Welcome Home Max

Jen and I spent the holiday weekend driving to Cross Roads, TX to pick up the newest member of the family – Max.

Max profile
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Max is a 7-month-old Cavalier King Charles Spaniel.  He looks like the other doggie, Ruby, who is a King Cavalier King Charles Spaniel and mini–Australian Shepard (aka Ausslier).  Max has a white tail and a brown freckle on his head, Ruby has a red tail and the distinctive aussie blue eyes.

The 1,500 mile round trip allow us to see miles and miles of Texas was fun and mostly uneventful other than traveling during a polar vortex that kept the temps in the single digits for most of the trip.  The temps also kept the puppy potty breaks pretty brief on the way home.

Jen enjoying her barbeque

We split the trip into two legs to make it a little easier on everyone.  Amarillo (6 hrs) is about halfway to Dallas/Ft Worth and was base camp to break the trip up. 

No trip to Texas is complete without a visit to get some barbeque.  Found Rudy’s in Amarillo for some brisket and baby back ribs – highly recommend when in Amarillo.

Max was a good boy riding in the backseat

Leaving Amarillo by morning, we made it back to Denver early Sunday afternoon for Max to acclimate to his new home and meet the growing group of Mahoney animal friends.  The good news is Max loves and seems to be loved by all the current animal residents.  Max and Ruby are enjoying wrestling matches and chasing sessions in both the living room and back yard.  Garth has also said ‘hello’ to Max and smacked in in the head at least once that I’ve see.  Alls good – Garth smacks everyone in the head at least once😉.

Max (originally Hobbit/Leo) is a rescue from Dog Ranch Rescue in Anna, TX.  His prior owners ran into some health issues apparently and couldn’t handle a puppy and his energy.  So far, we’ve found Max to be a very sweet boy, and Ruby helps us keep his energy and attention under control.  Max has big brown eyes and loves to sit with us on the couch and play with us and Ruby in between naps.

Ruby (blue eyes) and Max (brown eyes)

The family even made the Dog Ranch Rescue Facebook page when Jenna sent them a status update on “Max” once we made it home.

Benard Maine

Family trip to Benard Maine completed this week. The whole Chuck Mahoney clan made it out including the newly minted, baby Westyn. He was definitely the rock star of the show.

The first few days were a little foggy and cloudy, but still nice enough to do thinks like visit Accadia National Park, Bass Harbor Lighthouse, the Rockefeller Gardens and Beals Lobster Pier for both lobster rolls and whole lobster, yum.

Visited the sandy beach inside Accadia and took a hike, or two, inside the park. I survived my gorge path hike to the top of Cadillac Mountain, just barely. Connor had to haul me up the last pitch after I pulled something in the lower abdomen scrambling over some big rocks. The views from the top were spectacular. Fortunately, we found a friendly tour bus driver that offered the injured party (me) and my support team a ride down the mountain.

Thanks to Carolyn for the area research and the points of interests and activities lists.

Attendees: Judy, Alan, Sandra, Arre, Andrew, Sutton, Carolyn, Carlton, Ailsa, Freya, Chuck, Jenna, Connor, Cameron, Lindsay, Madisyn, and Westyn.

Birthday Trip

February 10, 2011:

The ski trip celebrating Bo’s birthday was fun. All of the old farts were able to make it out to both Vail and Beaver Creek. Kevin was sick for the first day and managed to give his sickness to me by coughing all over me during a lunch. Thankfully, I’m on the mend now. The entire 3 days were freezing cold. We topped out at about -1 for the first 2 days with the highlight being told at the top of the first lift on the first day in Beaver creek, “welcome to the top, we are looking at a balmy -14 degrees.” The cold only meant we had to stop a few extra times to warm up. We were graced with some fresh snow that made for some fun glade skiing. And yes, I did make it down the Birds of Prey (video here).

Weekend Trip

January 28, 2011:

Headed back up to Breckenridge and then Beaver Creek to ski and celebrate Bo’s birthday. I plan to rock the Birds of Prey. All of my little brothers seem to have problems keeping up with me, especially as they get older… ha.

Breck is hosting the annual International Snow Sculpture Championships this weekend and we should get a chance to see some of the creations (here are some pictures from two years ago). I’m looking forward to practicing some more with the helmet cam to capture all of the little shavers skiing. I think the next skill I need to work on is my video editing. I’m still a little sketchy on putting good clips together for a compelling mini-movie, but I’m working on it.