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morning walk:
Blue
Bette
Reggie
Monkey
Amber
Zoot
(6)
Roni took this group for a very fast walk in the monte. They took the land bridge to the area below the ridge near the charcos and walked north, got barked at by Angel's dogs a little across the land bridge, looped around and came home more or less the way the came. Bette was only on the leash for the first 50m, Reggie was on for the whole way (using Roni's harness technique plus one of the blue leashes for some length). Amber got put on the hook coming home as usual. Everyone had a good time and kept a high pace.
GRADE: A
morning run:
Posey
Frijolita*
Truman
Gowron
Xmul
Mega
Steve McQueen
Murci
Cookie
(9)
Southern charcos: ~8k. Frijolita screwed me like she did once before: she decided she didn't want to go south just as we got across the land bridge, turned tail and ran home. When I saw the look on her face I knew she was going to do that so I didn't bother arguing with her. I don't know what she has against that route but I won't take her that way again. The rest of my charges were just fine with this route - it was, in fact, a blast. Once we turned east into the monte it was extremely flooded in parts and everyone had a good time slogging through the water and muck until we reached a dry trail again. As we passed the intersection with the bag-end land bridge I heard machinery to the northeast, where it sounded like they were running a salt loader, so we crossed west at the wide berm just south of that spot. Everyone knew what I was thinking and did exactly what they should do without my saying anything. The swimming hole was fun and everyone enjoyed it. I forgot about Angel's corner being so populated with dogs right now and crossed at the alt. land bridge, which got us barked at. A few of my charges went to investigate but came back quickly. I should just run the ridge to get home for a while, since we all like it and it bypasses that spot. No real misbheavior and a very high pace on an overcast day.
GRADE: A
morning walk:
Alice
Ginger
Gracie
Blue
Rita
Ernie
Molly
Zoila
(8)
I took this group for a walk to and on the beach for the most part. We headed north to the shack, cut across the charcos and arrived at the tortuga sign in fairly quick order. Zoila was off the leash for the early part of the walk and was really good. I had Ernie on the leash early to keep him from punching himself out with his manic enthusiasim and this worked well... I let him off on the beach and he was great for the rest of the way. We went south down the beach from the tortuga sign and cut back into the monte at the maginot line; we were barked at dutifully by the dogs at the HoJo and Zoila paid them no attention. As we crossed doce I got her on the leash and this worked out well for the rest of the way home. She wanted to pull but that's better than sitting down and refusing to walk. In fact she lightened up on the pulling by the time we got to the shrimpery and enjoyed herself on the leash. Everyone else was really good the whole way to the gate.
GRADE: A
morning walk:
Miles
Henry
Tito
Blue
Bette
Stella
Monkey
Linda
(8)
Roni took this group out for a walk across the land bridge and to the south. Henry and Miles made it difficult in different spots, for different reasons... Miles because of his dawdling and Henry because he simply didn't want to go down a bluff coming back towards the land bridge. Keeping a group together with Miles in it is pretty difficult. Everyone did well and had a good time.
GRADE: A
morning run #1:
Godzilla
Otto
Shirley
Daisy
Hazel
Junebug
(6)
Up the beach to Au Soleil Couchant: ~5k. The main idea was a training run for June that also got some of the shorter-distance dogs out. I decided before I left I wouldn't try any leash work with June on this one, I just wanted her to listen, have a good time and be influenced by good dogs. It worked out well: we did not run into any salt workers and even if we had I think June was listening well enough that it wouldn't have been a problem; last time when I had both her and her sister it was that much harder when we ran into humans, and the fact that they were uncooperative made it worse. We left with Hazel on the leash; I let her off as we were reaching the wooden shack to the north and she was fine from there on. We took the long way via the blue bag trail in both directions. The ocean is churned up right now from a storm but even so June was game to swim several times and tested herself in the waves a bit - very cute. Otherwise she listened well and played a lot with Hazel and Daisy; I made sure neither of them roughhoused too much with her but she doesn't seem to have any issues that way and everyone was friendly. On the way home she got a little squirrely at the shrimpery and wanted to run ahead a little to get home but she didn't just run off and I managed to keep us together across the road and to the gate.
