Almost three decades ago, Joe Timko and Randy Neece were wandering through Disneyland, saw Goofy trailing around the gardens and made the connection.
This, but for dogs?
A Disneyland-inspired wonderland for their canine counterparts is what they were thinking. Timko, who Neece describes as “the most impulsive person in the world,” had no hesitation.
“That’s what we should do!” he says.
Dogs run around at the Wonderland yard.
That offhand vision has since expanded into Canyon View Ranch, a five-acre luxury retreat tucked into the hills of Topanga that its clients refer to as Disneyland for canines. Designed by married couple Timko and Neece, who worked as a trainer and TV game show director, respectively, this dog boarding retreat is like no other. Think multiple bone-shaped pools, a chauffeured shuttle service, behavioral and weight loss programs, 35 feet of underground tunnels and dedicated lands à la Disneyland, including Adventureland for the bigger hounds and Munchkinland for the little ones and older sports.
Dogs here wake promptly at 5 a.m. for morning exercise, eat breakfast at 6, take scheduled naps at 8, enjoy a “biscuit break” at 5:30 p.m. and are finally tucked in for “lights out” at 8. Ranch activities include hurtling through agility courses, swimming beneath a massive artificial waterfall and roaming sprawling fantasy playgrounds built expressly for their entertainment.
A map of the ranch drawn by Nina Rae Vaughn, the same artist who illustrates Disneyland’s official park maps.
(Canyon View Ranch)
Dog owners say that as soon as they pull into the driveway, their pups realize exactly where they’re headed and “start going bonkers,” says Neece. When they’re let loose, they enter Canyon View Ranch with the abandon of children running down Main Street, U.S.A.
Getting to the ranch requires a journey up winding hills, past signs that read “Please Be Kind,” on roads flanked by cacti, chaparral and coastal sage scrub. It looks nothing like the city.
Today, Canyon View Ranch boards around 60 dogs at once, often with a waiting list stretching six months or longer. There is no limitation on how long they can stay, and many of the dogs I meet today have been here for several weeks, totaling thousands with the ranch’s $100 nightly rate. Dogs travel from all over to get here, from Las Vegas to Dubai. Their owners include schoolteachers and secretaries alongside some of Los Angeles’ wealthiest families.
“We could be watching over all the jewelry in their safe,” Neece says, “and it wouldn’t matter as much as their dog.”
On this Wednesday morning, Neece and Timko lead the way through the property. Neece is calmly and casually kind, like a faithful bloodhound without jowls. Timko is sprightly, a live-wire Chihuahua. The two of them live on-site in what looks like a family home straight out of a 1990s Disney film, a white colonial home with blue shutters. There are 20 staff on-site. For Neece and Timko, the job is 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Munchinkland is for smaller and less energetic dogs at Canyon View Ranch.
Dogs follow animal care specialist John Highland.
“I have the best job in the world,” says John Highland, former veterinary technician and now one of the ranch’s animal care specialists, as the dogs stream into Adventureland.
A great many dogs run up to me, tails wagging, tongues lolling. Neece and Timko lead me eastward of Adventureland toward the dandelion-headed alpacas, Stumbelina and Sparkle. Other animals on-site include a stable full of horses and Cowboy the tortoise, who is about the size of a lawnmower and whose head protrudes from what looks like a Venus flytrap made of bone.
“They help bring the flavor of fun, and that’s exactly what we want to do here,” Neece says. “We want it to be an escape, just like Disneyland.”
Neece was raised 15 minutes away from Disneyland and developed an obsession with it early on. “I’ve read every book imaginable,” he says. “I have this really deep appreciation for Walt Disney’s vision.”
Every detail of Canyon View Ranch evokes the legendary Anaheim theme park. The property has its own illustrated map, drawn by Nina Rae Vaughn, the same artist who illustrates Disneyland’s official park maps. The dogs’ sleeping quarters are modeled after the park’s Pirates of the Caribbean ride, with its fort-like corridors made of sun-dried brick, the walls strewn with overgrown jungle vines. At Christmas, snow machines cover the grounds while lights are strung through the trees and holiday music plays all day.
The Disney vision has now come full circle. Several members of the Disney family are clients: Roy P. Disney and his wife, Sheri. His sister, Susan Disney Lord, is also a client, along with her children.
Canyon View Ranch even has what Neece describes as its own “Mickey Mouse”: Max the Tibetan terrier. A statue of him sits out front, honoring the first dog Timko and Neece owned together. “Usually, Tibetan terriers come in black and white, but we wanted Max, who came in earth tones, because he matched the furniture,” says Neece. The terrier, it turned out, was a champion, and the owner wouldn’t sell him unless the couple promised to show him. They agreed, and in 1997, Max won best of breed at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show. “All of this started because we made the decision to buy that dog,” says Timko.
Randy Neece, left, and Joe Timko spent years creating a “doggie Disneyland.”
Neece and Timko gaze over the canyon view from which inspired the ranch’s name. After 26 years, they’ve watched three generations of dogs come and go. “One of the things we didn’t count on when we started this was the emotional toll,” says Neece. “Yeah,” Timko adds, “every loss hurts.”
“When Max died, Joe struggled for weeks,” says Neece. “I later realized that a lot of it translated into him worrying about losing me next.”
In the late 1980s, while still working on TV sets, Neece learned he was HIV positive. “It was a death sentence then,” he says.
Larger dogs play in the Wonderland yard.
He survived, one of a comparatively small number of his generation who did. He returned to television briefly, working on two more game shows, one of which included one of his biggest paychecks. (“‘Match Game’ built Canyon View Ranch,” he laughs.)
But something had shifted. “When you go through something like that,” he says, “you really start taking inventory of your life. There’s something about that that frees you up to take a risk. I was ready to reinvent myself.”
The couple sold their house in Laurel Canyon and bought the Topanga property in the late ’90s from Melissa Sue Anderson, who had played Mary Ingalls on “Little House on the Prairie.” Slowly, year after year, they planted every tree alongside ranch foreman David Barrios, dug every tunnel, built every waterfall and themed land, until the place began to resemble the idea they’d first imagined while watching children crowd around Goofy.
Now, late in this hot August afternoon, dogs of every size race through underground tunnels and emerge from the other side even more manically happy than when they entered. The Pomeranian munchkins in Munchkinland skitter around, sniffing wagging butts. A Labrador sprays his friends with water soaked into his fur from the bone-shaped pool. If there is such a thing as the Rainbow Bridge, Canyon View Ranch must be what it looks like on the other side.
Dogs dip in a pool and follow John Highland at Canyon View Ranch.