Recertification Test

B and I woke up to six inches of fresh snow, and blizzard-like conditions. As I have to cross several summits, including Donner Summit, I was a little bit nervous about going, but figured I'd try and if it got bad, I'd just turn around and we'd go to Santa Rosa for our Recertification Test later on.

When we got to Truckee, the sun was shining through a small spot in the clouds, and there was a gorgeous rainbow, so I figured it'd be okay. 

The Donner Summit crossing went okay, just extremely slow, and it was really snowing hard, and I couldn't even see the edge of my hood at times. We went through three separate chain controls (where each vehicle is stopped and inspected by Cal Trans inspectors). Boreal ski area was on a wind hold, and it was pretty bad up there. You know it's really bad when the entire ski area goes on a wind hold (the chairlifts are dangerous in high winds). Incredible start to the first day of spring!

Then at the top of Donner Summit, I passed a bus with Japanese characters painted on the side of the bus that was stopped and 180° to the highway (facing opposite direction to traffic), so I guess they skidded even though they were fully chained up. Or maybe they threw some chains on the other side that I couldn't see, and skidded. There were quite a few wrecks up there.

I had to stop at the Gold Run rest stop to use the restroom, and brought B inside with me, as I was trying to hurry because it was getting really late. I thought it'd be faster for B to "hurry" in the designated dog area, then go inside with me to the bathroom, rather then to make two trips back and forth to the car. 

I thought I was alone as there were only two other cars at the rest stop, then all of a sudden I hear all these voices chattering away. B was sitting with her back to the door, so her tail was sticking out a little bit from under the stall. So I figured they were talking about her tail and a dog being in the bathroom. It only sounded like two or three women talking.

Then when I opened the door, to my shock, there was a long line of about 40 older women from Japan, and all these camera flashes going off in my face. They must have been from that bus up on top of the summit. I guess they will go back to Japan, and B and I will be featured in some of their vacation slide shows, where they might chuckle and comment something like, "those Americans sure love their dogs".
 
Gosh time flies! I can't believe it's been six months since I last saw K and my classmates and their partners. Everyone looked great, including the dogs. 

One part of the test was the food temptation test. I got very nervous because B loves food. B did very well on the food test. I was so nervous, I was like a deer in headlights. K had to remind me it was okay to praise B for not going for the food temptation. Shame on me, as I normally give her a lot of praise and love.

After we finished everything, K told us we passed the recertification. My two classmates and I had some questions. K answered our questions and concerns. 

The drive was a lot easier and quicker going back home even though it was raining the whole way and very foggy at the top of Donner Summit. We got home in two hours (instead of nearly the four hours it took us to get there).

Fourth Day of Class

This morning, we were all excited for class to start, knowing that we would be having our first night at "home" in our dorm rooms with our pre-matches. I had already put my shoes away as Ginza ate the top part of one Sorel boot when she first got matched with me.

Today we had several very informative lectures on Canine Health, and Canine Communication. I am really learning a lot here.

We did a lot of training practices, mostly working with the timer and getting the dogs to respond to us in different situations. Just before lunch we did a quick walk so they could do their business if needed. Then we came back inside and practiced with us holding empty plates with our dogs on leash, in preparation for our field trip tomorrow to a buffet place. 

Once we got the hang of handling plates and dogs on leashes, we tried again during our lunch with actual food on plates, holding the dogs' leashes, and walking with them to the table. We had a nice lunch, chicken salad on croissants provided by the "voluncheers".

After lunch we did another walk then we had another class lecture (the one on Communication). Then we went back to doing soundwork with the timers but making it more challenging for the dogs to push them a little bit. 

One dog did not want to do the soundwork. She actually refused to respond to the timer, so one of the trainers thought maybe she was upset about her new collar. So they tried to get the dog to have another go at responding to the timer, but this dog just tucked her tail in between her legs and ran to her crate, and nosed the door open so she could enter the crate. When the door opened, she jumped at the sound of the door slamming into the crate next to her own crate, then she got inside her crate, and managed to pull shut the door to her crate! 

So the trainer said, "get her outside". Yep, that was the problem. She had to go and apparently she didn't want to try to practice as she may have been afraid of having an accident, bless her heart. Once she came back from outside, she was fine and did a great job on the soundwork. Smart girl!

At the end of the day we had another lecture, which was about taking our dogs "home" tonight to our dorm rooms for the first time. They covered everything in the lecture, and it was an excellent lecture, so I felt confident in taking my pre-match "home" tonight. My pre-match is behaving very well, and is asleep next to me, but it was still good to hear what to do in certain examples, just in case.

Edited to add after Graduation:

First night at "home" in the dorm