03.12.13

morning run:
Lucy
Otto
Rita
George
Archie
Shirley
Rufus
Ernie
Maggie
(9)

Swampy southern loop: ~5k. I'm not totally sure about the distance on this one because there was a bit of dithering on my part. We went out by fording the land bridge and started south; I was thinking we'd cut across the charcos at the tar paper shack to get to the terreno federal trail and that would make a nice little loop to the intersection but the charcos there were much more flooded than I realized. I started off south again thinking we'd run around them but it was starting to get hot so I changed my mind; I decided to turn us around and head north on the main road, both to avoid xmul and underbrush (Maggie) and because this is a rare time when there is hardly any traffic. The intersection is flooded and there's nowhere to go so nobody goes that way right now. Everyone had a good time swimming everywhere and smelling all the cow poo strewn liberally on the road; there are also horse droppings so the monte is a fragrant paradise to a dog right now. We came home from the intersection via the cut-over, alt. land bridge and dirty road; the cut-over is pretty beaten down now since we've gone over it a lot lately but Maggie always insists on charging into the ice-plant or the weeds no matter how hard I try to keep her on the straight and narrow... I'm sure she has a lot of xmuls in her coat. She had a blast, at least, and kept up well, as did Lucy. This was a run of limpy, older, pudgy dogs so we kept the pace down and I gave everyone time to swim or catch up if they were behind. I had Shirley on the leash the whole time - she's just too crazed about hunting lizards to let her off; we're afraid she'll hurt her hips again and she's doing so well now. She didn't seem to mind and was really up for whatever we did. In general they were angelic and had a great time.
GRADE: A