10.05.11

morning jaunt:
Bette
Gracie
Lily
Molly
Stella
Floyd
(6)

We have lots to do here today with a HelpX'er arriving in the afternoon, so I just wanted to get some dogs out for quick one. My plan was to go straight up the beach past the tortuga sign a little bit and come back the same way, like yesterday, but immediately upon hitting the beach there was a problem: tourists to the north, perhaps with a dog; I thought they were heading south. I decided to switch up quickly, and took us up the north road to doce, south to our trail, and to the tortuga sign via the monte the usual way. My thinking was that the tourists would be well past our house to the south by the time we got to the beach to the north, but I was all wrong: they were heading north, not south, had Ken and Karen's dog with them, and were moving very slowly. When we got to the beach they were about 50m south of the tortuga sign, directly in our way. Although I don't think there would've been a problem if we had blown by them, I just didn't have time today for any kind of issue so we turned around and went straight back into the monte and came home the way we went: ~4k. We got home and I had all the dogs put away before those people had made it to the soldiers', so even though they didn't get to swim very much and didn't go very far we seriously ran those 4k at top speed with only one brief stop.
GRADE: A

beach run/swim:
George
Tuesday
Daisy
Mo
Una
Twiggy
Xmul
(7)

Once again, foiled by people. The beach looked clear to the north when we left, but when we got around the bend there was a group of local kids just to the north of the tortuga sign. They must've been beach-combing further north before and we didn't see them. The pups adore Tuesday, who was on the leash the whole way, and who put up with all kinds of abuse from her little puppy friends with no complaints. We turned around south of the sign and headed back, half-swimming, half-running the whole way. Tuesday was fine until about 50m from our house, when she got that paranoid look again and started hanging back, digging in against the leash. It turns out she's a good influence on the pups, because for once they all just came right in without having to be rounded up, following Tuesday the whole way. I don't know why Tuesday gets into that dark place when she goes on a run with me, but it was still a nice, fun run/swim.
GRADE: A

rehab swims:
Greta
Shirley
(2)

Greta did 7 laps and Shirley did 6 in calm seas. The water was nice. Shirley really wants to run, but she's a trooper and enjoyed swimming. Greta made me carry her all the way to the water... someone observing from town with binoculars would swear that a wolf-man was wrestling a small, brown bear into the ocean repeatedly.
GRADE: A