Karma and the Dunes - Oceano, CA

As one of Ruthi's friends pointed out, we haven't updated our blog much. Not much excitement when sitting for 4+ months in Oceano near Karma’s favorite running area – The Dunes. In our first site, we were about 20 yards from the entrance to the park area. For the last 2 weeks, we were further from the dunes but the pattern remained the same. Most mid-mornings, Ruthi took Karma out with her tennis ball (Karma’s that is), a hundred foot lead (Karma is not to be trusted on recalls with all of the vegetation and other dog/wild animal smells) and the “Chucker”. To ensure the most exercise for Karma, Ruthi would trick Karma into thinking the ball was going uphill and off she’d go. Then Ruthi would throw down hill and Karma would charge in that direction. Once she got the ball, Karma needed to come uphill again to Ruthi for another throw. The process is repeated until Karma calls a time out, goes to a bit of shade under one of the bushes where she digs, digs, digs into the sand for a cool spot.

When other people or dogs come to the dunes, Karma shares her ball both for the people to throw and for the dogs to go get. She especially likes small groups of kids. Karma takes the ball to one kid at a time making sure each has an opportunity to throw the ball. Even if the kid is too young to get the ball much farther than Karma herself, she doesn’t mind. The idea is for the ball to be thrown and for Karma to catch or chase it down and REPEAT forever. She will be 8 next month and we have noticed a bit of a slow down but not very much. Instead of running like a rocket up the hill for the 20th or 30th throw, she not trots or even walks near the end of our daily Dune time.