Charlie the dog, my friend Carol, her son Josiah (age 4.85 years) and I didn’t know what to expect when we set off in the car last Saturday morning for Rutherfordton, North Carolina, a very small town about 4 hours east of Durham where the Four Paws Kingdom Campground is located. The Four Paws Kingdom Web site advertised it as “the first and only dog-dedicated campground in the US”.
Turns out Four Paws Kingdom is owned and operated by an energetic, outgoing, dog-loving German couple (Meik & Brigit) who do all the campground work themselves. Meik built all the awesome ‘rustic Ikea’-style cabins (equipped with refridgerator, microwave, coffeemaker, TV/DVD, dining set, 2 queen-size beds, 1/2 bath, air conditioner, cute porch with BBQ and more) and developed the dog playgrounds/parks; they both do the cleaning and landscaping; and they both run all the fun campground events. Brigit is also an artist who has designed all the campground’s signs and sells her handpainted silk dog art and homemade dog biscuits in their gift shop. They are constantly toodling around the campground in the their German-engineered golf cart doing things like refilling the dog poop bag stations and making sure the RV folks don’t need help with their hookups. They always stop to talk to you and to make sure you and your dog are having a good time. At one point, Brigit rescued Charlie from an eye infection with her veterinary supply. She pronounces Charlie like “SHAH-lee”. It’s pretty cute!
The first day, we took Charlie (and ourselves) swimming at the fenced-in dog pond. I was nervous all afternoon about the Chili Cookoff that was to take place at 6:30 that evening at the main campground pavilion. I had brought our trusty crockpot from Durham, with the Chipotle Beef & Lime Chili already halfway done (thanks to Sarah Joseph for the recipe!!), so that I could just add the final ingredients and let it simmer all afternoon. Well, by 5:45 PM it wasn’t tasting as flavorful as we thought it should. This was certainly due to the fact that I hadn’t let it simmer for the full 8 hours. I was a little desperate. But Carol saved the day by suggesting we add a bit of the red wine we had brought. I also added a lot more pepper and half a bag of shredded Mexican cheese. Perfection! Honestly I don’t think it could have tasted better, especially with a handful of old-fashioned corn tortilla chips and a dollop of the fresh lime crema I had made using fresh lime juice, lime zest and sour cream! This was certainly a winner, I thought.
Well, I was actually one of 11 (!) entrants in the chili cookoff. The judging portion of the cookoff was very well organized. Anybody who wanted to eat chili, including us chili chefs, received a “Official Chili Judge” badge, a tray full of numbered plastic cups containing the chili samples and a ballot. Mine was cup #6, but no one knew that but me. I thought my chili was second best out of all. Alas, I did not win the trophy – a homemade trophy a la Brigit, of course – though I knew in my heart which chilis were the tastiest.
The next day was Doggy Olympics Day. I was skeptical about my and Charlie’s athletic and technical abilities for a dog competition, but Brigit assured us that no experience was necessary. There were a surprising 30 or so entrants in the Olympics, which consisted of six events across a two-acre dog park. Meik had spent the whole morning setting up the obstacle courses and necessary equipment. The dog park was off limits for the rest of the day so that no athletes or their trainers could tamper with the courses.
When evening time rolled around, Charlie and I were given a badge with our names on it and were labeled official athlete team number 4. One particular funny event was the three hoop challenge. When Meik yelled “Go!”, we crossed the start line to the first hula hoop, in which Charlie had to sit. We then moved to the second hula hoop, in which both Charlie and I had to lie down. Finally, in the third hula hoop, Charlie had to eat a dog biscuit while I ate an Oreo cookie before we ran across the finish line. We were more in it for the fun of it, however, we did feel a little competitive toward the end. Especially when a goofy 4-month-old Great Dane named Georgia (who competed next to Charlie during each event and consistently underperformed compared to Charlie) received the bronze medal! Oh well. We had a GREAT time participating, and Charlie really enjoyed himself too!
The rest of the weekend was spent swimming, hiking (Four Paws’ hiking trails are made especially for dogs and their owners, complete with dog poetry!), building campfires & telling ghost stories, mining for semi-precious stones, and hanging out in Chimney Rock, NC and at Lake Lure, where Clinton and I had our honeymoon back in November. We discovered that not only is Charlie an excellent swimmer, he can also swim to retrieve a tennis ball over and over again, just like a Labrador Retriever!
On Monday morning, Clinton drove in to the campround to replace Carol & Josiah who needed to drive back to Durham. Later that day, Clinton and I swam at the famous Lake Lure public beach and then decided to head up to ‘La Strada’ – a pizza restaurant with a great view of the lake and beach – for a bite to eat. But before we could go in to the restaurant, we needed to change out of our wet beach clothes. Unfortunately, this had to be done in my little car, which was sticky, tricky and awkward, what with the pizza staff giving us funny looks. We must have looked suspicous in our car removing clothing. Well, then a very strange thing happened: at the very moment that Clinton unzipped his wet shorts, a huge wind funnel descended upon the beach and swept up the people’s belongings, including beach umbrellas, beach toys, flipflops and colorful towels. All of these items swirled hundreds of feet into the air in a violent cloud of sand, the beach-goers staring upward and aghast. We witnessed all of this from our cliffside perch at the pizza restaurant, looking down at the beach below. I marveled at the possibilities of this cosmic phenomenon. Is Lake Lure some type of vortex in the time-space continuum? Have the aliens decided to attack our planet on the Fourth of July, just as they did in that movie, Independence Day?! Could Clinton’s pants have caused some sort of global chain reaction? You know what they say – if a butterfly flaps its wings in Tokyo…
So Charlie spent all day yesterday very depressed that we left the Four Paws Kingdom. To appease him, Clinton and I purchased for him a large and very expensive pet bed. Today was the first time he actually decided to LIE DOWN on this piece of extravagence. Charlie told me today that he wants to go camping again as soon as possible.
Hope you all had a great 4th of July! Stay tuned for more of Crystal’s adventures…
gramps
July 8, 2006 at 12:10 pm
Well, that was pretty hilarious. Love, Gramma and Gramps