So, I thought I’d add something about activities that allow furry friends along since there seems to have been an influx of pet adoptions during this pandemic since we’re all at home to care for and train these pets and they can be great companions during a time when physical contact with others has been so restrictive and mostly non-existent. We recently added a furry friend to our family and he actually has quite a bad case of separation anxiety. So, over the winter break we tried to find some different places we could go that allowed our furry friend along. We were able to fit in a few and I have a few more in mind for the future.
We went to dog beach over in Huntington Beach! We have never been out to Huntington beach so it was a new adventure for all of us and I have to say that I love that neighborhood surrounding this beach and I also saw a beautiful, large park with lots of trails that I might want to back there to explore. The beach was extremely clean, the people were friendly and the dogs were so behaved. Our pup was kept on a leash since he was quite young and has never been off leash before but most of the dogs there were off leash but still interacted well with our pup and my kids. Being that it is winter, it was a little nippy out but not too much so as the weather at the time was still in the high 70s. Our dog was able to frolic in the water, there was enough beach space that my kids could run and play in the sand without worry of being too close to others. I did not see a bathroom around but there were a lot of spots with doggy bags for people to grab in case they forgot their own so they can pick up after their pets. You do have to pay for parking here and I could see how parking might be scarce on a warmer day. It is only $2/hr to park so I paid for an hour and a half which was more than enough time for us to enjoy the outdoors.
The 2nd place we wound up at was Old Poway Park. They have a train track around the park which currently is shut down due to the pandemic but it is still a beautiful park with beautiful old buildings around it and old train cars to explore. There is also a small fish pond to look at and little pathways around the park to walk around. Across the street there is a play structure and someone started a rock snake there in case you wanted to check it out. We went there early in the morning and there was very little people there. We brought our masks just in case we came too close to people but there was no issues with that at all. There was lots of free parking and it looked like there were shops and eateries around although the seemed to only be open for take out. I feel like this park would probably be quite popular pre-pandemic. It was kind of nice to enjoy it with nearly no one else there but us. Our pup also enjoyed the scenery and new smells and we saw others walking their dogs in the park too. There were also stations with extra bags for your dog waste around the park. California is pretty awesome about thinking of the needs of your furry friends which in turn helps to keep places like this cleaner.
The 3rd place we took our furry friend along to was Mt. Baldy……more specifically the Icehouse trail there at Mt. Baldy. We wanted to get some snow fun in and thought this would be a nice trail to check out. It was a much easier drive up to this mountain than going to Snow Valley or Big Bear and there wasn’t a lot of traffic going up there since we went the weekend after the big snow storm. However, since the weather got warmer again after that snow storm, the snow that was left was icy which made things more slippery up there so we didn’t get as much snow play as we would have liked. There others up there trying to sled and hike all the way up this trail but we didn’t want to to chance it especially with the baby in our arms. Just be wary of this when you go up there. We saw other serious hikers going up with their walking sticks. Others who were there just in sneakers and not boots kept falling on their behinds so we just hung out near the beginning of the trail and took photos, let the baby touch some snow and our furry friend explore a little. Even he was slipping in the snow and his breed is meant for weather like this. The older kids made little snow balls just to throw up into the air…..the snow was so solid that it would hurt if thrown at each other…..lol. I have another place in mind for some more snow fun that hopefully we’ll make it to before the season ends but as of right now there chains are needed to go there so we’ll see how it goes when we get us some chains for our vehicle. When we went up to Mt. Baldy, there was no need for chains. The roads were clear of ice despite the trail itself being covered in ice. I keep telling myself that I will one day just own a cabin up there in the mountains to go to for some winter weather or just to get away from city life fore awhile. Some of the cabins in the mountains look so tranquil. Life goals……….I’m putting it out there into the universe so one day maybe it will come into fruition.
Anyway, onto the next adventure……the next place we went to is closer to home. We went to the Temecula/Vail Lake KOA campgrounds. They have a lot of trails here that you can actually go biking on also. We had to pay $$ just to check out the trails though which they don’t tell you on their website. The trails were nice though and we had a great time exploring them with our furry pal. He was in heaven hear and was jumping over things and smelling all the new smells. He didn’t want to leave. If you happen to be an RV person, I saw that they do book spots for RV camping here. Check out the website above for more info on that.
2 of my kiddos got new scooters for Christmas since their old ones were in pretty bad shape (they have had them for about 6 or more years) so they wanted to find a place that had paved trails so they could ride their scooters while we exercised our furry friend. Temecula has been lucky enough to be still renovating their parks even during the pandemic so we found this amazing playground (Vail Ranch Park) that looks like it has all new equipment on it complete with a huge zipline!!! It also has a wonderful paved walking path that goes from this park through a neighborhood through. It also has workout stations which we stopped at to try and do the suggested workouts at. If you come early on Sundays, there aren’t a lot of people here. However, it seems that later afternoons on week days is prime time for outdoor activity so the playground can get quite crowded.
That about sums up some of our most recent adventures. I have more ideas in mind and will post about them as soon as we make it to these places. One thing I love about Southern California, is the endless adventures there are to be found here even after living here for so long. Do you have any favorite places to take your furry friends to that your kids also enjoy? Please comment here……I would love to explore it too!
ImPerfect Ari 