Stray Escort

There are many stray dogs on the roadside near the path entrance to the hill top.
Neutered, most of them are fearful of humans but some are friendly to regular hikers.
Lately some strays followed and acted as escorts to our human like this one.
He, a neutered male, escorted our human from the roadside up three-quarter way to a resting point.
When our human went down, he followed closely behind.
Our human purposely walked slow so that the stray could trot in front.

At this fork lower down, our 4-legged friend decided to wait for our slow human to catch up while enjoying the view. (We are experiencing a slight haze from open burning from a neighbouring country.)
On seeing the stray totally engrossed in his thoughts, our human quietly turned and quickly went uphill again.
Soon our human heard quiet shuffling behind, turned and saw our little escort behind.
Well, what can our human do except reward it with some kibbles that were kept in an air-tight sealed bag in the haversack.
This stray never left our human's side and followed all the way down to the road.