GRADE: A
morning run #2:
Rufus
Jack
Twiggy
Luna
MoMo
Roxy
(6)
Up the beach to Au Soleil Couchant: ~4k. Rufus really wanted to get out and it will probably be the case that I have to take dogs to the vet this week so we wanted to make sure he got a run in today. Roxy can always get thrown in on these kinds of runs - she always needs it. Rufus was a little less of a bear about the muzzle yet again. Every time we do it it gets a little easier; I think he's starting to get that it comes off when he calms down but he still gets himself worked up too much. I think if we keep this up for a while he will calm down more and not need it but for now this is better than the old way. I had Rufus and Roxy both on the leash from the shrimpery until we turned north at which point I let Rufus off, but I ended up putting him right back on when I saw Angel's moto up at the wooden shack. As we got near I saw four of the adults that both Angel and we have been watching over emerge from the shack, where Angel was obviously hanging out with Chino, his buddy who spends a lot of time there. Once everyone saw everyone else the four monte dogs bolted up the blue bag trail, which is their normal way to get around and south to Angel's corner. Luna and Jack were the only ones serious about giving chase and I reeled them in verbally before we made it down the embankment. There were no hostilities or even barking. I'll go see Solitaria (the female) and her pups later. I took the shorter way around the charco to the north to leave those dogs alone, and we took the maginot line from the beach coming home to avoid the shack altogether. All in all everyone was good, listened and had a good time. It was overcast yet hot; it even rained on us a bit on the beach but when the weather is like this nothing gives a break. Hardly any bugs noticeable for some reason.
GRADE: A
morning run:
Eve
Posey
Chester
Elewah
Xmul
Mega
Steve McQueen
Murci
Cookie
(9)
Southern charcos and then some: ~9k (maybe 10k, have to check). We did the usual route up the length of the palapa road, but then I thought maybe they would enjoy a swim. It was overcast and slightly cooler out and the heat wasn't a factor so I took us all the way down the Au Soleil Couchant access road only to discover a group of boats about 800m to the south on the beach. If I hadn't had Elewah with me I wouldn't have cared but she can be an ass and I didn't feel like wrangling her so I just let everyone have a dip, turned us around and headed back the way we came, coming home instead via the blue bag trail. This added quite a bit of length to the run. I scooped Elewah up at the shrimpery; it was absolutely no fun jog/walking that final 300m home without being able to use my hands to defend against the bugs, which were terrible at the end. Still, everyone had a great time.
GRADE: A
morning walk:
Bette
Reggie
Monkey
Amber
Zoot
(5)
Roni took this group out for a very fast walk in the monte. They went across the land bridge and to the south to avoid the salt worker clusters on the dirty road and elsewhere. Reggie was off the leash a little but Roni left him on for the most part, with Amber on the leash coming home. The pace was high and everyone had a good time.
GRADE: A
morning walk:
Alice
Ginger
Gracie
Blue
Chester
Ernie
Molly
Ziggy
Stella
Linda
(10)
I took this group for a walk in the monte; we jogged a little in spots when the bugs were especially terrible. Ernie and Stella left on leashes; Ernie came off after we crossed the land bridge heading out. I had a feeling there would be salt workers between the land bridges and I was correct, so instead we took an odd southern route we haven't done in a while: all the way south to the last entrace into the monte, on the "terreno federal" road back north and across the charco to the tar paper shack and the main road again and home the way we went. This is basically the same distance as the ridge (maybe a little bit longer). Everyone was really good and enjoyed the different scenery.
