In January we wanted to check out our new snow shoes somewhere near Mt. Hood. Since we left late in the day, and wanted something fairly easy, we decided on White River or Mirror Lake. Since Mirror lake had almost no snow, we opted for White River. This was also Loki’s first time in the snow, and of course he loved it!
I gave the dogs a nice lecture about manners since it was quite crowded at White River. 😉My lecture obviously fell on deaf ears since the first the dogs did was run circles around everyone they saw.We let the dogs run off some steam before we started our trek. Loki was super excited to be somewhere cold... he could finally run for more than 5 minutes without getting hot!!Of course, Dusty likes the snow for a completely different reason: UNLIMITED SNOW BALLS!I think this was the most I've seen Loki run... EVER.After quite a few minutes of running the dogs stopped by the creek for a water break.I think Loki would have thought harder about the water break if he knew it meant climbing a steep snow bank. Of course Dusty bounded right up!This is just another example of Dusty's amazing ability to smile for the camera. Seriously, all you have to do is pull the camera, and call his name.Loki definitely fits in with the snow well. It's amazing that he was only 6 months when this picture was taken :OI feel like I have to take a few extra shots of Loki in the snow, since this may be one of the only environments in which he can hold his own next to Dusty.After letting the dogs run off some excess energy, we were on our way. The fresh air never felt better 🙂Along the short hike, we took a few side trails to investigate the capabilities of our new snowhoes. Which, by the way, we would recommend paying the extra money for quality snow shoes even if it seems like they are over priced.This seemed to be the best way to get down the steep slope. It was probably the fastest, but may not have been the most graceful.I tried the steepest hill I could find to see how my alpine-geared MSR snowshoes dealt with steeper hillsides. It took a few attempts, but I did make it to the top 🙂Dusty, of course, always manages to find a fast and athletic way to get down a steep bank. His policy seems to be "leap first, ask questions later".There were a LOT of people at White River, and of course, we were not the only people who thought it would be a great day to let the dogs run 🙂All in all, our trip was a blast, and, despite the large crowd, we had ample opportunity to enjoy the scenery.
