'Crossing the River With Dogs' is a logic-based river-crossing puzzle based on the textbook of the same title. The idea of any river-crossing problem is simple: get all of the people or items from Side A to Side B. The problem-solving aspect comes into play when there is limited room on the 'boat', and the actors in the problem have various conditions that need to be met.

In this puzzle, there are four humans and four dogs. Each dog belongs with its respective human. There is a total of eight passengers, but only three can fit onto the boat at the same time. The dogs can get very anxious if they're left alone, and must either be with their human, or with other dogs, in order to feel at ease. For the boat, any human can pilot the boat, but dogs cannot. There is, however, one dog who received training at a special boarding school for dogs, where the trainers taught him how to drive a boat. He is the only dog in the group of dogs that can pilot the boat.

This problem has more than one solution, but some solutions are more simple than others. There are many ways to analyze and tackle this puzzle, and prove mathematically that it is solvable. For me, I decided to get a piece of paper and a pencil, and sketch it out. Once I started sketching it on paper, it became easy to keep track of where all of my passengers were, where the boat was, and made the problem much easier than attempting to figure it out in my head. The game I've written is essentially based on the idea of getting out a piece of paper and using a pencil to keep track of all the moving parts. Enjoy!