After being home for months I expected Mom and Dad to be a bit rusty when it came to going on car rides. However, never in my wildest dreams did I ever imagine they’d completely forget how to go on an adventure! Would you believe over the long holiday weekend we went for a car ride that led to nowhere? Based on my experience driving with Mom and Dad a couple weeks ago, I knew to expect some excited chattering and embarrassing behavior because they were happy to be out of the house. Yet I never thought they’d forget how to stop the car and have fun!

My first clue something was amiss was when we drove past one of our favorite hiking trails. At the time I didn’t think much of it, because I assumed we must be heading to someplace better. I did note though that Mom and Dad seemed to get extra excited commenting about all the cars in the parking lot. Sure there were a lot of cars. That trail is awesome!

As we drove on Asa and I got very excited when we sniffed the first hints of salt air. Of course! We must be going for a romp on the beach! Yet even I understood why we didn’t stop when I saw all those people packed in on the small stretch of sand available during high tide. There’s no way we could run and play fetch. Mom must have forgot to check the tide chart before leaving the house.

While I barked a few suggestions, we drove on passing more favorite places, but not stopping to stretch our legs at any of them. As we approached a popular park I perked up. There wasn’t a single person to be seen there. Yet we did see yellow caution tape blocking the entrance and around the bandstand. Was it reserved especially for me and Asa to play? Or was there a murder? I’m guessing it was the latter, because Dad continued driving, and Mom kept right on stating the obvious about everything we passed. We even drove by the ice cream stand without stopping!

After making a big loop past many of our favorite places, we finally returned home disappointed that we never stopped at any of them. And then do you know what Mom and Dad did? They took us for a walk on the same old street we’ve been walking up and down for months now! Clearly they were embarrassed they forgot to stop, and was hoping we didn’t notice. I blame Asa for not barking with me for them to stop on that car ride to nowhere.