This kind passenger went above and beyond guiding this Blind girl and her guide dog!

Описание: I am so grateful for wonderful people in this world like Brad. He didn’t have to volunteer to help me, but he looked outside of his own world and saw someone else in need of a helping hand, or in my case, a helping eye.

This was the end of a very long travel day for me and guide dog Arabella. A total of 10 hour travel time from Nashville Tennessee to Portland Oregon. When you are traveling with a service dog, it is very important to alter their feeding schedule based on time of travel and lengths of travel. Since Arabella and I are a new team of one year, and have only flown with her a few times, I am still learning her and what travel feeding schedule works best for her.

When I have flown with Arabella in the past we have always had a early morning departure. This time our departure from Nashville was 4:30 PM, with a check in two hours earlier. Since it was an afternoon flight, I thought I would give Arabella a very small breakfast to hold her tummy until we made it to Portland late that evening. In the past she has done great, but at the end of the day these dogs with all of their amazing skills and intelligence are still dogs. Crap happens to the best of them! Even my former guide of 10 years, Antonia Hope, she had a couple of these accidents in the airport in our early partnership as well. In Arabella’s case on this trip, I believe she would’ve made it if the Gate would have been closer to the baggage claim.

Lesson learned from this experience, if I have an later afternoon flight, no breakfast for Arabella, but don’t worry, she will get a later dinner the night before with extra food to hold her over, and the next evening she will get double helpings for dinner!

PS. I would rather have a Number two accident any day then a number one accident, much easier to clean up. 😉

Oh the joys of having a guide dog! Trust me, Arabella and Antonia have been worth every inconvenience, they have given me so much more in return... Sight, Independence, confidence, freedom, and love! Worth it all in my book, wouldn’t you say?