High time for a road trip

I’m happy to report that Gunther and I have hit another milestone together! We went away for our first road trip and overnight excursion, which meant he was with me 24/7 at every venue and during every activity I participated in. It was an excellent opportunity to put the skills we had learned together to the test and experience some new things together.    

We spent the weekend in Ann Arbor, combining a University of Michigan college visit for my son with the opportunity to see some friends from Philadelphia who were there to visit their daughter. I’ve been to Ann Arbor a few times, and it is an extremely dog-friendly town. So, I figured this would be a reasonably trouble-free destination for our first overnight outing together. And even though service dogs are legally allowed in public places, I purposely chose The DoubleTree Hotel, which welcomed dogs, to avoid any potential hassle. So, what could possibly go wrong? 

Well, friends, I, unfortunately, made the mistake of choosing the very same weekend as the 50^th anniversary celebration of Hash Bash. What is Hash Bash, you ask? Originally started in 1972 in protest of Michigan’s felony marijuana law, it’s when 10,000-15,000 cannabis enthusiasts descend upon the town and light up their doobies in a show of activism and advocacy for the legalization of weed. Regardless of your personal stance on this topic, let’s just say this is not the most conducive environment for a disabled woman who is trying to practice keeping her service dog focused entirely on her. 

It’s about a two-hour drive to get to Ann Arbor from our home. When we first got into town, we met our friends at the Stray Hen Café. Their daughter and her group of friends were giving my son the unofficial and more “authentic” tour of the campus and an insider view of college life. We had planned to have lunch together and then let the kids go on their merry way while the adults explored the downtown shops. We had a large group—ten of us all together—so we took up quite a bit of space. The tables were narrow, leaving no room for Gunther to go under, so I had him lay down next to my chair for the meal. He was sticking out more than I would have liked, but people did a great job of walking around to avoid him. Even with the servers and patrons milling about, he did a fabulous job staying put and out of trouble. I occasionally plied him with some treats to keep him in the zone, but he really didn’t give me any cause for concern.

Once we were done with our lunch, we all decided to head over to the M Den store to check out the U of M merch for sale. The store is massive, with two stories full of clothes and accessories. We took Gunther up to the second floor—his first elevator ride with us—to see all the U of M branded dog gear. It was a small elevator and very slow, jolting a little when it stopped, which made him a little nervous. Once out of the elevator, we encountered a labyrinth of clothing racks and shelves, but G walked beside the wheelchair taking it all in stride. A young boy politely asked if he could pet G, but my girlfriend quickly explained that he was working. It was wonderful having an advocate with me to help with the explanation. 

After we left the store, the plan had been to meander all over downtown, go through the campus, and visit the art museum. But the closer we got to The Diag near the middle of Central Campus, the more we got into the thick of the cannabis celebration. The throngs of people out and about made it difficult to navigate my wheelchair along the sidewalks while trying to keep Gunther in the ideal position by my side. Even so, I was amazed that he kept moving forward and didn’t get too distracted by all the people. 

However, when it came to any other dogs we encountered along the way, that was a different story. With the sidewalk being so crowded, there was no room to keep a reasonable distance from the other passing dogs. Every dog we came upon ended up only mere inches away and served as an irresistible distraction, resulting in Gunther pulling on the leash in excitement. No matter what I did, including waving treats in his face, I could not get him to focus his attention on me. His curiosity only abated when the other dogs’ owners would eventually walk past us. 

We had at least three or four encounters with different dogs before we were able to get off the main drag. My arm was hurting at that point from all his pulling, and I was feeling pretty defeated that I couldn’t break his fixation with each dog. Most of the limited practice we’ve done with Gunther around other dogs has involved at least a few feet of distance between them. In those instances, he’s not perfect, but you can usually snap his attention back to where it needs to be. Although these were unusual circumstances with the overcrowded sidewalks, it was clear that this was an area of his training that we needed to work on more together.

We were able to duck into our favorite confectionary shop, Bon Bon Bon, to regroup, buy some delicious chocolates, and escape the crowds and hemp haze. While the hordes of people proved overwhelming for all of us, the plus side was that there was no drama. Our biggest challenge besides the dog encounters was the powerful combined odor of every kind of cannabis concoction imaginable. You might think that being outdoors in the fresh air would make things less concentrated, but that was simply not the case. I guess when you take thousands of people who are continuously lighting up and put them all within a radius of a few city blocks, what you get is a highly potent and dense cloud of smells and smoke. It was enough to make my eyes water and head pound, so I can’t imagine what a dog, whose olfactory receptors outnumber mine by over 240 million, would experience. We all decided to hightail it out of the downtown area.

The rest of the day was spent enjoying drinks at our hotel bar, capped off by an incredible dinner with cocktails at the Gandy Dancer, an upscale seafood restaurant located in a historic former train depot. Gunther behaved wonderfully, and there were even moments when I almost forgot he was there. I wasn’t sure how sleeping in the hotel room would go for him, but we brought a dog bed and placed it under the desk to give him a den-like vibe. If he was stressed in any way, he certainly didn’t show it other than on the elevator rides, which I suspect made him feel unbalanced. While in the room, he chewed on his Nylabone, chased his ball a little, snuggled up with his blanket, and slept like he would during any other given day at home. 

At 7:15 am the following day, I woke up to a wet nose in my face and got my husband to take him out so he could do his business. Later that morning, we all went to brunch at the Northside Grill. The meal went off without a hitch, but as we were leaving, Gunther spied a tortilla chip under someone’s table and went for it. I was embarrassed as I heard the chuckles around me. Of course, I told him to “Leave It,” which he did momentarily but then resumed eating it as soon as my head was turned. What can I say? We are a work in progress!

I would return to Ann Arbor with G without hesitation when there isn’t some large-scale event happening in the city. I particularly want to note that everywhere G and I went, we were treated with the utmost respect and consideration by all the hotel, retail, and restaurant staff members. I mention this because I’m part of a private PAWS Client Facebook group and have seen disconcerting posts about clients and their service dogs being turned away from restaurants and other public venues in various places around the country, even though ADA laws prohibit this. I suppose if you’re the kind of town that allows 15,000 stoners to gather in celebration of weed, you’re not going to be too uptight about a service dog! 

All in all, it felt like a mostly successful adventure. Being in the wheelchair with Gunther out in public is very different than being with him at home while using the walker. I get a little anxious about accidentally running over his paws if he gets too close, but I also feel safer because he won’t pull or bump into me and accidentally cause me to fall. In all honesty, I don’t need G dog with me when I’m out in the wheelchair because I always have family or friends around if I need help with something. But it just feels good to give him exposure to these different experiences when they make sense to do so. And we’ll never master any of the tasks that need more work if we don’t keep putting ourselves out there.