Cedar scent in my tent. Soft and spongy soil. Rhythmic breath, deep basset baritone. Elvis, snoring louder than anyone ever should. Sawing logs in the redwood forest.

          He ain’t nothing but a hound dog.

Mouth agape, grinning about some really great inside joke that only basset hounds know. He was a yard sale. Sprawled all over the place. Dwarf two-inch legs jutting up to the sky, like four posts of a billboard promoting dogs on vacation. I wish I could sleep like – live like -- that.

          Let it all go, his body said.

Sun coming up, searing a laser hot slice of orange glow through turquoise tent. Snuggled up to Elvis, the king of camping, was his best bud, Dude. The basset/beagle, a bagel, was spooning Elvis, quietly snoring with a peaceful baby face. Dude released himself to the universe. The forest.

            Let it all go.

Like a sweet little basset boy that finally found home. In a Coleman tent that rattled in the ocean breeze.

Wait, did someone say ocean?

           Barrroooooooo!

Right inside the tent, with redwood air and basset hounds sawing logs, was the scent of the sea, the rhythm of Mother Ocean.

You can smell her from the forest, few places on Earth – here in the California redwoods. Here in No Cal, two hundred year old trees hang out with their next door neighbors, sandy beaches. You never see that in So Cal, where we once lived.

Here, the forest and the ferns and the cliffs and the mist…. Here, there are so fewer people than So Cal - the way nature intended.

This is the real deal. A surf dog secret spot. That view of the redwood coast, near the Oregon border, will change your life. If you let it.

Elvis lumbered out, ahead of us on the trail. And stood, statuesque, on the shoreline bluff. Misty filtered morning light, deep basset hound thoughts.

Mesmerizing waves, dancing to shore. Round black rocks, rocking back and forth, back and forth in the tide, making music.

Elvis, thoughtful. Gazing out at the future ahead.

I loved that about him- the effortless ability to sum it all up in the fewest words possible.

= Flashbacks with Dude n Elvis. I miss my old boys! =