Toffee's Off Leash Adventure

Toffee gets to be off leash all the time in our yard. But we walk a lot in town, and we take her places and she needs to be on leash. 

Today we went for a walk on the C&O canal starting just north of mile 103, and walking almost to mile 105. And Doug let her off leash to run. I was displeased because it is against the rules. 

Doug said "In the government shut down, there are no rules."

Sigh. No, that is not how it works. 

It also concerns me for her to be off leash in case she gets too far from us, and runs into another hiker or hiker with dog/s, or a cyclist. I don't know how she's going to react. 

Turns out I didn't have much to worry about. She is a very good listener, and came right back when called when she got too far ahead of us on the trail. She ran off trail and into where the canal used to be, down into the gully and back up, big circles all around us. And when we saw people long before she did, we put her back on leash and stepped off the trail. She couldn't care less about the bikes. And we saw no other dogs.

Big adventure for our girl. She earned her big nap when she got home!

I'm glad we let her have some free running time. I think of all the years we took dogs, for 25 years, into the woods off leash, and they just ran themselves stupid. She got to run herself stupid. 

The trail is very flat and easy. We saw cyclists with full rack packs, obviously biking the full trail and camping along the way. My friend Martin wrote about it here in this wonderful article. A younger me would want to do it. After all, as Martin says in the article, it is "blissfully flat."

So a round trip walk of a little over 3 miles. Toffee has been out cold on the couch except for eating dinner and going out once to pee. I'm sore as hell. But it was a great day. 

No breweries or visits anywhere, we came home. Doug and Toffee napped hard and I played games on my phone. Big work day tomorrow, trying to get a client ready for website launch on Tuesday. Wish me luck! 

Digits below! But a couple pictures first. Miss Thing looking into the woods. Mile post (MP) 104. We parked just north of MP 103, and didn't quite walk as far as 105. Miles seem much much longer in the woods, it seems. And finally, the Potomac river here seems incredibly low. The water was an amazing green. None of my camera phone pictures can do it justice.

digits

exercise: 12/12 hours. Big big walk with Doug and Toffee on the C&O canal. 1 hr 17 min/3.34 miles; 13k+ steps by bedtime

blood glucose:

8am: 154
4pm: 100
9:45pm: 112 

food & meds:

8am: jaridance + phentermine
10:30am: egg mcmuffin w/double sausage
12:30pm: met+glip
4:15pm: white wine, crackers, spready cheese
7pm: jambalaya, rice mix from Aldi w/chopped kielbasa thrown in
8:30pm: met+glip, some mixed nuts; white wine