Last week I asked Laura what she wanted to do for Christmas. Family was not going to be here until the weekend, so we had time to ourselves. She wanted to go on December 24 up to our “Critter Cabin” south of Mosier, and cut some wood and clean up the brush. It is over 1 mile behind a locked gate, with the closest neighbor 5 miles by road or 3 miles as the crow flies.
While it had been cold, in the 20’s during the day, there was only a few inches of snow.
She decided we would make a picnic of it, so she got some large shrimp, butter for melting, a can of pork’n’beans, homemade rolls, apples and tangerines. We built a fire cooking, and proceeded to work. About noon we sat down around the fire and cooked our lunch. (The shrimp were great, even though it was the weather was below freezing.)
After lunch we decided to go back to work for an hour or so before heading home.
Just before we were leaving, we discovered Reba was missing. We yelled and whistled (what good that would do was doubtful, as she is hard of hearing). We looked all over, but could not find her. We attempted to track her, but there were literally hundreds of fresh deer tracks, bobcat tracks, coyote tracks, and bear tracks.
Twice we headed down into the canyon where we thought she had wandered to. Each time we made a circle, trying to check as much area as we could. It was like looking for a needle in a haystack, or worse, as the needle might be moving. There were literally 1,000’s of acres to look for her.
We thought that maybe she had started sniffing a squirrel or rabbit, and had headed down hill. Next month she will be 15 years old, and she is getting a little stove-up in the back end. Possibly she was just too sore to make it back up the hill.
Finally, as night was approaching, we had to leave. On the porch we left Laura’s coat and my gloves with the hopes that is she made it back, she would stay there until the morning, when we planned to return.
Needless to say, Christmas Eve was not very cheery at Our home.
The next morning we got up and drove the 26 miles to the Cabin. No Reba.
We checked the wildlife cameras we have there, and no photo of her. I had brought my rifle, as usual, and Laura had her pistol. We brought our cork boots so we could go clear to the bottom of the canyon. Yesterday it was far too dangerous, as everything was froze.
So off into the canyon we headed, whistling and yelling. We finally made it to the bottom, and no Reba and no Reba tracks. All we saw were bobcat and 2 sets of fresh bear tracks.
So, back up the hill we went. You know a hill is steep when you can stand up, put your arm out and touch the ground!
When we finally got to the top, we decided to run the chainsaw for a bit, just in case she was in the vicinity. Maybe, just maybe she could hear it, and would come to the noise. Still, no Reba.
We decided to leave, so we put her dog bed (Laura had brought it from home), and some dog food on the porch, and reluctantly left. We would make another attempt tomorrow to see if she returned to the cabin.
I had one more spot however that I wanted to look. I figured that maybe she had just gotten confused, and decided to head down hill. About a mile and a half away, with a 1500 foot elevation drop is Mosier Creek. It is big enough you would not want to cross it, especially on a twenty degree day.
Anyway, we had brought the combination to the gate on Mosier Creek. Luckily someone lives a couple miles past the gate and they had plowed it out. As we were approaching where I figured was as far as we could drive, as we came around a corner, Laura said, “There’s Reba!” And sure enough, there she was, standing in the road.
Needless to say it was a joyous event, and probably the best Christmas gift we could have gotten.
Reba was hungry, and a little stove-up. She immediately went to sleep on the floor of the pick up. She is still gimping around, but she will probably slowly get better.
Ps: This was probably her best Christmas ever also!
This is a very nice story that Pat wrote for me!
