Here our fearless band of backpackers pose for a photo at the trailhead. I dropped Dawg and Andra here and parked 0.7 miles away in the trailhead parking. A few folks have asked me how I get Dawg to pose for the photos. The simple answer is, "I ask him to."

While on the subject of dogs, I'd like to plead with people that read this not to take your dog backpacking until you understand the issues involved and your dog is trained for it. Your dog will follow you until his feet bleed. That level of loyalty deserves to be respected and cared for. Most dogs cannot do what we did on this trip. Most dogs are what I call ornaments (aka Christmas - "Noun: a thing used to make something look more attractive but usually having no practical purpose"). Ask yourself if this describes your dogs day. You get up in the morning and your dog watches you as you shower, eat breakfast and leave for work. The average commute in the US is 44 minutes, so between 9 hours at the office and 1.5 hours of driving coupled with 1 hour to get ready for work, your dog did zero for 11.5 hours of the 16 hours per day you are awake. You get home, feed him and yourself, and now are too tired to walk him at all or at best a couple hundred yards.

A dog with that routine if taken to the snow to play, will have bloody feet (snow is course and sharp) in under 3 hours. If you hike him on trails, his feet will be sore in 4 miles or less, but he can't tell you that. If you hike him two days in a row over 4 miles, he will be limping. Blood on day 3. You get the idea. Just like you, your dog needs physical training to do something like this. Not to mention having dog first aid items with you and coming to grips with the fact that if your dog injures himself 3 days walk from a road, it won't be pretty.

We ran into two women hiking out via Piute Canyon that stopped to ask us about camp spots. The first thing one of them asked was, "do you have booties for your dog." To which I replied, "If your dog needs boots to hike, you have no business bringing him." She then told us of a couple hiking with their dog with which they shared a camp spot. The dog had booties although she said they look worse for wear and the dog was so sore, it wouldn't even get up in camp when called. For the love of God, or Dog, don't do this to your best buddy. Educate yourself if you want to take your dog. There's a 90+% chance you have no business taking your pup.
That bad boy on my back is last year's Christmas present. My 20 year old backpack was looking quite worn and since we take somewhat luxurious trips, Andra got me the largest backpack Kelty makes - the Redcloud 110. As Dawg and I navigate the first stream crossing, I'm carrying a 71 pound load while Dawg cruises with just 6 lbs, 6 oz's. In order to reduce Dawg's load, I bought Stella and Chewy's freeze-dried dinner patties. They aren't volume friendly, but they provide a better calories per pound ratio compared to kibble.

Here at the second stream crossing I use my poles to maintain balance.
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