GRADE: A
morning run:
Godzilla
Rita
Rufus
Lily
Jack
Luna
Roxy
(7)
Up the beach past Au Soleil Couchant: ~6k. Rufus was less of a bear on the muzzle - he didn't try any crazy flips to get it off and was calmer by the time I did than on previous runs. I put Roxy on the other leash at the shrimpery. She came off on the beach but I put her back on again when we headed back into the monte at the tortuga sign. EVeryone behaved themselves the whole run, kept up and had a good time.
GRADE: A
morning run:
George
Otto
Shirley
Maggie
Twiggy
MoMo
Cookie
Zoila
Junebug
(9)
Up the beach and back a twisted way: ~7k. This started out as a short puppy training run and ended up being quite a bit longer due mainly to the actions of a few irritating salt workers. We left heading north towards the shack and took the short-cut to the beach around the charcos, which are now filling up from rain. We didn't see or hear any salt workers anywhere heading out. Zoila and June were really good and had a good time with the rest of the group. George and Maggie were lagging a little bit on the way back but I didn't think it was a big deal. We were almost home, on the last stretch of the road heading south from the shack before the dead goat intersection when we saw a truck of salt workers heading towards us. Neither Zoila nor June were too thrilled about this, as I suspected they would be. I thought I wrangled things pretty well by leading us all down onto the shore of the charco to get around them but one of the salt workers insisted on walking down and blocking our paths, freaking Zoila out a bit; worse, he acted as though he somehow couldn't understand Spanish and simply stood there like a lump with his mouth hanging open after I asked him several times to please move back a bit. Finally it became obvious that he would not move without a fight and I had bigger problems, as Zoila now wanted to head the other direction. I decided there was no dealing with the people so I turned us around to head back to the blue bag trail. George had alread moved ahead and obviously didn't want to turn around and go all the way back, as he had already been lagging and wanted to get home, so I left him to go home himself (he knows the way) and concentrated on the rest of the group. I thought Maggie might go with George but she wanted to stay with me, even though she had already been lagging... she was a real trooper on the way home. We ended up going all the way back to the cut-over and the ridge, and came home via the land bridge - almost double the distance I had intended. I tried Zoila on the leash a little near the end but there was really no point - we were all tired and wanted to get home. The pups had a lot of fun but I won't be taking them both out like this together for a while until they get better on leashes. Nobody really misbehaved, we just got screwed over by some very uncooperative people.
GRADE: B
morning run:
Posey
Eve
Truman
Xmul
Mega
Steve McQueen
Lex
Murci
Cookie
(9)
Southern charcos: ~8k. Everyone was really up for this one and the whole group consisted of serious running dogs so we more or less flew the whole way. We ran the entire palapa road from south to north, looped around to the swimming hole and came home via the alt. land bridge. Everyone was great and had a good time.
GRADE: A
morning walk:
Zasu
Blue
Bette
Tito
Linda
Monkey
Zoila
(7)
Roni too this group for a walk in the monte. The idea was to hit the land bridge but there were people there and when they turned to head down the dirty road there were more salt workers and a dog barking around the bend. Roni did a little leash work with Zoila. The bugs were terrible so the walk was a little shorter than normal but nobody minded.
GRADE: A
morning walk:
Bette
Monkey
Linda
Stella
Amber
Zoot
(6)
Roni took this group out for a fast walk more or less around the cow pasture and environs. There were groups of salt workers everywhere close by but everyone was good about staying with their human. The bugs were bad so everyone kept moving.
GRADE: A
morning walk #2:
Zoila
(1)
Roni took Zoila out on her own for a little one-on-one with the leash.
GRADE: A
morning walk #3:
Miles
(1)
I took Miles for a stroll in the bugs. He dawdled, I did the dance of the mosquitoes.
