We recently took a car trip to see my family for my brother’s birthday – so fun! This entailed packing up the car with all our stuff and the dogs. We’ve done this a lot over the years so we’re pretty good at fitting all our stuff into the car while still leaving room in the back for the dogs to be comfy. Sammy spent the night before the trip sleeping in the bedroom instead of on the couch. I think he wanted to make sure we didn’t forget him!

The dogs always get really excited when they see us packing the car, and once we carry their dog beds out they know they are in for an adventure. They go crazy when we let them out the front door and they immediately run to the car and jump in any open door. Once we get them corralled in the back, they don’t calm down until we actually get on the road.

Sammy used to be a challenge to travel with, as we would have to stop for him to pee about every hour. He’s gotten better now, and we can go up to three hours without stopping for a pee break. I don’t mind stopping, though, since it gives me a chance to get out of the car and stretch. The very back area of the car has enough room for the dogs to sleep and stretch out a bit, which helps on those 10-hour travel days.

We stopped overnight in Salt Lake City in a downtown Hilton that was pet-friendly. It was kind of a posh hotel but no one minded when we brought the dogs through the lobby. They got a lot of smiles and pets and comments on how beautiful they are. We’re lucky that our dogs are pretty well-behaved. The only mishap was when Sammy figured out that there’s a huge gap between the floor of the lobby and the floor of the elevator.

The first few times we went on the elevator he was fine. Once he discovered the gap he refused to board and I had to pick him up and carry him onto the elevator from then on. It was bit embarrassing, but once I explained it to our fellow passengers they were very sympathetic. It wasn’t too much fun when the dogs woke us up at 2:30am needing to go out. It was bitterly cold in Salt Lake City, so the middle-of-the-night pee run was a challenge.

Once we got to my sister’s house, the dogs were able to run around in the backyard and use the dog door at will, which makes life easier. I think her dog Clyde was happy for the company. She said he got depressed when we left.

On our trip home we stopped at the same hotel in Salt Lake City and Sammy still wouldn’t voluntarily get on the elevator. And, strangely enough, the front desk told me there were no stairs up to the guest floors. Is it just me or is that really weird?

The dogs were as happy to get home as we were, and they immediately ran outside to the backyard through their new Extreme Weather dog door!