Riflescope Blog: Expert's reviews, news, notes on rifle scopes, hunting optics, shooting, binoculars, night vision sights, gun accessories, and more
Friday, January 15, 2010SHOT Show 2010!
The Shooting, Hunting, Outdoor Trade (SHOT) show is in Vegas again this year. Leaving Monday. This is my Superbowl, this is some of what I get paid for. Pressing the flesh, establishing new contacts, and putting faces to names. Some politics. I don't know how many SHOTs I've been to over the last couple of decades, but an awful lot. It's still kinda fun, but certainly exhausting and tons of work.
A full dozen OP employees will be there this year, the most ever. Buyers, merchandising, executives, and gun monkeys like me.
We'll do our best for the company and for you! I'll fill you in when I get back.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
A full dozen OP employees will be there this year, the most ever. Buyers, merchandising, executives, and gun monkeys like me.
We'll do our best for the company and for you! I'll fill you in when I get back.
Happy New Year
Hope Christmas was great, and have a Happy New Year! God bless you and yours!
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Merry Christmas with Steve's Slow-Cook Venison Stew!
Not many foods can thaw a cold winter chill like a hot hearty stew made from meat with an animal you have taken. This is how I built my last batch of elk stew, courtesy of an animal taken this October in Colorado with the Burris company.
Steve's Slow-Cook Venison Stew:
In a large slow cooker, add the ingredients in the following order:
A few carrots cut into one inch pieces, or baby carrots.
A few ribs of celery in one inch pieces
Several red potatoes cut into one inch chunks
A few parsnips cut into one inch chunks (this is a secret that really takes stews over the top)
A cup or two of chopped onions (I use both red and yellow)
Lots of chopped garlic
A few bay leaves
A couple tablespoons of Worcestershire sauce
A tablespoon or so of dried thyme (one of my favorite herbs, always dried from my garden)
A tablespoon or so of dried basil (from my garden)
Black pepper to taste ( I like pepper so I put in a couple tablespoons)
A couple pounds of any well trimmed venison cut into one inch pieces
A couple large cans of whole tomatoes with juice (I use our frozen garden cherry tomatoes)
Several cans of beef broth
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup cold water
You can determine your own exact recipe according to your tastes, and size of cooker. Remember to crush the herbs to release more flavor. Do not stir the pot. Make sure the fluid covers all the ingredients and is pretty close to the top of the cooker. Put the temperature on low and forget about it for 8 or 10 hours.
Scoop out the meat and vegetables and place in a large covered serving bowl, leaving the liquid in the cooker. Discard the bay leaves. Turn cooker to high and cover it. Whisk the flour and water in a small bowl until smooth. Add a cup of the cooking liquid and mix well. Stir the mixture into the cooker and mix again. Keep it covered and cook for 15 minutes. Pour the sauce over the meat and vegetables and enjoy with a hearty crusty bread. I always make wheat bread from scratch to go with this special treat. The stew freezes well. I have used variations of this recipe with whitetail, mulies, pronghorn, caribou, and now elk. It's a simple recipe that you can modify to your desires.
I took the preceding picture last night from some thawed leftovers. It was accompanied by raw cow's milk french bleu cheese with seasoned rye crackers, 12 grain bread and cold grape juice. Life is good. Enjoy!
Docter Shawn's Weatherby with Nikon Monarch Riflescope and Leupold Scope Mounting System
A week or so after I fell coming down a mountain on my last elk hunt I discovered I buggered my knee. Wasn't getting better, so I had to see someone. I filled out the form at the doctor's office, and in the paperwork under the explanation of how the injury happened, I put "fell while hiking." When I finally saw the doctor and he asked me exactly what happened, I said "fell while hunting" instead of "fell while hiking." He looked at me strangely and said, "Hunting, huh? Did you kill anything?" I thought, oh, crap. Here it comes. Another anti hunter. Instead he said, "I grew up shooting javelinas with a handgun in Texas", so I knew I was in like flint.
Anyway, surgery went okay, and during my first check up afterwards I left his office with his new Weatherby Vanguard in .270 Weatherby, one of my favorite cartridges of all time. I told him I would fix him up. I installed a Nikon Monarch 2.5-10x42 with the BDC reticle (a best value, quality riflescope), and mounted it in lapped Leupold Dual Dovetail rings and bases. I also cleaned and polished his bore and crown, disassembled his whole gun and went over every part and torqued the action screws to the proper inch pounds. Boresighted it with my Leupold Zero Point boresighter. Gun looks good. Walnut stock. A bit too pretty for me, but very functional. Butler Creek flip up caps rounded it out, although Nikon has been shipping adequate flip ups of their own design lately.
