Dog-friendly Highway 20 preserves beckon in spring

Photo by Kampus Production.

The Sierra foothills cover hundreds of square miles, so your best bet for a wildflower-and-waterfalls weekend is to narrow down an itinerary. Our suggestion: take Highway 20 east out of Marysville (Sutter County) and spend a day or a weekend exploring several sites between there and Grass Valley/Nevada City, a distance of about 40 miles. Read more.

Arch in from the west (Mariposa County, west entrance)

Dog at Yosemite West entrance in Mariposa County

Open the windows and let your pup take in the smells as you drive Highway 140 from Merced to Yosemite’s El Portal/Arch Rock entrance. This route offers plenty of dog-friendly fun along its windy way, passing through the towns of Mariposa, Midpines and El Portal. If you are coming south on Highway 49, be sure to check out Coulterville, a monument to another time. We recommend staying in one of these historic towns before heading into the park. Read more.

Sheraton Redding hotel at the Sundial Bridge

Dog and people at the Sheraton Redding Hotel

Location, location, location…The long-awaited 130-room Sheraton Redding Hotel at the Sundial Bridge sits right next to Redding’s landmark attraction, the Sundial Bridge, a pedestrian span across the Sacramento River. Four-legged guests are welcomed with all manner of treats, from water and food bowls in the rooms to specialized crates, bedding, collars and leashes on request. Read more.

Keeping the holidays safe for dogs

By Chris Pitts, RVT, of Broadway Animal Hospital. The holidays can be stressful and full of temptation for pets as well as people. Those friends and family you entertain can be seen as invading hordes to your dog. All the lovely, butter-filled treats you work so hard to prepare can cause GI upset and pancreatitis in your dog. Those gorgeous decorations you work so hard to hang, can be awfully tempting to a curious canine companion. And all those things you may think of as just trash, can be just the thing to make your dog dumpster dive his way into an emergency trip to the vet. Read more.

Make time for Mount Shasta

White dog with Mount Shasta in background

The Shasta Cascade region’s name comes from a monumental mountain (Mount Shasta, at 14,179 feet, one of the highest peaks in the country) and the Cascade mountain range that begins where the Sierra Nevada peters out, just north of Lake Almanor in Plumas County. The mountain, 75 miles north of Redding, is considered by many to be one of the world’s most spiritual “power spots,” but even if you’re not into New Age philosophy, you owe it to yourself to bask in its bewitching presence. Read more.