When Winter Storm Juno hit the Mid-Atlantic states, Pittsburgh-based YouTuber Matthew Philips didn't freak out; he looked at it as an opportunity. While most of the city stayed inside, Philips took his huskies out into the snow and turned the entirety of Pittsburgh into a dog sledding track — and naturally, the video he shot while doing so is amazing. Let's have a look at it, shall we?
Philips' Twitter bio describes him as "Hang gliding pilot and instructor, mountain biker, crazy person" — but he's the kind of "crazy person" that mostly just enjoys high-octane entertainment. His dog sledding adventure may not be as high-octane as some of his other pursuits, but it's rare to see a big city this quiet; I'd argue it's still exciting, just in a slightly different way. In any event, both Philips and his huskies seem to have enjoyed themselves (all that snow is the dogs' natural habitat, after all!), and the rest of us get to live vicariously through them via their footage.
"Since I knew downtown was a ghost town late at night, I watched the forecast the other night and waited for the perfect time to go... in hopes of just having a fun time and getting some one-of-a-kind pictures," Philips told the Daily Dot via email. "Then we packed up the equipment and the dogs hopped in the car and we just picked a good spot to park and went for it." He estimates they ran approximately two miles, going over the road, bike lanes, sidewalks, bridges, and Pittsburgh's riverfront trail. Surprisingly, they weren't totally alone — wrote Philips, "We encountered one snow plow... who stopped and looked at us in surprise, and a couple pedestrians and police officers, who pulled out their phones to take pictures and joked about needing a ride home after the storm finished." Here, give it a watch — it's absolutely delightful — and check out some photos he snapped during the adventure over at his Flickr page:
This isn't the first time Philips has taken his pups sledding, by the way; his YouTube channel is full of other outings, including this one from the Laurel Mountain State Park:
BRB, you guys. Totally going sledding, although minus the huskies. Something tells me my cats wouldn't enjoy pulling a sled nearly as much as those pups.
Image: Fotolia
