It was an early evening in November. We were just outside of Grants New Mexico on I-40 East. My husband and I were on our way to Georgia to deliver a load. My husband is a truck driver and I was traveling with him, along with our two dogs, a lab mix and a Chihuahua. I was sitting in the passenger seat when out of the blue this dog came running out on the highway. We almost hit this dog!
My husband pulled the 18-wheeler over to the shoulder quickly and I threw my shoes on and got out of the truck. We were scared for the dog's life—it could get hit by a vehicle. The dog had stopped running and seemed scared and unsure about what to do. At first she just stood there and looked at us! I had forgotten to shut the door on the truck and my lab mix had jumped out after me. My dog ran to the stray dog and so I was able to grab the stray dog, a female. She had a collar on but no tags.
So we loaded her up and once we got her in the truck I checked her out to make sure she was okay. And while I was checking her out I realized we had a beautiful purebred Redbone Coonhound in our truck. I got online and did some searching to find out if anyone had a missing dog in the area. Found nothing! She stayed on the truck with us for the night and that was a very long night. With not much sleep, because she whined and cried all the time.
The next morning I was again on the computer looking desperately for the owners or a place for this dog. I wasn't going to dump her off at a "kill" shelter—I don't believe in that. I made call after call trying to find a place for this dog. Eventually I talked with a hound rescuer in Austin Texas and I sent pictures of the stray dog to him. Yes, she was a coonhound. The rescuer, Jerry, frantically called his contacts everywhere to find a place for this dog. He called us back and told us to take her to a place right out of Amarillo Texas named Critter Camp. She would wait there until another of Jerry's contacts could pick her up and bring her to an Austin Texas-based rescue group. Later that day I got an email from Jerry telling me that if he can't find the owners of this dog, he had someone ready to adopt her. All in a days work!
I'm a huge animal lover. Both my husband and I have saved many dogs. We take them out of horrible situations and find good loving homes for them. Someday I want to open my own business to help animals!
—Rachel, with Alan, her truckdriver husband
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