After Hearing A Noise In The Woods, Quick-thinking Hikers Immediately Spring Into Action!

 When three hikers set out in Australia’s iconic Mount Glorious National Park, they were smart enough to have their cameras handy for all the incredible photo opportunities they would encounter. However, they were destined to witness an unbelievable sight.

Family Affair

For Jessica Paton, a lady from Queensland, Australia a normal trip to a national park turned into something very shocking and interesting. Consequently, on July 24, 2016, she decided to share her interesting story on social media. She couldn’t believe the fact that a fun trip with her husband and father would lead her to so much fame.

What’s That?!

Jessica explained that the original plan was for her and her husband Luke to bring her dad to see some rock pools in a fairly secluded section of Mount Glorious National Park. While on their way exploring the park, the trio noticed a disturbance in one of the deep pools ahead of them.

Saddest Sight

Over-brimming with the curiosity of watching some wildlife in the famous park, the family thought of the disturbance as a great opportunity for fulfilling their desire. But, the situation changed drastically, once they took a closer look at it. According to Jessica, the family was crushed to see this “forlorn little face looking back.”

Help Me!

Contrarily, the family found a dog in a state of helplessness and utter distress. “We approached cautiously, not knowing whether this was a domesticated or wild dog. Either way, we couldn’t leave it there in the freezing water ”, Jessica said.

Against The Stream

The family was quick to comprehend the state the puppy was in, as it looked completely exhausted, from all its attempts at struggling to climb out of the deep section of water it had fallen into. In order to save the dog, it was necessary for the trio to take some quick and effective action.

Back Off!

It was of utmost importance that the dog didn’t get injured during the whole process. The family knew they needed to be cautious and grabbed a giant stick in case the dog attacked after they pulled it out of the water. “We gently looped a rope around its head/shoulders, and with a slight struggle, dragged it out onto the rocks,” Jessica wrote.

Far From Home

The exact opposite of what the family had thought of happened, as, the sad, terrified dog timidly hid away from them and went back towards the pool instead of attacking them. When it turned away, they saw she was a female who had been neutered. Jessica and family knew this could only mean one thing: the dog had once been domesticated and she was a long way from home…

Nowhere To Go

They realized that leaving the dog there would mean pushing it towards death. “She was in a completely inhospitable section of a bush, in a gully with cliff face and hectares of a national park on one side, and a scrubby, rocky, unscaleable bank up to a busy road on the other. There were also no houses within at least a 5KM radius, and no obvious way for her to make her own way out of the gully ”, Jessica said while explaining the critical situation.

Don’t Run!

The next major problem was that of finding the dog, as being terrified it had sought to hide just after being rescued. Fortunately, the family found it hiding underneath a thick undergrowth, shortly after some sincere efforts. Surprisingly, the little dog had dug out an area for herself.

Miss Piggy

The trio was pleased to witness that their efforts hadn’t been in vain, when the pooch responded with a lick on Jessica’s hand, on giving it a gentle scratch on the head. The trio decided to name their new friend Miss Piggy, a funny name since the poor dog seemed to have gained some weight on her mountain adventure.

What Goes Up

The only task left now was to safely escort it off the mountain. Luckily, they had carried rope with themselves, which came in handy for tying the puppy up, so that it couldn’t run away. This was the only possible option left, for them to rescue back the puppy safely.

Must Come Down

It took meticulous planning on the family’s part to advance ahead. Explaining their course of action at that time, Jessica wrote,“We created a makeshift harness with non-slip knots, and tried to coax Miss Piggy to slowly climb through the scrub and loose rocks with us. She (predictably) wasn’t overly keen on that, so we set about carrying/nudging her along – one person leading her and another pushing/carrying her from behind.”

Danger Zone

The path ahead was extremely dangerous for poor Miss Piggy. As there were unstable rocks beneath their feet, the embankment was laced with vines, and the brush made it easy to trip. Things became scarier when, Jessica’s attempt to boost the puppy up over a small ledge failed, as, her make-shift harness came undone.

Escape Plan

“The only way I could stop her was to get in front of her and head her off before she got to open ground. With her escape plan thwarted, she slumped down into the undergrowth and resumed her state as an immovable object,” Jessica wrote. Miss Piggy was now terrified and completely worn out.

Macgyver Apparatus

“It was becoming pretty obvious that she wouldn’t be able to make it up the bank unless we carried her, and so we were throwing around options for a harness and hammock set-up, using towels and ropes,” they said. Finally, Luke remembered that he had a large canvas bag in their car. If they could walk just 15 minutes back up the creek, maybe Miss Piggy would get inside and they could carry her down.

A Big Girl!

Fortunately, the bag was a perfect fit for the pooch. Yet when Luke and Graham lifted her, she was approximately 88 pounds. Together, they could carry her, but they were afraid to risk dropping her down the bank. They had to make their Macgyver apparatus completely foolproof with strong branches threaded through the bag’s handles.

Finally Free

It was a 30-minute climb through the bushes to deliver Miss Piggy to the bottom of the mountain and over to where they parked. A happy Jessica wrote,“When we opened the back of the car, we were greeted with a different dog – the little tail was going a mile a minute.”

Oh No!

In order to track down the dog’s owner, Jessica posted on a Facebook page for lost pets in the area they had just hiked. Much to her surprise, she received a message just 30 minutes later from a man who lived about 9 miles from where she was hiding. “He was absolutely sure this was his dog, who’d been lost since Jun 30 after wandering out of their yard,” Jessica wrote. But she was crushed when he referred to the dog as “Bob”, implying he had lost a male dog…

My Hero!

Thankfully, the dog’s name was “Elly-Bobby” (named after Ricky Bobby) and Bobby’s dad had plenty of proof that Miss Piggy was his little girl after all. The poor man had been searching for hours every night since she disappeared, never giving up hope that he’d find her.

Happy Reunion

It was an emotional reunion of Bobby/Miss Piggy with her dad. It was a joyous sight for Jessica. It was a true miracle that the dog came out of the whole ordeal relatively unscathed. She had no signs of injury. Jessica says, “Whatever the story, we were just happy to have been in the right place at the right time to be able to help her.”