Sometime when it's not 20 below like it is today I'll invite Docter Shawn to my range, maybe with Chuck the vet and Jerry the instructor. No substitute for trigger time.
Thanks again to Docter Shawn for cutting out the extra knee parts that I ruined. God saw fit to give me two knees, so I have a back up.
Pearl Harbor Anniversary, BLACKHAWK, Leupold, and Bushnell Weather Stations
December 7th, Pearl Harbor day, was the anniversary of the day I joined the Navy, thirty years ago. Dad was old Navy also. He asked if I had my flag up at home, and the answer was, "Yes, Sir!". Of course it stays up 365 days a year. Dad was just invited to Washington, DC to tour a bunch of sites with 99 other WWII veterans. He was asked to wear a uniform if he still had one and could. He got into his dress blue top, but had to get his wife's help getting out of it, and the pants somehow shrunk many inches since he last had them on in the 1940s. This is a curious phenomenon, and I have experienced it myself over the years. Many of my pants exhibit this same attribute of shrinking with age. I guess modern technology still hasn't figured out how to stop this from happening.
Mike Noell and the guys from BLACKHAWK! were in the other day for a visit. Had a blast downtown after our meeting was over. Things got loud. Had fun. Good food and drink and company. I remember something about Demi Moore. I poured myself into my hotel room like a soup sandwich, and before I knew it it was time for work again. I don't know of another business that is run as well as BLACKHAWK!, and every person I am aware of there is top quality, same as their products. Top quality people as in hire them immediately if you ever get the chance.
L3 (best known for EOTech Holographic Weapon Sights) and Electro-Optical systems (formerly known as Raytheon, Northrup Grumman, Thermal Eye, etc.) were in yesterday and we had a good meeting about new products and the night vision and thermal imaging industry as a whole.
Leupold/Redfield was in this morning and I saw the new products. This is the perfect time to reintroduce Redfield properly, not like some lame ducks that tried it before. The riflescopes are made in the US, and the marketing will be aggressively pointed not only towards Redfield with all their excellent attributes, but also against imports. Redfield will take the shooting world by storm this year, mark my words. The scopes look really great, and the prices are shockingly affordable. Buy them at OpticsPlanet within a week or two.
We just got a ton of Bushnell Weather Stations in stock. We bought a closeout, and the prices are fantastic. I'll be buying a few for gifts this year. Take a look at them.
Hope your hunting season is going well.
Cyber Monday at OpticsPlanet
Cyber Monday is here! Today officially starts the main part of our Christmas season. Hope all of you had a great Thanksgiving. My Shirley and I have been eating well, like you're supposed to do at this time of year. My turkey brined for four days and was the best bird we have ever eaten. Bold praise, indeed, but factual. I used the leftovers for turkey pot pies. This week I also made elk pizza bread to die for. With all the mozzeralla I put on it it probably hastened that end. The elk meat I brought home from a recent hunt is some of the best venison I've ever had.
OpticsPlanet is fully staffed and ready to ship. Of course we're not just about optics, but many other categories. Tactical and law enforcement supplies are in high demand, and we are stocked full with the items for shooters and sportsmen. Shop early, shop often! Take a look at our BRILLIANCE AWARDS pages for the products voted the best from our customers to help you with your gift choices. Gift certificates are easy and quick for those hard to buy for people.
Enjoy your holiday preparations!
Bushnell Backtrack, Zebra Skin Rash and Knee Surgery
One of the products I used on my last elk hunt was the Bushnell Backtrack. This personal locator/GPS is about the size of a pocket watch, and just about as easy to use. Turn it on and wait for a few satellites to triangulate your position. Set it to zero. Done. It will tell you how far and what direction to get back to the zero point. You may also set it for additional zeros, such as a road, a hunting stand, or maybe your car at the mall. This inexpensive unit could've saved my butt on a caribou hunt years ago when I got lost. Search and rescue, the whole deal. Great trip. Anyway, the Backtrack should last forever and get you back without that feeling that you're lost. Another item I used on both my elk hunts was the excellent Bushnell Legend 1200 laser rangefinder. This is my new favorite rangefinding unit. Clear, small, with 6x magnification, and the reticle is a circle, which I have come to prefer. Money well spent. Also a great Christmas gift.
Back in my Safari Synopsis blog I mentioned that I would get amorous on my zebra skin covering my guest bed. Well, I finally did. Now My Shirley has a rash on her butt, we can't stop sneezing, and the bed smells like formaldehyde. Live and learn. Last time for that experience. Whinnying like a horse adds a nice touch, if you are ever so inclined to try this.
Knee surgery Friday from my fall in Oregon. Thought I got away with it. Damn.
Christmas time is coming, and we're feeling the increased volume. We hope to keep earning your business...Thanks!
