“I have had dogs follow me on climbs before, but never on something like this,” Wargowsky wrote in a blog post about his travels. “I instantly begin to picture this dog joining us for the duration of the trip. It would be so great to have a companion, a temporary Nepali therapy dog. Then I start to think about exactly what we’ll be doing in the next few weeks and the dream fades.”

Wargowsky thought there was no way that Baru would be able to join them on their potentially treacherous journey — but the spunky dog quickly proved him wrong.