GRADE: A
morning run:
Rita
Gowron
Otto
Shirley
Rufus
Twiggy
(6)
Up the beach past Au Soleil Couchant: ~6k. Rufus needed to get out, as did everyone else in this group. We took the blue.bag trail to the tortuga sign road to the beach, headed north just past Au Soleil Couchant and came home via the slightly shorter way from the tortuga sign. Rufus was slightly less of a bear in the first 250m and was a good boy once off the muzzle. Shirley had to be on the leash for a spell to keep her from punching herself out. Nobody misbheaved and everyone had a good time.
GRADE: A
morning run:
Godzilla
Chester
Daisy
Xmul
Mega
Lex
Steve McQueen
Murci
Cookie
(9)
Up the beach and back: ~8k. We really wanted Xmul to get out today because we'll be busy all day tomorrow with the sterilization clinic. Since we left late I took us mostly up the beach; it's basically 2k to the tortuga sign the way we normally go, and we ran at least 2k up the beach with a lot of swimming and horsing around on the way. Chester, as usual, avoided the water and had his own, weird kind of fun in the sand instead. Everyone was really good the whole way.
GRADE: A
morning walk #1:
Blue
Bette
Reggie
Monkey
Amber
Zoot
(6)
Roni took this group for a fast walk in the monte. Bette and Reggie left on leashes, with Reggie's tied into a harness; Bette came off quickly and Reggie was downgraded to plain-old-leash/no-harness once across the road. Linda was slated to go but was just too disruptive getting into the launchpad and even caused a briefly-terrifying accident: Amber got her front right paw stuck under a metal hook sticking out from the gate and freaked out. It turned out that she was alright but the whole thing was caused by Linda's poor pre-walk behavior, so she went in the box for a bit and sat this one out. She has to learn to tone it down when told, so we're being sterner with her and she can't always get her way. Once past this incident everyone else was fine. Roni got Amber on the leash on the way home and everyone behaved themselves well. The bugs were unreal, really for the first time this rainy season: black clouds of mosquitos were visible at any stopping point, so there were not too many of those. Roni actually had to use a bit of bug spray in the air around her generally to dispell the cloud of blood-suckers that had harried her all the way home and into the yard... haven't done that for a few months now. On the other hand it was pretty out and there were large flamingos in the nearby charcos; the dogs were good and the flamingos were mellow. Everyone did well and had a good time.
GRADE: A
morning walk #2:
Zasu*
Miles
Henry*
Stella
(4)
This was supposed to be a short jaunt down to the beach to screw around in the surf while avoiding most of the bugs. Zasu more or less scotched it by turning her ears off to investigate the brush near the road, which was in the wrong direction as Roni was heading to the beach via the southern access road. Roni had to turn around and go get Zasu, who was now surrounded by a black cloud of mosquitos near the road. Zasu decided she'd had enough of the world and came back to the gate. Henry followed her, so I let them both back in and Roni took Stella and Miles down to the beach for a short walk. They both had a good time.
GRADE: B
morning run:
Posey
Eve
Rufus
Frankie
Mega
Petey
Hazel
(7)
Up the beach past Au Soleil Couchant: ~5k. We took the blue.bag trail to the tortuga sign, went north past Au Soleil Couchant and came home via the shortcut next to the charcos. Rufus was a bear about the muzzle for the first 250m, but this time I didn't screw it up and it stayed on so he had to settle down and deal; the muzzle came off shortly after the shrimpery and he came off the leash after we were heading north towards the shack. Everyone was good the whole way. This is Petey's distance and also his kind of run. He rolled in some awful filth early on but one dip in the ocean fixed that. The sea was really churned up and there were even waves, something all of The Tribe love. Mega and Pete swam every time I asked them to and didn't mind the rough seas at all. It wasn't hot and the bugs were only bad in spots. All in all a nice, short, fast-paced run with some fun in the surf to boot.