Another Successful Elk Hunt: The Bushnell Elk Excursion 2009
October 28th, 6 AM. Outside John Day, Oregon.Dark. Cold. 17 degrees when we woke up. The boys dropped me off with instructions to follow a barbed wire fence for a mile or so up the mountain (as the crow flies) and take a left and find a good vantage point. Music to my ears. Scary before sunrise by yourself. Real half-light Blair Witch Project-looking. Stranger in a strange land. My pack is heavy with emergency equipment, lots of water, food, extra clothing, and stuff to last a day in the elements. Fences there are held up by triangles of posts with boulders on top called "rock jacks". Posts can't be put into the ground because there are too many rocks to dig through.
I walked uphill forever with my Streamlight Buckmaster Camo Trident headlamp. The green light illuminates nicely with three different intensity levels and runs forever. My modified BLACKHAWK! pack is full of gear, and I'm carrying my Stoney Point shooting sticks with the optional Tripod Kit. My Weatherby is hanging on my shoulder by my outstanding, sticky and non-slip Butler Creek Comfort V-Grip sling and the gun seems heavier than it should be. Around my neck hung superb 10x50 Bushnell Elite binoculars (discontinued-too bad, they were excellent) held by the Butler Creek Deluxe Bino Harness. Climb up, up, up and up some more. Repeat. Small steps in granny gear. Don't look how far you have to go, just put one foot in front of the other. Repeat.
When I got to the top of the mountain there was just a hint of light in the East. As I peaked, the view made me giddy and drunk and took my breath away. A few miles away was another snow covered mountain top peeking through a mass of cottony clouds sucking the light from the sky to my right. The clouds were thick and low. To the West there were dark storm clouds and I could see the rain falling from them to the basin hundreds of yards below. The bottom of the basin was spectacular, and as the sun continued to rise I saw old growth pines with diameters many feet wide, giant skyward reaching intensely golden tamaracks, and giant craggy boulders shot long ago from volcanoes like the nearby Crater Lake. Only God can paint a three dimensional picture like this. You can shoot as far as you are capable of shooting from this perch on top of the world.
The terrain is some of the most geographically diverse I've ever seen. The terrain differed from the Cascade mountain range to the more arid desert land, and then changed again in the Blue mountains, where we hunted.
Our transportation for the four of us hunters and gun monkeys (we would meet another guest, Myron, at the lodge) was a pair of 2010 Suburbans. Lou was my travelling partner for the 5 hour ride (took us 7) from Boise to Ritter, Oregon, and back when done. Lou's a great guy and has some outrageous and spine tingling life stories. We absolutely proof tested and abused these new Chevys in snow and mud and frame-torquing rocky terrain. By the last day of the hunt they were lumps of mud with scratches and gravelly brakes. I think we ran over some cattle, too, unless Chevy has been having problems with calf hair in the undercarriage.
Our guide was the world renowned big game record book scorer David Morris. His lodge and porch was partially constructed of barn wood from a turn of the century building on his land. His grandfather built it with local help. These hundred year old buildings were put up with dowels and mortise and tenons and strange angles that get stronger with time. Many of the angles were fitted together and were marked with Roman numerals, so that when Dave took it apart he knew which ones went back together easily. The porch was maybe 60 feet long and included a hot tub. Some of the numerous animal mounts in his house were record book animals, and his lengthy hunting career started as he left the womb.
Some days, with Dave guiding, you could almost see him grinning from behind, and hiking ahead of us, pushing us on, and leading himself away from us even more, similar to a Mom with a bratty kid at the mall she doesn't want to be associated with. Actually, he took to us flatlanders really well, and was gracious and aware of our capabilities at all times. He cooks a mean grouse and backstraps. He used the drippings to make gravy for breakfast biscuits. His son Holt seems to be an apple off the same tree and is a nice young man to be proud of.
Inside the lodge we had nice beds, bathroom facilities, and our friendly host and all around sportsman John Vaca, a current international goose calling champion cooking for us. He is truly the Emeril of hunting camp. *BAM!* He was always up early making coffee or preparing something to fill our bellies before we left. His famous ribs were killer.
Before hiking up the mountain that first day I took off most of my outerwear to prevent sweat, but once again to no avail. I had to huff and puff and stop many times before I crested the mountain, and I was just dripping with sweat. Maybe you just can't prevent it, but God knows I try.
Other days varied in temperature and terrain and weather conditions. One day I just about had enough. It was probably the most miserable day I have ever spent in the field. Hiked a few miles with Dave and fellow hunter Ken and got sweated up and rained and snowed on.
