When we started out on this adventure we were concerned about how Pekoe would travel.  We were sure we would be making frequent stops so he could scratch in the dirt, which would adversely affect our plan for making our target of six-hundred miles a day.  As it turned out, once we put him in his cozy car carrier each day and started, he went into cat mode and we didn’t hear a peep from him.  With an A/C vent blowing directly on him between the front seats to his station on the back seat, wedged between massive mounds of gear, he remained cool.

We made it out of Big Bend without encountering any flash flooding, through Alpine and Terlingua, places we had happened upon in a magical twilight 48 years before, and on to Guadalupe Mountains NP.  Our first afternoon there, it rained.  We started floating on the floor again.  I went outside and dug a drainage trench down the slope in front of the tent.   It helped a little, but what helped more was the rain stopping.  In the morning we moved the tent to a different site, and by moving I mean we pulled up stakes and carried the whole thing down the trail to its new, shadier site.  Pekoe remained nonplussed throughout, even when this rather healthy tarantula crossed the path a few feet from the tent.

After that, Guadalupe was uneventful, if a little too warm.  We did a day trip from there up to Carlsbad Caverns, where Pekoe had the pleasure of having the entire, air-conditioned pet boarding kennel to himself.  Then it was on to Great Sand Dunes National Park, one of the few we hadn’t visited. They have an interesting campsite acquisition system there, which we discovered right away.  We had no reservation, so it was a long-shot from the get-go, particularly since the park is a long way in off the main road.  We lucked out and found a site clear for one night and put up the tent.  Being at a higher elevation than where we started, it was starting to get much cooler at night, and Pekoe began actually burrowing down in the sleeping bag there to keep warm.  The cat adjusts.  The next day we had to vacate the campsite by 1:00 p.m., because it was reserved for a couple nights starting then.  We asked the rangers for a list of sites that were available for that night, but they said, “No, no, no.”  Just like the French; “No, no, no.  That’s not how it works.”  We learned they went around both loops of the campground at 8:00 a.m., finding out who was leaving, and putting up availability cards on the posts.  They wouldn’t tell you ahead of time; you had to pry it out of them when they came to your site and told you to vacate.  So, while we were waiting for rounds, we went down and scoped out a site two doors down that was empty, hoping it would remain available, and we could jump on it.  When I went back to our tent I found the front flap open. I went inside and couldn’t find Pekoe. He wasn’t laying in the corner liked he often did; he wasn’t in his special enclosure. He wasn’t there.  He had waltzed out through the front flap and was gone, 2000 miles from home. I ran outside and started asking everyone around if they’d seen him, and when the rangers came, I told them we had a missing cat.  We were frantic. Losing the beloved cat on his first camping trip.  I blamed myself for not thoroughly zipping the front flap. The particularly unpleasant lady ranger said, “Well, I hope you find him because he won’t last the night here, with the predators we have.”  In a panic I went back into the tent for my hat, thinking to go out and start a search, and digging through the stuff at our end, uncovered Pekoe burrowed down in the sleeping bag.  Lost and found.  He looked at me as if to say, “Something wrong, Papa?”

On to Black Canyon of the Gunnison at 9000 feet, or so, the whole park driving up from the valley floor aflame with blooming wildflowers.  The first night there was a ranger talk on stargazing at the amphitheater, so we packed Pekoe up in his carry pack and lugged him down there.  He didn’t care for it.  Either the presentation or the accommodations didn’t measure up, and he let us know.  Pekoe is generally such a laid-back, easy-going guy, and when he complains, it’s for good reason.  He started vocalizing, and we left somewhere between Andromeda, and the Milky Way.

It got really cold by the next morning, so we drove down the mountain and into Montrose to get a sweater for Pekoe.  We had plenty of warm gear for ourselves, but he had only his fur which, while substantial, remained inadequate. We found what we were looking for in a thrift store, a nice knit sweater and a kind of little jacket thing.  They both fit, and Pekoe didn’t mind that they were designed for a dog, and were both pink.  He wore the sweater that night.

The next evening, for all intents and purposes, the trip ended.  Following a short hike down a trail to look at the canyon, I mixed our usual libation and pulled up a chair.  I turned to speak to my esteemed wife and long-time camping companion, and only garbled sounds came out.  I couldn’t form words.  My speech came back in a couple minutes, then departed again.  No motor deficit, no cognitive problems.  I could think clearly, I just couldn’t speak.

We scooped up Pekoe, put him in his car carrier, and drove down to the ranger station at the ark entrance.  A very kind and efficient lady ranger called the park EMT, who arrives in about two minutes and assessed me in the open doorway of the car.  In another few minutes an ambulance from Montrose arrived, as the hospital helicopter hovered overhead.  It was determined that I would be OK to transport by ambulance, so down the mountain we went.

But this is about Pekoe’s adventure, not mine.  Suffice to say, I made it, thanks to the best care I’ve ever had, with no lingering issues, (though some might argue that), and after a few days recuperating with friends in Fruita, we turned back for care and treatment in Florida.

Here’s how it went for Pekoe. After being hauled down the mountain unceremoniously, he checked into a motel, and spent an anxious night.  Next day, upon my discharge, we went to nearby Fruita for a few days, where we stayed with an old army buddy and his wife. Little did he know, but we were done with camping for a while.  We had a lovely room upstairs, and the only anxious moments were when Pekoe escaped the room.  We were sitting out on the back deck when the neighbor’s dog, a friendly sort who was visiting, starting barking hysterically.  He charged the sliding glass door to the house, and we saw a flash of Pekoe as he split back upstairs.  We found him under our hosts’ bed. Next day we started back to Florida and a left carotid endarterectomy.  For me, not for Pekoe.  He thoroughly enjoyed the ride back on the 10, air blasting, with stops in a Red Roof Inn.  Sometimes, when it’s raining, or gets too hot, or he grows weary of living so small and close to the ground, “Is this camping, Papa?”