Puppies to the beach!

Last night we finally got it together and took the pups to the beach.  This something we have been wanting to do for a while, but it is slightly difficult since they are only allowed on the beach at certain times and we don't necessarily want to take them to the beach when we want to relax and swim, etc.  So last night we headed out to Isle of Palms at about 7, only to find out that the park closes at 7, oops.  Then we decided to head over a few minutes to Sullivan's Island.  We found a place to park and a doggie friendly beach.  By this time it was about 8 so it was a great temperature and getting closer to darkness (I love the beach at night!).

We headed down the beach for a nice walk to start out with and of course we made the pups walk in the surf.  Apollo was loving it, but Basil freaked out every time a wave came in so she was jerking my arm quite often.  As a result of the initial reactions we just had Basil hang out in the shallow surf area to get the hang of it, but Apollo went out with Ben to where the water was about halfway up to Ben's knees.  It was super cute because at that point Apollo had to "doggie paddle".  He didn't seem to mind it all that much, but every time Ben moved Apollo would follow him; he definitely wasn't taking any chances of being left out there.

After Apollo got done swimming for a few minutes we continued to take our walk down the beach.  Every once in a while Apollo decided to show us his best cockroach impression and rolled all around in the sand.  They both do that sometimes at home on the carpet sometimes after baths, but this was just hilarious to watch in the sand because he looked like a crazy dog.

A bit further down the beach we came to a calm pool of water that looked like it had been left behind at high tide.  This seemed to be the perfect opportunity to let Basil give swimming a try since there were no waves to freak her out.  So we took both pups out to where they couldn't quite stand and they were swimming around like pros.  They actually both seemed to like it at this point, but we didn't want to press our luck to we brought them back to the sand.

So after a nice walk we headed back to the car, both pups managed to poo on the beach (thankfully we had our bags like we were supposed to), and then we had a lovely ride home that stunk of wet dog.  Gotta love it! (not really)  They were a wet sandy mess and when we got home they definitely needed baths.  I am thinking we need to have a kiddie pool for their baths from now on because after seeing them in the water at the beach I think they would like baths a whole lot better that way. :-)

Our first trip to the beach was a success and we are definitely going to have to try it out again.  I love walking on the beach and bringing the pups along was an added treat.  Next time we are going to have to remember the camera so we can catch their cuteness in action!

Here is just a fun pic of them when they were little; pretty much only the size has changed :-)