“He looked exhausted.”

Most great bachelor parties involve an element of surprise. But recently, a bachelor party canoeing on the Minnesota River got the shock of a lifetime when they spotted a huge, furry head poking out from the muddy shoreline.

“We had been on the river for … a full day and night, and hadn’t seen anyone else,” bachelor-in-question Mitch White wrote in a Facebook post. “ My [n]ephew … heard a dog barking behind him and turned the canoe around to see what was going on …”

The head belonged to a senior St. Bernard who’d been wandering the area and somehow gotten hopelessly stuck.

“When we got to shore, [we saw he] was buried up to his neck in the thickest of mud,” White wrote.

The men began using their oars as shovels, trying to dig the poor pup out of the mud. In need of some help, they called 911. Soon, firefighters from the Carver Fire Department were on the way.

In the meantime, the men did everything they could to keep the dog comfortable.

“We gave him water, [and] he drank about a half a gallon before stopping,” White wrote in the post. “[We] gave him some of our lunch meat and summer sausage we had been lunching on just before we found him.”

By the time fire department captain Shaun Cox arrived at the scene, the men had been digging for about 20 minutes.

“When I first saw the dog up to his back in the mud, I felt pretty bad for him, as he looked exhausted,” Cox told The Dodo.

Firefighters and bachelor party members were initially anxious that the dog, whom they later learned was named Ed, wouldn’t react kindly to their help. However, the group was pleased to find Ed to be very friendly and cooperative. Soon, the big guy was free from the riverbank, relaxing in a truck bed.

Ed’s owner was so happy to reunite with his pup, who, according to CBS News, had roamed off the family’s property and was missing for a day before rescuers found him.

Cox was similarly thrilled that this unique rescue had come to such a joyful conclusion and that Ed would finally be home safe.

“I was happy to see them reunited,” Cox said. “[Ed] looked a lot better the next day, after having had a bath.”