Sunday, October 25, 2015

Pugs In The City Part 1 of 4

The weekend of October 17th we took a trip to St.Augustine, Florida. St. Augustine is about an hour away from us. This trip was for a pug event to benefit Central Florida Pug Rescue (CFPR) called Pugs In The City. This was also a make up trip for Henry. In August 2014, right after Henry "lost everything" (his siblings, his eye, his kidney and bordering on losing the sight in his remaining eye) we had booked a trip to St. Augustine to try to help him through his tough time by gong on a mini vacation. Well, it fell through. He was no where near well enough. He was still chemo sick and by then also had suffered a serious bout of pancreatitis. So, the trip never happened. So, this was not only a great pug friendly trip for Henry, it was also an opportunity at a re-do.

We will tell the story in a 4 part series. The opening episode is about getting there and the dog friendly hotel. Henry enjoyed the hour long car ride and once we were on the "big road" (the interstate) he pulled his head back in the window and settled on his passenger lap pillow for the ride. Once we got there, he was ready to hop out of the car and explore his surroundings! He, of course, was also ready for his lunch which we had strategically packed in a cooler. Well fed, he sniffed around his new home away from home. The hotel was a very dog friendly hotel. They had a small fenced in area for dogs to enjoy while off leash. It was a nice area for pet owners and pets alike.

While there were a few other non pugs at the hotel and the event, there were obviously more than just a few pugs! When we first got there, the pugs warmed up to each other immediately. Surprisingly, the pug peeps were a bit on the shy side at first meeting. In the dog run area, though, there was another Henry! A non pug Henry! A moderately misbehaving, humping everyone else in the park Henry. Oy. It was giving the name Henry a bad name. LOL. Non pug Henry kept getting fussed at by his peep but it was futile. Pug Henry just kind of did what he usually does in new spaces and that is walk the perimeter. He sniffed the fence about half way around and then found a place to sit and settle. He was approached and smelled by several other pugs but never really returned the favor. There was a another blind dog in the run that day. Harley. He was about 8-9 years old. I can no longer remember exactly but I do remember that he was considerably younger than Henry. Other than Ann's dog, Julia, (Ann from CFPR), Henry was the oldest dog at the event that we knew of there but there may have been other elders there that we just did not know about. Julia is a very Luna-like little diva pug and she still has the most adorable pug strut going on. She is the same age as Henry.

It's funny, last week we were just talking about how at a long ago pug event how we could not easily identify our boys from the pack of pugs from a distance. Well, I guess that may be because they were puppies/young pugs (as were the majority of that group of pugs). At this event, though, it was easy to spot Henry in the crowd (and not just because he was the one with shaved square on his side or he was the one stuck under a table or chair but just because at this event the pugs truly looked a lot more different than one another. I guess with a little bit of age, they begin to look a bit more distinct. Anyway, it was not a challenge to tell them apart and spot your own.

#AdventuresOfHenry! #Henry'sMakeUpTripWasASuccess #HenryStrongAllYearLong