St. Joe's state park

Close your eyes and imagine a beautiful, white, sandy beach. Well, actually, if you close your eyes you won't be able to read this, so go ahead and keep them open. But keep imagining the beach. Vast white sand extends as far as the eye can see in both directions. On one side it is bordered by graceful palm trees and on the other, the blue ocean laps gently at the shore. Seashells of every color, shape and size are scattered liberally across the sand. The morning sun is still so low that even the shells cast long shadows.

Yeah, yeah I know. No palm trees. They were on the other side of the peninsula from this picture.

Now imagine a dog charging gleefully down the beach. He is a large, handsome dog, and his jet black coat shines and flashes in the morning sun. Dancing playfully through the shallows, he is the very essence of freedom and joy.

At this point, the idyllic image tantalizing your brain begins to go a little south. You suddenly realize that this dog running so free and unsupervised down the beach is supposed to be one of the elite CCI service dogs in training who are never supposed to be off leash unless supervised and in a safely fenced area. But he is not wearing his customary yellow cape. You scan the horizons for his handler...someone...anyone! But to no avail.

From another corner of your consciousness you become aware of the fact that the above mentioned dog is charging down a beach in a State Park that strictly prohibits dogs of any sort off leash. And he is running on a beach that does not allow dogs at all. Period. In fact, you can just make out a sign in the distance that reads "Pets Prohibited."

Can you see it? Good job you're almost finished.

Now, dig deep into your memory banks and go to the place where you keep memories of things you don't want to remember but can't exactly manage to forget. Find the nastiest rotting dead thing you can find. We all have one or two in there somewhere. Preferably it should be some kind of marine animal, but a bird will do just as well. Actually any smallish animal will do as long as it is dead and rotting. Place this bit of stinking organic matter into the dog's mouth. Some of it should hang out the side a little, flopping against his face with every bound the dog takes.

Not exactly a dead rotting animal, much less THE dead rotting animal...but shells were just as
characteristic - He LOVED them :)

Congratulations! You have just recreated Novel's last adventure from our recent trip to St. Joseph Peninsula State Park.

Ok, to be honest, I took some artistic licence in telling that story. Obviously I wasn't actually there, but most of the details are accurate, like the time of day, the picture of the beach, the dead thing, and most importantly the unsupervised and forbidden off leash freedom. (we did have permission to have him on the "Pets Prohibited" beach, but only as long as he was wearing his cape. Which he wasn't) However, as my brother (who was the one who actually retrieved Novel from this adventure) informed me, he wasn't exactly charging down the beach when he found him, but was sniffing around a fire pit, and turned into the gleeful dancer only after seeing his captor. Though, judging from my own knowledge of Novel's personality, I think it's safe to infer that he probably did take a turn dancing down the beach.

My brother's probably-more-accurate-version of the story was actually quite hilarious in itself, but unfortunately, I don't seem to have the same knack for telling it as he did, and besides, I had already written this whole thing out.

Despite Novel's crazy escapade, our trip to St. Joe's this past week was quite wonderful. It was filled with long walks and early morning runs on the beach, puzzles, good food, a little shopping, an epic sandcastle, swimming, (yes, swimming in January!)  and of course lots and lots of sand and saltwater everywhere :)

Just realized that there aren't really many pictures of me on here...
so for those of you who don't know...that's me.

This face is the absolute epitome of Novel :)
Only imagine a tail wagging so hard you can't see it. Come to
think of it, that may be what's actually going on in this picture...

Me and my peeps :) Except for my bro who was taking the picture.

Just to prove that I did actually go swimming...but it was COLD!

Yes. There was sand and saltwater EVERYWHERE!

 I'm pretty positive that Novel somehow got the memo that this was a vacation, because even with his cape on, he never really made the switch into his usual "working mode." He wasn't bad exactly...just full of himself...full of puppy playfulness and his usual, crazy, all-encompassing joy for life. And of course it probably didn't help much that his gentle leader broke in the car on the way there leaving us with nothing but his flat collar to "reel in the crazies," or that everything was so very new to him, or that I was on vacation and didn't exactly always take the time I should have to work through things with him.

Trekking home after a very long day...I think we hiked something like 18 miles
 in the sand that day. That was also the day that I took almost all of my pictures.

So maybe it wasn't a perfect week if you gauge it by actual progress made or work done, but it was a perfect week of rest and relaxation. I think Novel and I are both ready to jump back into work and school and training after a long and wonderful Christmas Break.

Novel was NOT pulling on the leash in this picture...it was actually my brother
pulling on Novel ;) wink wink