River Bend redux

It was another beautiful day today and a holiday to boot, so I decided to take the dogs to the River again for more hiking, swimming, and geocaching. Today, we crossed the river and cached on the other side. It was a very scenic area that was full of lots of wildlife (herons, egrets, ducks, geese, jackrabbits, deer). I spent as much time taking pictures as I did geocaching. But I did find 8 geocaches today! We hiked 6 miles, although it didn't seem like that far as we stopped so often to look for caches and to take pictures. It felt so good to get out again!

We stopped at several places along the river to take pictures and to let Hope and Nick swim, well, mostly Nick swam...

This was one of the first places we stopped after crossing the river...

This was another cool place that we stopped at to let the dogs swim...

You can't see it very well, but there was a heron on the island across the way. We stuck around for a while as I was waiting to see if he'd take flight, but he never did... 

Same place, different angle, converted to black and white...

A fun couple of days with the dogs in the beautiful weather. They haven't moved all night! The baths will have to wait until tomorrow....

Happy Valentine's Day!

We had a quiet day at home today for Valentine's Day, but here is a picture I took of my valentine doggies.  They don't look very happy, but they weren't cooperating.  I thought it was funny because it was like they were shaped like a heart. Or do I just have a weird imagination?

River Bend

I took Hope and Nick to River Bend Park to do some hiking and geocaching on Saturday. It turned out to be a beautiful day, we hiked 4 miles, found 13 geocaches, and the dogs had fun swimming in the river about mid-way through the hike.(click here for more pics)

It's funny, but Hope now refuses to swim if Nick is in the water ever since he learned how to swim last year and pushed her underwater. Can't say I blame her. So I have to put him in a down and make him stay with me and then she will go in, but only for a few times. Nick, on the other hand, now loves the water and loves to chase sticks. It's like the roles have reversed, go figure!

Unfortunately, I took my camera with me, but forgot to put the memory card back in, DUH. So this picture was taken with my camcorder camera and isn't the greatest. Oh well.

I'm still trying to figure out the software for the camcorder, so this is kind of pieced together. Not as easy as the Flip, but I'm sure I'll get used to it.

Oreo-dogs

We've had a sweet boy named Ethan visiting us for a few days.  The weather has actually been cooperating and I was able to take the dogs out for a hike and to play at the school (on the cement, since the fields are too muddy) this weekend.

I dubbed them the Oreos, if you look at the pictures, you'll see why! :-)

A small world

Last night, Hope and I had a visit at Sutter Rehab. I have taken all my CCI pups to Music Circus shows during the summer. We always sit in the same seats and have been going for years and there is a really nice older couple who always usher where we have our seats. The husband even brought dog biscuits for the dogs. What does Sutter Rehab and Music Circus have in common? Read on...

Turns out one of the patients we visited last night was our usher! Somehow we got to talking about Hope as she said she was so well behaved and she started talking about dogs and mentioned Music Circus and how well behaved the dogs were there that attend the shows. She said she recognized me from somewhere and that's where we made the connection, she remembered us going to the show. At the end of the visit, she said she hoped she would see us this summer! I'll have to make sure we get our tickets for the nights she is going to be there so we can see her, even though I won't have a pup. :-(

This is a picture of Hope (on the right) and her buddies at Music Circus when she was a pup in training...guess we saw "Fiddler on the Roof" in 2006!

These dogs certainly leave an impact on people...who would have thought Hope would get to be a therapy dog for someone we barely even know, but see every year? It's a small world, that's for sure!

A couple trips to the Lake

On Sunday afternoon, a friend called me up to see if I wanted to go geocaching with her and her dog. I was planning on taking the dogs out to the river anyway to do some hiking/geocaching with them, its more fun with a friend, so of course I said I would join her. Lucky for me, it was close to my house, so all I had to do was load up my GPS and leash up the dogs.

We went to a small nature area called Mormon Island Wetlands. It was more of a drylands than a wetlands, although a bit muddy in some places from the recent rains. See my geocaching blog for a few more pics (click here) Afterwards, we drove down a little bit to the parking area for the lake and let the dogs swim.

Nick and Hope at the sign by the entrance:

Hope takes Nick for a walk... :-)

I was glad to see that Nick remembered how to swim! He had finally started swimming right about the time we turned him in. Good boy! The only unfortunate thing is Hope no longer wants to swim when he's around, last year he pushed her underwater at Salmon Falls to get the stick she had fetched. I remember feeling a little panicked as she totally disappeared for a second, but she came back up quickly...guess she doesn't want to deal with that anymore.

The dogs came home and crashed that night and I didn't have the heart to wake them up to give them a bath as they were both filthy. That was my excuse to take them out to the Lake again yesterday after I got home from work! Nick had fun chasing sticks, Hope just hung out by the edge of the water mostly.

Here are a few pics I took...

Flying dogs....

Posing for yet another picture!