Camping and the Outdoors

one of the beautiful things missing from walking, camping and my outdoors experiences is the presence of a beloved pet.

one of my more memorable trips out into the wild was a geophysical survey trip. My father and a colleague were off into the Barbeton mountains to take core samples from the rock there.

My dad and his colleague, Maarten, are geophysicists, and they were interested in mapping the paleo-tectonics of the area, especially since the estimated age of the Barberton mountains was sufficiently old to provide good data. The core samples provide information as to the magnetic vectors of the volcanic rock, which, when related to the age of formation and local conditions, provides a glimpse of how the rock has shifted over the ages. Ok.

The thing is, Maarten brought along his dog. We weren’t camping in any game reserves or on land accessible to the public. Permission was requested of the local landowners and we were pretty much on our own. Maarten’s dog Ralph was in his element - quite literally, of course! Watching Raplh have the time of his life was a complete joy. He went chasing off after an antelope that easily outdistanced him, bounding off into the late afternoon slopes golden with African sun. He returned, completely exhausted, about 4 hours later, flopped down into the firelit circle after drinking his fill and slept through!

If you have read “Jock of the Bushveld” by Sir Percy Fitzpatrick, you will know about the joys of having a dog along for the outing (and also much about the camping life).

Of course, it is out of the question for anyone who camps to bring their pet dogs with them. The local wildlife populations owuld be decimated, the waste, the food problems…

Still, it would be wonderful to share the wild, the outdoors, with one’s wonderful dogs.

Trackback URI | Comments RSS