Pigs and bunnies and horses… oh, my!
A life-changing visit to Best Friends Animal Society: Day 1

There’s an easy way, and there’s a hard way.

The easy way slopes upward, but gradually and the rocks form a natural staircase.

The hard way follows the same path, but it’s a slick, steep rock with few toeholds. There’s a prickly bush that catches your pants and branches too thin to use for balance but thick enough and at just the right height to get you in the face.

We’re going to take the hard way.

Cyrus Mejia, co-founder of Best Friends Animal Society, says the easy way belongs to the rattlesnakes. Each time he hiked Turtle Canyon along the easy route, he encountered the snakes. So, one day, he hiked up and struck a deal with the rattlers: We’ll climb the hard way from here on out as long as you stay on your side, the easy side. The snakes agreed, and so he hikes the hard way… and hasn’t ever encountered a snake on that path.

Anywhere else, from anyone else, I might not have believed it. But Cyrus? I believed Cyrus.

There’s an easy way, and there’s a hard way.

“Save them all” is the hard way.

It’s hyperbolic. Grandiose. Save them all? Really?

Yes, really. If it can be done, Best Friends will do it.

I was elated when I received an invitation to spend a few days at the sanctuary on a sponsored media tour. To be honest, I didn’t read the details of the email; I just said YES! Even if I had read it–tours of Horse Haven and Piggy Paradise, puppy socialization class, a hike to Turtle Canyon with one of the sanctuary’s co-founders, and so much more–I still wouldn’t have believed just how much the experience exceeded every high expectation I had.

The first morning we–there were 6 of us–piled into cars to head to the sanctuary. The refrain was, “I am SO excited.” Everyone was gushing, which is unusual for a media tour when most people (not me… never me…) play it cool. As we passed the giant orange sign marking the entrance, tears filled my eyes (see? never cool).

This is the place that saved all those animals in Katrina and the place that saved the Vicktory dogs–and still cares for 6 of them. This is the place of Dogtown and The Champions. This is the place of Angels Rest.

We arrived, climbed in a tour bus, and rattled off to Horse Haven. As we stepped off the bus, two women called out. One led a miniature pony–Uncle Feather–and the other led an awkward, gangly foal. They yelled for us to stop, led the horses to a pasture, locked the gate, and called us over.

The foal, Little Prince, was four weeks old.

He had that morning been released from quarantine, and we were about to witness his very first moments of play, unrestrained and free.

The woman you see in the pasture is a trainer, and she kept saying that as much as she wanted to snuggle and pat and hug Prince, it wouldn’t help him learn to be an appropriate horse. Instead, she kept shooing him out of her “bubble” so he starts to learn boundaries. It was a common theme throughout the trip: The welfare of the animals factors above everything else, even your desire to snuggle a precious foal with a baby mane.

From there, to the potbellied pigs. I fell in love. They’re hilarious and smart and sweet. I gave a big boy named Jared a belly rub and swooned over the piglets squeaking away in their pen. I could’ve stayed all day, but we were whisked to goats where the cutest little goat tried to eat the zipper off my sweatshirt as I gave him a back massage.

Back on the bus and off to birds. The birds are worth their own post by someone who knows birds better than I, but my impressions: They are loud. And feisty. And also very funny. They’re brilliant; an African grey named Cody kept making fun of us with a fake-polite laugh. We clicker trained cockatiels to touch a target stick and rewarded them with millet. The exercise helps them get weighed without force.

But I feel for those birds. I can see how people get in over their heads thinking a bird will be an easy pet, and those birds were anything but easy. And the noise… My ears rang for an hour after! Their caretaker was fabulous. She loved and doted on them. She knew each bird individually, their quirks and personality traits. And she told us all about bird breeding, how it’s akin to puppy mills, and the problem–the crisis, she called it–is confounded by how long the birds live. We met a Mealy Amazon named Paco who was born in 1957. It was gut-wrenching to see the birds who, in their homes, had been so stressed that they plucked out all their own feathers, leaving their bodies looking like a plucked chicken while their vibrant, expressive plumes showed the bird they were before. One even sported a leather vest because he was addicted to self-mutilation. {To learn more}

We then went to the bunnies, which was the literal opposite of the birds: quiet, calm, peaceful. Their caretaker was adorable. When she talked for the bunnies–as we all do with our own pets–she had this adorable affectation. It was clear how much she adored the bunnies (and Guinea pigs) in her care. It illustrated so perfectly the ethos at Best Friends: every single life matters. By the way, the bunnies are also clicker trained!

At lunch–the sanctuary has a vegetarian cafeteria–we ate with a handful of the co-founders. I was thrilled to sit and chat with Gregory Castle about all sorts of things, but mostly reactive dogs.

Then, we met Cyrus for the most spectacular hike of my entire life. One of my new friends on the media tour made the point that none of our photos were turning out because they’re just not immersive. You can’t get the sense of being engulfed by 200-million-year-old rocks.

We climbed–the hard way–to the top of Turtle Canyon. We saw the remaining elements of a home of basket dwellers, people who pre-dated pottery. Protected by the elements in a small cave, the home structure, hearth, and cooking stones are entirely enact (as is Mormon graffiti from 1919). We saw petroglyphs carved in the walls: a shaman holding a snake, circles, waves, another snake.

We arrived at Angels Rest. I can’t do it justice. It’s beauty and magic. I cried. A lot. If we hadn’t been in a group on a tour, I would’ve sat on a bench and wept.

The hike down felt easy compared to the way up, but I was so emotionally drained after Angels Rest that it felt slower, too. At the bottom, exhausted, we climbed back into the cars. Covered in dust and filled with hope and love, we went back to the hotel for a rest before dinner.

And all that?

All that was before we met a single dog.