Paddle, Paddle, Paddle

I don't think Sammy expected to have to have another full day of excitement and new things. I think he was quite happy with the weekend, and could have just napped the next couple days away. That isn't what happened, and I think in the end he is ok with it!
First, he was waaaay less than pleased about my 5am alarm for me to be to work at 6. If he had opposable thumbs, he would have grabbed my cell phone and thrown it. Apparently he was quite the stinker pants this morning, grouchy and lathargic. It didn't help that by noon, the temperature had risen above 90 degrees already. Well, I got off work a little after noon and came up with, what I thought was a brilliant idea. It's hot, Erik's off, I'm off, it's a weekday, and it's not showing any signs of raining (like it said in the forecast!)...lets take Sammy to the lake today and not wait til next weekend!
I hurried home, got in my swimsuit (tried to convince Erik to wear a swimsuit, but failed), got beach towels, bug spray, water and the camera and we were off to Fremont Lakes. Sammy was, of course, very excited, and for once, didn't fall asleep on the car ride. He usually passes out when we hit interstates or highways, and we had mostly highway driving. I think he was just too excited for what may be coming to stay still!!
Oh and we got soooo excited because as we were driving by, we saw a family of dogs, and one was a CORGI!! But by the time we got our day pass, car parked and got over there, the corgi was nowhere to be found. We were sad. Well Sammy had no clue about any of it, just excited about the smells, sounds, and new sights! We took a little walk around the park so he could truley enjoy the water. He was plum tuckered out by the time we hit the beach, but that was probably for the best. We had to keep him on a leash for a couple reasons. One: we saw a sign saying to keep your dog on 6' ropes and there were lots of state park people there doing flood monitoring, landscaping, and clean up from the holiday weekend. And more importantly, two: we didn't know how he was gonna react and chasing him down did not sound like fun in mid 90 degree temperatures.
He waddled right up to the water without any problems. The last time we were at a lake fishing, I kept him away from the water because the flooding was really nasty, so he was probably unsure if he was allowed to. Plus, there were jetskis making waves, he was concerned about them coming towards him! Lol. Once I went in, he kinda staggered in. After getting in, he seemed ok. We slowly went forward and finally I just got tugging him a little so he would have to be afloat and see how he did before he had the chance to get scared, meaning too stubborn! He did great. It was a little surprising to him, but he doggie paddled like he had been doing it for years!!
He swam right back to where he could stand and looked at us both. I persuaded (tugged) him back to swimming and to my (and Erik's) amazement, he just swam right past me and around me, back to the shallow water! He looked like a pro!
He was distracted by other people and stuff, but seemed to be having a good time with it! I had to kick it up a notch, of course. He had been great with the little short bursts of swimming, but I really wanted to know how he would do in a longer swim (see if life jackets are in our boating future, so I picked him up and took him out to water about 6" below my shoulder. He didn't struggle getting out there, swam right out of my arms back to the beach. Looked up at Erik mostly and looked proud when he got back. The next time we went a little deeper. He was so funny, when I picked him up out of the water, he kept his little paws paddling in the air! He paddled the whole way out to water up to my shoulder!
He swam back, and that was just about enough for him. He was all out of energy. He rolled in the sand, then came out a couple of inches into the water where I was laying down (well on my elbows in the water). He definately had fun. Erik wished he had brought his swimsuit (duh) and I can't wait to do it again! I really want to bring a squeaker tennis ball and see if he would play with it or not. Probably not, but you never know!
Today was most definatley a success, couldn't have gone better. And we will be finishing with a very thorough bath!! He smells very fishy! As do I.












"Can we come back soon, Momma? This is sooo fun!"