Beach Time

We checked into the hotel over an hour later than we expected because the holiday traffic from people going home was pretty crazy.  Our hotel room had a glass door which was weird, but it gave Ruger a lookout point to watch Doug unload our bags: 

I knew we couldn’t take the dogs on the Boardwalk, but I thought we could take them on the Wharf.  Nope.  We walked down a portion of the pier to see if anything fun was happening.  It was pretty mellow and cold! 

We stopped at a dog friendly restaurant that is not dog friendly anymore.  I asked the bar tender if we could order a couple meals to go so we could sit at the bistro set out front.  Of course the specials weren’t available “to-go”.  She was awesome though!  She said she would let us order them and then pack them in to-go containers.  Then she changed her mind and said she would bring us drinks, food on REAL plates and everything we needed to eat out front.  Even the security guy at the door ended up bringing us drinks and greeting the dogs.  We left them a fairly large tip for going out of their way; we pretty much had our own private wait staff.  I like to think we helped bring them a little business since a few people walking by were commenting that our food looked good.  (We ate BBQ ribs and fries). 

I tried to take a fun picture of Doug and the dogs, but it didn't work out.  We were very close to a capturing very cute picture though:

Winnie wouldn’t go to the bathroom anywhere, so we took a walk to a nearby park.  We leashed them to a basketball pole and let them roam around on their 26 foot leashes.  She still wouldn’t go.  After wondering around, trying to get her to go to the bathroom over and over again, we finally gave up.  It was cold in the evening and we didn’t have anything more than short sleeves, so we went back to the hotel room.  Doug appreciated the extra relaxation since his head was really sore.  Side note:  we have a Cal King bed at home because Doug is tall.  The hotel bed was a Queen size; Doug ended up hitting his new staples on the headboard when he tried to lay down.  Ouchie!!  Since we don’t let the dogs on the furniture or bed at home, we figured we would in the hotel room (we had to pay for them to be with us, so why not!!??).  They LOVED it! 

It was amazing - Ruger slept in!  He still got up early to go out and pee, but he would climb back in bed and sleep again.  One morning we slept until after TEN!!!  I can’t remember the last time I slept in after 7:30!  Most of the time we’re up before 6am (if we’re lucky, we get to sleep until 5:45); we take turns getting up with them on the weekends.  The extra sleep was worth the extra $50 per night to have both dogs with us. 

We found a dog park not too far away, so we took the dogs on a walk the next morning.  If Winnie could let out a sigh of relief, it would have been loud!  She was holding in both pee and poop for over a day and a half.  There were a few dogs to play with each time we went, but we mainly used it as Winnie’s toilet. 

We walked back to the hotel so Doug could get some rest; we didn’t have much planned besides wondering around to beaches, eating and relaxing – perfect plan for Doug’s head injury. 

We walked everywhere since parking was pretty slim at the hotel.  We packed up our beach chairs, towels, dog leashes, drinks, etc and ventured through the city.  The restaurant we wanted to try was on the way to the dog friendly beach, which was about 2 miles away. It was featured on Diners, Drive Ins and Dives.  Honestly, I’ve never seen the show. 

The dogs were very well behaved while we ate our food; the waitress brought a bowl of water for the dogs too.  Lunch view:

Lunch was great, the weather was great and the view was great too.  It was great! Ha! 

We walked to the beach after we finished lunch.  I have a lot of trouble choosing pictures sometimes, so here are a bunch more beach pictures: 

 This is how my picture dilemma goes:  I like this one because it's mellow:

 I like this one because it had a big splash:

And I like this one because it has a splash, but I can still see the green rock before the wave covers it:

Ruger had a blast!!  When the first couple waves rolled in he wasn’t too sure of them, but then he wanted to chase the waves, run up and down the beach, dig in the sand, play in the water, eat the foam, etc.  Winnie, on the other hand, wasn’t very fond of it.  She became a parkour ninja when the waves washed in near her. 

We tried to take some pictures of ourselves.  Ruger was squirmy, so I pulled on the nape of his neck.  The pictures are SO funny and still make me laugh because I was apparently stretching his face backwards: 

Then I tried to get fun pictures of the pups: 

And finally pictures of Doug and me: 

Winnie decided the beach was pretty fun: 

This picture was just before a woman came over and said, “My dog isn’t very friendly, but I’m going to do some off-leash training over here for a little while.”  WHAT THE…?!?!? 

I knew EXACTLY what was about to happen.  This dumb girl was going to unleash her dog up the beach a little and he was going to run to our dogs.  YEP!!!  That dog took off like a bat outta hell running towards our dogs.  She ran after him; yeah right she could catch him and yeah right she could call him back to stop him. 

I saw the dog coming and said, “oh no, oh no, oh no….”  I don’t remember if I gave the leash I was holding to Doug, or if he was already holding both of our dogs.  Her dog reached us and our dogs were ready to go.  I’m so glad our dogs are always used to playing with other dogs!!  I immediately stood up shouted “NO!” and pictured what was about to happen – I knew not to use my arms or upper body to stop the impending fight, so I quickly shoved her dog with my knee, grabbed it by the back of its collar and pulled it about 5 feet from our dogs.  I was waiting for her dog to turn on me, but I was ready to fight this dog.  Sounds dumb, but it’s true. 

In a split second I saw what could have been my future of wrestling this dog into a submission hold and laying all my weight on her dog while squeezing its muzzle shut (I’ve done it to Ruger numerous times, so I feel like I could have handled it).  It was going to happen.  Kicking probably wasn’t going to phase the dog while it attacked ours or us.  Doug could only watch as he held onto our dogs....  Her dog didn’t move a muscle.  

I think it really helped that we didn’t panic; we didn’t let the dogs do anything more than a split second sniff face to face and immediately pulled them apart.  It all happened so fast, but the gal was running toward us the whole time and apologized profusely when she caught up to her dog.  Stupid girl.  I certainly hope that taught her a lesson.  Her significant other watched from a ways away with their child in a stroller.  I would have loved to know what he was thinking while watching all that go down. 

She grabbed her dog and dragged it back to the other side of the beach, hooked it to its leash and they left.  Doug said I did a good job and I felt justified in the impeding beat down of her dog. Haha! 

Our dogs settled down pretty quickly as we went back to relaxing and waiting for the sunset.  As the sun descended it got pretty cold.  

I realized the sun was going to set over the city and not the ocean, so we packed up our stuff and began our walk back to the hotel.  The Boardwalk:

 

We stopped at Foster’s Freeze for delicious goodies – quite a fancy anniversary dinner huh!?!? 

The dogs could hardly stay awake when we got back into our room.  I think Winnie’s eyes closed as soon as her head hit the dog bed.  We showered, finished our ice cream and then both dogs joined us on the bed. 

We all slept pretty well; much better than the first night.  They still don’t get to sleep in our bed at home though! 

We ate breakfast, packed up our stuff, checked out of our room and made a last trip to the dog park.  The stoners we saw the night before were still at the dog park.  They were there when we took Winnie to go to the bathroom the night before; they were saying things like, “I love you guys!” to us.  We let Ruger and Winnie go to the bathroom and left pretty quickly.  They had a few dogs with them and one was really annoying.  It kept running after Winnie like it had little-dog-syndrome.  Ruger and Winnie slept really well on the way home.  They were still exhausted from their trip to the beach and about 4 miles of walking.