GRADE: A
morning walk:
Gracie
George
Rita
Godzilla
Otto
Tuesday
Shirley
Molly
Daisy
(9)
I took this group for an extended walk to the north. We took the blue.bag trail to the road and headed north to the crossroads, went east a bit to catch the road that comes back on the opposite shore of the charcos and came home via the ridge and the land bridge. Everyone was really up for this one. I left with only Tuesday on the leash but I put Shirley on before we turned north towards the shack - she was going too fast, pulling everyone forward and was set to gas out halfway through if I didn't rein her in. I left her on the long leash for most of the walk and she had a good time; it was also a much nicer pace for everyone else without her frenetic energy on point. Gracie and George were cute together, frequently paling around. We saw nobody but we did get barked at halfway to the cut-over heading south, perhaps by the same dog that barked at Roni yesterday. We saw a couple flamingos in the nearby charcos here and there; recent rain accumulated a little. Everyone was really good and had a great time the whole way.
GRADE: A
morning walk:
Blue
Bette
Tito
Gowron
Monkey
Linda
Zoila
Junebug
(8)
Roni took this group for a walk in the monte on the other side of the land bridge. She originally thought to go across the ridge between the land bridges but as she got close to the northern bridge she heard a dog barking just across it. PupG decided she was going to charge off and investigate so Roni redirected everyone back towards the charcos just to the east of the ridge and PupG turned around. Everyone liked that route since there's a lot of fun to be had sliding around in the charcos and sniffing around on their banks. They continued south of the main land bridge for a southern bonus loop and came home the way they left. The pups did well for the most part but taking both of them was probably a mistake - there was too much mischievous energy in this group (PupG). Roni tried Zoila on the leash a little towards the end with mixed results. They both had a good time but could use some more outings with fewer dogs to make sure they have good habits. Tito did amazingly well considering the pace. Roni carried him a couple of times over large puddles (he prefers to supervise the fordings) but he was generally game and kept up. Bette, as always, said "YAY!".
GRADE: B (PupG)
morning run:
Truman
Frijolita
Elewah
Lily
Jack
Xmul
Lex
Murci
Cookie
(9)
Southern charcos: ~8k. The monte was soaked after recent rains but the bugs are still not terrible. We ran the palapa road in its entirety from south to north, looped around to the swimming hole and came home via the alt. land bridge. The only place we saw salt workers was at the very end crossing that last bridge, where there was a small group to the north in the charco just west of Angel's corner. Everyone was good the entire way until the very end, when Elewah jumped some poor dude on a bike who happened to appear at the end of the last trail just as we were nearing it; she led Lily and a couple others north up the road after him lackadaisically, making more noise than doing anything. At least she had the sense to come back to me and come to the gate with the rest of us. The guy in question was going to work at a house to the north of us, so I walked up and apologized after I let the dogs in. No harm, no foul, but she's a jerk about bikes and I should be scooping her up at the shrimpery instead of letting her have her head at the end. Otherwise it was a high-paced, fun run.
GRADE: B
afternoon beach jaunt:
Blue
Chester
Rufus
Twiggy
Luna
MoMo
(6)
Up the beach past the tortuga sign: ~4k. It was early afternoon and a bit cloudy so what the hell - Rufus really wanted to get out. The rest of the group suggested itself quickly. It was a bit rough getting out of the launchpad; Rufus got the muzzle off by himself so I had to force him to focus on running the old-fashioned way... it was operator error, I put it on too loose. Once over that hurdle everything was fine. We took the maginot line to the beach, which was really churned up by a storm. Nobody wanted to swim all that much but I made them go in a few times heading north. We got barked at a little by a stray near the HoJo but it was so windy we could barely hear - I saw it give up as we turned north. Since swimming wasn't that fun I figured we might as well stretch our legs running, so we went a bit farther than the sign, turned around and went into the monte there instead of going all the way back on the beach. I took the pace up when we entered the monte and everyone enjoyed that. There was some cloud-cover so it wasn't too bad and I had a little water in the bottle so I gave it out and we hauled ass for most of the way home. Nice, short run with the black-and-blue crew (all black dogs except for Blue).
GRADE: A
