Dogs fitness Gym-free hiking Hills Holidays Mt. Hood Oregon Oregon Hikes Snow snowshoeing Snowshoeing Mt. Hood snowshoes tips trails Winter Winter Sports

Snowshoeing with Dogs

Lisa Eirene

About Lisa Eirene Lisa lost 110 pounds through calorie counting and exercise. She swims, bikes, runs, hikes and is enjoying life in Portland, Oregon. Her weight loss story has been featured in First Magazine, Yahoo Health, Woman's Day and Glamour.com.

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8 Comments

  1. Ingunn

    Snowshoeing with dogs – here’s one area where I and my furless wonder don’t have much experience! 😉 But I chuckled at “stay on trail” – up here there’s no such thing as a trail when you snowshoe! Plus, in some cases, if you do try to follow a summer trail, it could take you into sketchy avalanche-prone territory.

    1. Lisa Eirene

      There are a handful of good snowshoeing trails here on Mount Hood (and even more in Bend but a lot of them for some reason say no dogs–which seems weird to me). The trails are marked well and easy to follow. Some are groomed (like Trillium Lake) so you can’t really get off trail and get lost or get stuck in really deep snow. But there are also a bunch of trails that I probably wouldn’t snowshoe on because I am definitely not a back-country explorer. It’s not for me! I don’t have the navigation skills to try it and like you said, it can be sketchy and avalanche prone.

      1. Ingunn

        That’s cool! The only marked trails that I know of up here are for xc skiing. There’s a Snowshoeing Washington (or something like that) book that has suggested routes though.

        1. Lisa Eirene

          I’ve never been snowshoeing in Washington. Someday I hope!

  2. Fran

    It’s never that cold here but you have some good tips.

    When we have snow here, I always make sure her paws are dry and clean when we get back home. Since they use salt here for icy roads, it’s important to take care of her paws. I often use vaseline after I got home.

    That blanket idea is a good one, I’ll remember that one if it ever gets cold here and we go on a hike.

    You might consider buying her a jacket to stay warm at those temperatures.

    Hopefully the cold will go away soon but you will still have some snow so Bella can play in it. Bet she loves it as much as my Bella.

    1. Lisa Eirene

      Good point on the salt. Here in Oregon they don’t use salt on the icy roads but they use gravel (which is really gross after the snow and ice goes away). I hope your Bella’s paws are ok. I know whenever Bella’s gets bad it’s about a week or two to heal them.

      We bought Bella a fleece lined waterproof “cape” thing. It’s not quite a jacket because her belly is bare but it’s warm and covers most of her body. I should probably look into some kind of sweater-type thing someday.

      1. Fran

        So far we haven’t had any snow and we have had no icy roads. So for now her paws are okay.

        1. Lisa Eirene

          That’s good. I always feel so bad when our fur babies are injured! 🙁

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