A short story about what I learned today.

This is a big manky waterfall. I learned today that swimming in a turbulent pool directly above big manky water falls is a bad idea even for a dog of high swimming ability such as myself. I only wanted to rescue Jason from the horrible experience of being in the river without me but as I jumped into Pauley Creek in the Sierra Mountains of NorCal and heard everyone frantically calling me, I thought, perhaps I had made a bad decision. As I was was swept toward the lip of the falls I figured out why it was a bad idea. Just as I was about to go over, one of the other boaters paddled out and made a micro eddy behind his boat so that I could swim next to it, grabbed my collar and pushed me to Anna who had jumped in the river, in her clothes and was standing waste deep just beyond the current. I was pretty exhausted at this point from being stuck in the current swimming upstream so she pulled me in to the rocks and I crawled out of the water with my tail between my legs. Oops. In an effort to teach me that whitewater is bad for dogs, my people then took me to the Reno, NV white water park where Jason threw sticks in the river just above a big hole. I went deep a couple times, it freaked me out but I still tried to rescue the sticks. Enough about me. Here are a few shots of Pauley Creek which flows along the famous Downieville Downhill. Jason hooked up with some boaters from Mammoth Lakes to run the creek while Anna and I went for a run up the trail and took some pictures.



While we were in Truckee CA Anna got a chance to visit a few of her childhood hang outs. That's Donner Lake in the back ground and Truckee just beyond that.



We also got a chance to go climb around on her old jungle gym. She used to spend time just about everyday sitting on this rock, hanging out, enjoying the view. That's why she can't tell you jack about movies or music from the 80s and 90s yet, can explain in detail every crack, bump, cave and piece of lichen that exists on this large granite rock. We had to pry her off the rock and bribe her with chocolate to get back in the car. Good thing Jason is patient.



So, there you have it. Now we're working hard in Price UT where the grill lines are stained on the microwaved chicken but the fun riding and good people make up for it. I keep trying to tell my people that they should try dog food for a few days and then complain about painted meat but they just tell me to stop barking. We've got to work on the language barrier.

City Girl

The city is not the friendliest place for dogs but occasionally the shorter half of my team of chauffeurs will take me for a rebellious run on a golf course.



The problem with big cities is that all the trails surrounding them don't seem to allow dogs so my mom gets to eat all the gross stuff that I would usually find, like banana slugs... I think she ran out of GU on this ride outside of Redwood City CA. They told me it was uphill both ways! HOW FUN!



Luckily, after leaving So-Cal, we spent a night in Kernville and played in the river! It made up for all the time stuck in traffic.



I did get to go on this ride in Pacifica CA but after I ran through piles of poison oak, my people stuck me in the car for the second lap. It was full of fun kickers, and fast bermed turns... I had no choice but to run through the Poison Oak so they wouldn't land on me.



Something about muscle beach...



We headed over to Oakland CA after galavanting around the South side of the Bay Area for a week of working with local land managers, cycling clubs and trail users to talk about access issues and show them how to build some sweet single track. In return they showed us how to ride up some STEEP fire roads. My peeps also got to go for an incredible ride in Tamirancho, miles of swoopy single track in Marin County.



which included some nice breaks...



As we left the Bay Area I kept thinking I smelled something familiar and then I saw this huge white mountain that I recognized... we were going home (kind of)! Technically we were home because we live in the car but we seemed to be going to my grandogma's house where I would surely be spoiled and taken for lots of runs in the woods, get to play in the yard, chase squirrels and harass chickens. Mount Shasta is like Disney Land for dogs and my people seem to feel the same way about it.