in the corner closest to the door. For five minutes neither of us moved. We just stared at each other. Finally he stood up. He walked over to me slowly and sniffed my leg. Then he lifted his leg and urinated on my legs. Then he jumped up into my lap and licked my face. He has never willingly let me out of his sight since.

I filled out the paperwork and we left. We took him to a beach and played with him in the waves. In the pound they had called him Blue. He had been a stray and they didn’t know his name. So we sat at the beach and whenever he turned away from me I started calling out names. I started with the A’s and worked my way through the alphabet. When I said Max, he immediately turned and looked at me and then came over and rubbed against me. Max it is!! That was almost 13 years ago.

A few days later I went in for a job interview. I had recently been downsized. It was the second interview and I was offered the job. It would be hard work, 80 hour weeks, but great money and a stake in a new company. I accepted. When I got home an hour later, Max had destroyed some of my favorite things. I was furious. I wanted to kill him. So I sat down and breathed and thought. And I came to the conclusion that he was right. After almost two years in a corporate job after graduate school, I realized I didn’t want to spend all my time inside any more either. I picked up the phone and called the employer and told them I was going to have to pass on their offer. That was the first time Max saved me from myself.

A week later I purchased a small plastic airline kennel and strapped it onto the back of my motorcycle for our first test run. I shoved Max in and we went to the park a few blocks away. When we got off the bike and went into the park to play, I put my helmet on the ground and went to pick up a stick to throw for him. He walked over and urinated on my helmet. He might as well have spoken to me. It was clear he wasn’t happy with things. So I put on my smelly helmet after a quick rinse in the fountain, shoved him back into the crate and went home. I dropped Max off and went out and traded in the kennel for a larger one. I took it home, strapped it onto the bike. Max took one look at it, jumped up on the seat and into the crate and sat down, ready to go.

Three weeks later we took off on a 1 year journey through the US, Canada and Mexico. We traveled over 20,000 miles camping and exploring and he was the best friend and companion I could have asked for. Only twice did he refuse to jump up onto the bike. The first time was when the crate fell off going over a mountain pass in Colorado at 5 miles an hour. He was not happy. Not injured, but not happy. The second time was when we did an 18 hour day from Los Angeles to New Mexico. I didn’t want to get back on either.

Max traveled with me through ten countries in North, Central and South America. He protected me at night when we camped out. He attacked the police that tried to rob us in Mexico. And he was my friend. He saved my life and he changed my life. He has been rafting, kayaking, tubing on the Rio Grande and flying to South America.

Today I was helpless to save him when he was caught in an Africanized bee’s nest. I tried to grab him and was covered myself and couldn’t get close. We both ran, he the best he could. I raced to a restaurant up the street and stole their fire extinguisher. I raced back and blasted the bees off of him. He was already out of it, covered with bees and unable to move, probably in a coma. We raced to the vet but when we got there, it was too late. I’m so, so very sad. He was my friend.

So now I just keep remembering him standing in the water before it happened, looking happy and free in his old age. Every day of his life was a blessing, since that first day at the pound. And I am so very grateful to have been part of that.

Thank you to everyone over the years that have loved him and been his friend.

Tomorrow we will find a place in the jungle and bury him.

On a Saturday morning In May of 2000 I adopted the first dog of my own as an adult, Max. He was an 18 month old, 45-pound Australian Cattle Dog. He’d been in a shelter in Delaware for 3 months minus a few weeks with a family that didn’t work out, and was scheduled to be euthanized Monday morning at 6 am.Three weeks later Max and I took off on a 1 year journey through the US, Canada and Mexico. We traveled, camping and exploring, for over 20,000 miles by motorcycle. Max rode in an airline kennel mounted onto the back, and he was the best friend and companion I could have asked for. Only twice did he refuse to get up onto the bike.

Over our 13 years together, Max, who was joined by Dozer in 2005 and Margie in 2008, traveled with me through ten countries in North, Central and South America. He and Dozer protected me at night when we camped out. They chased off the police that tried to rob us in Mexico. They have been rafting, kayaking, and tubing on the Rio Grande. They are well known amongst many of the indigenous groups we worked with in Panama and have been in many areas of the jungles that few non-natives ever visit, and they are in more tour client photos than I have.

Max was my friend and constant companion. He saved my life and he changed my life. In 2010 I took a couple of ladies on a private camping tour to a small private island off the coast of Panama, inhabited by only one family. I had always taken the three dogs, Max, Dozer and Margie on all of my tours and this was no exception. When we arrived to the coast to meet the boat for the trip to the island, I unloaded the equipment, luggage and dogs from my truck. That was apparently the first time since we had left Panama City 2+ hours earlier that the ladies had noticed the dogs. They were polite but visibly concerned. “Do you always take your dogs?” I replied that I do. “Does anyone ever complain?” I had to think back but the answer was no, never.

 

Over the years so many people who had seen me traveling or who had been on my tours had expressed how much they wished they could travel with their dogs, and I was grateful for my good fortune to be able to do so.

After three fantastic days on the island, the ladies approached me. They wanted to let me know that although the snorkeling was amazing, the food delicious, the island gorgeous, the people friendly, the guide excellent, and the ice cream a huge treat (I had made homemade ice cream the last night), “ … the best part of the trip was your dogs. We really enjoyed them. Thank you!”

That is when the idea for Happy Tails Canine Adventure Tours was born. I knew that I had to come up with a way to help others to travel with their best friends. And, now it’s finally coming to fruition. They say that humans are attracted to pets and especially dogs because they give us unconditional love, but for me I think its because they give me the opportunity to love unconditionally!

So keep the rubber down, the wind in your hair and the tails wagging! The best is yet to come.