The Dog Lover's Companion to Washington, DC-Baltimore [ILLUSTRATED] (Paperback)

by Don Oldenburg (Author), Ann Oldenburg (Author), Phil Frank (Illustrator) "The canine presence has long been a part of the scenery in the nation's capital, where politicians know that every baby kissed and every dog..." (more)
Key Phrases: dog exercise area, leashed pup, pet fee, George Washington, Connecticut Avenue, Civil War (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Review
Indispensable to dog owners, dog lovers, or indulgent onlookers, and vastly entertaining as well. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Description
This guide includes day trips to the Atlantic Coast beaches of Maryland and Delaware and popular spots in Virginia and West Virginia. 10 b&w illustrations.Maps.

Product Details

• Paperback: 350 pages
• Publisher: Avalon Travel Publishing; 1st edition (September 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1573540412
• ISBN-13: 978-1573540414
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,368,209 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in this category: (What's this?)

  #51 in

  Books > Travel > United States > States > Maryland > Baltimore

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars No longer have to wonder where to take your pooches, January 6, 1999

By A Customer

I highly recommend this book to dog owners who love to take their little four-legged friend(s) everywhere. It is well organized and the writing style used is perfect for dog lovers.

It covers almost all the parks in the Washington D.C., Virginia and Baltimore. Have you ever looked up a park on a map and it looked huge and perfect for your dog, and when you got there, you and your dog were very disappointing with the park? Well, the review for each park is quite accurate. With this book on hand, you can look up a park and find out if it is suitable for your dog before driving there. It covers important information that a dog owner needs to know about the park/area - such as the poop scoop law and the leash law.

It also contains information (ie. hotel, restaurant, pet stores, etc...) that is very useful for dog owners who like to take their pooches on vacation with them.

Embedded into the book, you will find dog adoption information. The book encourages suggestions from readers. I've already written to the publisher suggesting to include information on various rescue organizations and local animal shelters - a way to help promote pet rescue/adoption.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Can I Kiss the Authors?, November 6, 2002

By	Erica (Virginia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Dog Lover's Companion to Washington, D.C. and Baltimore: The Inside Scoop on Where to Take Your Dog (Dog Lover's Companion Guides) (Paperback)

This is one of my favorite books ever. Really. I moved to the D.C. area with my lab three years ago, and while we were used to having dozens of places to go for various reasons or times, I didn't know where to begin to find good places to take her around our new home. This book was a godsend for finding fun places to go, especially because I found the reviews to give a me a very accurate idea of what sort of place we were going, including what sort of "feel" it might have for dog-friendliness. Some of the features of the book I have found extremely helpful are:

* Birds-eye maps showing where the reviewed locations are in the counties covered (perfect for finding a park near odd places that I might run errands)
* How strict the leash law is followed (this is a biggie for me -- while the authors point out excellent reasons to use the leash, they very helpfully suggest where we can get away without it)
* Rough idea how crowded the area in question might be, and how easy or difficult to get to (varies of course by time of day and season)
* Whether there's a place for doggie swimming

In my area (Sterling/Ashburn, VA) I've found the book to be amazingly comprehensive for my local and outlying areas, and find that the park descriptions have always given me a pretty accurate idea what to expect. The book covers a wide enough range (including some pseudo-local vacation destinations) that I've used it on countless occasions to find nice stopover while on short trips outside my "home turf". Highly recommended for anyone who enjoys finding varied places to visit with their pups.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Very helpful and informative guide to the local area., January 2, 1999

By	Rob Waner ([e-mail]) (Howard County, MD) - See all my reviews

A very helpful guide, pointing out places and events in the local area that would otherwise pass by unknown. I've found a few tiny errors in the placement of parks on their maps, but nothing major... All in all, a great book.