Adventures in "the 'Hood"

 Today, me and Teka decided that we would

keep our "adventure" close to home.

So,,,,,This is our house in Richmond VA.

(for earlier houses, check prior posts!)

 And this is the park right across the street.

It is small, but very pretty.

 OPA

This weekend we will be right at the center

of the excitement.  The Greek Festival 

takes place just about a block away 

from our house.  This "hood" smells

wonderful...starting about 3:00 pm

this afternoon!  

If you are coming

to the festival, and need a place to 

park, we have room for two cars

(if they are friendly) in our driveway.  

Let us know if you are coming.  

Otherwise, we will have you towed!

 We are also close enough to these places to 

walk to them, even though we will not do that 

today.  That is my dad's head next to the sign, 

so you can see that the bottom of the sign is

about 7 ft. from the ground.

 On the South side of Cary St, but "North of the James"

is a wonderful neighborhood called "Windsor Farms"

We like to walk there because it is shaded, and because 

we kind of snicker when the muzzer gets excited about

a nice house or garden.  We are simple dogs and

it doesn't take much to amuse us.

 This is a pillar at one of the entrances.

 This is a reallly big magnolia tree.

 And this is one of "those" houses that makes muzzer 

so happy.

 And this is me, needing a haircut.   But I can still make 

muzzer smile.

 All of the sidewalks in this neighborhood are

made of hand laid brick.   Most of them are

well maintained.

 But some of them are not well cared for.  This is

one of the reasons muzzer grumbles until she sees 

a neat house.   Bricks that are heeding nature's message

to get out of the way make her trip, then she curses, and

sometimes she falls.   To avoid this, we make her

wear really dorky shoes.  It helps a little bit.

 This is another house that she likes.

 And another house!

 With a truly lovely side yard and conservatory.

And a for sale sign!   Uh Oh!  Dad is in trouble fer sure, 

fer sure.   Actually, we hope that you all will fall in

love with our "hood" and buy this so that we can

be your neighbors.  Mr. Rogers Reigns.

Gussie n Teka

Walkin' on Wednesday

 So our adventure this week was on Wednesday

And we went over to Byrd Park to walk the

Dogwood  Dell Trail

 Dad and Teka took off down the trail.  

This is truly an urban park, there is city

all around it.  But it is hard to tell that here.

 Ummm....wait up guys. 

I want to go this way.

 Lots of places where you could see

this cute little stream

 And one place where me and Teka

decided to get up close and personal.

 Teka was gonna go wading again

 And I was just sniffing when I got water in my nose!

 Ummm...does this bridge make my butt look big?

 So then Dad spotted this place off to one side of the 

road/trail.  And we decided to explore some.

Muzzer was not happy about the warning sign that 

was talking about things like snakes, and sheer rock 

face walls, etc. 

We all reminded her this was supposed to be an

ADVENTURE!

And she agreed to go just a little way down the trail.

 Boy, was she glad she did.  We saw these growing on a 

fallen tree trunk.

 I got to sniff some more flowers.

And we saw this neat building.

It used to be part of the water pumping system

for the city of Richmond.  And once upon 

a time, they used the top floor as a dance 

hall!   Now it is just abandoned looking, 

but still has good bones and lots of class.

Just like a lot of Southern Ladies we know.

Gussie

Our Monday Adventure!

pony pasture trail

rapids outlook  where teka took a swim

 So, yesterday was our first official day of summer vacation!  Dad has been grading and grumpy all week, but Sunday was commencement (and he got to wear his favorite costume!)  Yesterday was the day final grades had to be in, but he actually finished up Sunday night.

And we celebrated with an adventure!

We all piled in the Gussiemobile early in the morning (9 ish or so) and went across the James River to a place called Pony Pasture.  It has lots of nice trails, runs right along the James River, and we figured we might just walk the trails for a couple of miles and do some relaxing.

We pulled away from the house and got on the toll road and Muzzer says....."oh no, I forgot the camera.  So all these photos are from the park system website.  Dumb Muzzer.

It was a lovely day.  There were only three cars in the pawking lot when we got there, so we set off down the closest trail lickety split.  Teka took the lead.

Of Course!

First loop over, back at the pawking lot and Dad decides he wants to see the Rapids Outlook.

None of us would have guessed what was going to happen next!

No, not bears or snakes or even creepy crawlies.

Dad and Teka walked down to the water and SHE JUMPED IN FROM THE ROCK!

Good thing she still had on her lead!  

I think she was as surprised as the rest of us.

But now we know she can swim!

                                                                                       Dad tugged on the lead, and she got out with a bit                        
                                                                                       of help.  And boy did she shake that water off
                                                                                        quickly.  I cannot do a word for word quote
                                                                                         but she said something about how cold the

second trail of the day

      water was.  With more descriptive terms!

 This was the second loop we did, and there were lots of mucky muddy spots.  We got muddy enough to get our feet wiped, but not so muddy that we were not allowed in the car.

We had a really good time.  Much more fun than trying to figure out the new blogger interface this morning!

We will get better, and that is a promise.

Many thanks to Garth Riley for inspiring this walk.  Good Dog!