There are fewer and fewer places staying open 24 hours anymore. Even Walmart, once the bastion of 24 hours a day service, now closes before midnight hits.
But there still are a few places that are always there when you need them—Sheetz, some fast food restaurants, and also a place I recently discovered that I have to rave about here briefly.
To be fair, this place has been open for a few years,; but not having a dog for the last 10 years until recently, I haven’t had a need to visit.
Now that I do? What a Godsend.
The place I’m referring to is the Bethany Pike Car Wash and its accompanying Bethany Pike Dog Wash. It’s located at the base of Route 88 heading up into Oglebay Park on 269 Bethany Pike in Wheeling.
From the outside it’s a bit unassuming. After all, if you’ve seen one touchless automatic car wash, you’ve seen them all. Sure, the bells and whistles can change, but the premise is simple—pull in, deposit your money and pick your services, drive into the bay, and wait.
The same concept for your dog, however? Genius.
On the left side of the facility are two large, self-enclosed rooms that have everything you need to give your puppy a proper bath, free from the added distractions at the pet wash inside area pet stores. It also allows you to wash your dog properly outside of your home bathroom, leaving you one fewer room in the house to clean up (not that you need to make a mess at the dog wash).
When you walk in, the concrete floor has a drain in the middle, in case the water escapes the washing area, or a soaking pupper decides to leap from the tub onto the floor and does the patented doggy shake dry.
Our newly adopted dog needed a bath and, considering my apartment is shower only one, it wasn’t very convenient. The local pet store has a do-it-yourself washing stand that is quite nice, and reasonably priced. But we just finished taking him to the dog park, and I suddenly remembered hearing about a pet wash out Bethany Pike.
So we drove out and decided to give it a shot.
The washing station inside the dog wash 
The close-up of the selections available for the dog wash.
Everything You Need is Right There
Aside from the obvious convenience of the dog wash being open 24 hours a day, inside consumers will find everything they need to wash their dog(s). Forget your shampoo? Not a problem, the machine has both dog shampoo and conditioner, along with flea and tick shampoo.
There is a nozzle that can be rotated to select the option you want to use at present from the machine: shampoo, condition, flea and tick shampoo, rinse, blow dry, and disinfect (for the tub once finished, not the dog).
The cost was $10 for 10 minutes to get the ball rolling. If you need more time, you can purchase an additional 10 minutes of time, this time for $5 dollars. This is similar in price to the larger pet stores, though the one we used previously did not have flea and tick shampoo built into the machine.
If you’d rather towel-dry off your dog as opposed to using the blow dryer attached to the machine, there is a vending machine around the back of the facility which sells microfiber towels, along with treats for both puppy and human.
The towels work well, though customers with larger breeds should purchase multiple towels, or bring their own. We’re opting for the latter next time. Blow drying would be ideal, but our new family member really hates having air blown on him from a human mouth. The industrial blow dryer? Yeah, he was not a fan.
This is a great resource to have for area pet owners, both in Wheeling and the surrounding communities. It’s also within reasonable driving distance from the dog park, though having a similar setup in East Wheeling would be ideal.