Dave told me to go over to a peak and sit in a good place. I was wet from the inside and outside. The snowflakes were ice balls and only went sideways except for the ones that adhered to my everything. I was really, really freaking cold. Bad, bad cold. I knew I could stand it for one more minute, though, and I did. Then another one. Then I couldn't do it for another second, but I convinced myself for another minute. And another one. I only had 8 1/2 hours to go. I wanted to scream on the radio for someone to get me the hell out of here NOW! I dreamed of a large heated quilt to cover me from my frozen head to my toes. I wanted a hot bath. One more minute, one more minute, one more minute. I told myself I was being a big baby and this is what I signed on for. I didn't expect it to be easy, so I got what I wanted. I hiked up the mountain side using my used up legs to get some circulation going. I wanted to make a fire but didn't. I kept thinking, "Have I done everything I can do to stack the odds in my favor? Is there anything more I can do?" The answer was no. I was doing all I could. I must've said, "This sucks!" to myself a hundred times, but I finished the day strong. Boy, am I stupid sometimes. Next vacation maybe I'll go on a tropical cruise with My Shirley, swim trunks, and whiskey instead. Just kidding. This is what I am supposed to be doing. But after two elk hunts in a row I think that that's enough and I will never do it again. Or until the next time someone invites me. Hell, I'm already looking forward to it. Lou shot a nice bull that first day, (see gut pile, below) but none of us had a chance for the rest of the trip. The animals just weren't cooperating. I did get the opportunity to shoot two nice blue grouse with a borrowed Beretta 391. They were every bit as delicious as the ruffed grouse, sharptail grouse, and sage grouse I've shot before.
I didn't get to check zero on the Devil Gun until the last hour of light on the last day of the hunt when I exploded a game-bird-eating feral cat at about 80 yards offhand with a 180 grain Power Point from my .300 Winchester Magnum. Popped it like dust in a balloon. Never let it be said I don't do my part for conservation.
Some days were quite comfortable, with great views and good weather. My new boots were great. Good ankle support over rocky terrain, and no blisters. One evening I was laying comfortably on my back on a cliff and looking through my binoculars at a golden eagle soaring almost without motion in the air currents. It slowly changed locations until it had the backdrop of a dazzling full moon. What a stunning, unforgettable sight. I did take a fall going down a hill one night, and luckily my knee found soft ground to land on. Lucky. You don't get too many chances. I shouldn't have been hurrying. I could just see myself dragging myself backwards on my ass down a mountain to the nearest road for help. It didn't hurt, though, and I thought I got away with it until I got home and it doubled in size. Gotta get it bled and scraped out again, I guess. No fun.
The last evening back in Boise we hunters went out to eat, minus Myron, who had to leave early. Boise at 9PM is NOT the bustling metropolis. Good food and good company. Whiskey was involved and I was feeling a bit Navy, which sometimes scares me. But all in good fun.
So yes, it was a VERY satisfying and successful trip, although no elk died for me. I was glad to get home to My Shirley and Rad.
Queasy on the Night Before the Big Bushnell Game
11:30 AM Saturday, October 24th. Feels like the night before the big game.
I'm waiting in my Jeep for my shooting range to open.
I deep cleaned the Devil Gun and installed a Bushnell Elite 6500 2.5-16x42 in lapped Burris XTR rings.
I got back from my Colorado elk hunt sponsored by Burris last week and had a few days to clean up any issues at work before I leave Monday morning for another elk hunt, this time with Bushnell in Oregon.
Packing is easier this time because my gear was just proof tested on the hunt last week outside Steamboat Springs. Pretty much the same stuff to bring, with some slight modifications.
Since my Browning boots went South on me and I trashed them last hunt, I needed new ones. After three trips to stores, I bought a pair of Rocky Lynx's, and I've worn them at work and while cutting my grass and today again at the range to help break them in more quickly. You need well broken in boots for the terrain on these elk hunts, but I hope to be okay. My toenail bruises are mostly gone from my last trip when my boot soles came off and I had to duct tape them back on, increasing the room in my boots, causing my toenails to push into the toe box of my boots while walking down hill. It didn't really hurt, and the lovely dark purple color matches almost any hunting ensemble.
Ready to go. Talk to you soon.
I'm waiting in my Jeep for my shooting range to open.
I deep cleaned the Devil Gun and installed a Bushnell Elite 6500 2.5-16x42 in lapped Burris XTR rings.
I got back from my Colorado elk hunt sponsored by Burris last week and had a few days to clean up any issues at work before I leave Monday morning for another elk hunt, this time with Bushnell in Oregon.
Packing is easier this time because my gear was just proof tested on the hunt last week outside Steamboat Springs. Pretty much the same stuff to bring, with some slight modifications.
Since my Browning boots went South on me and I trashed them last hunt, I needed new ones. After three trips to stores, I bought a pair of Rocky Lynx's, and I've worn them at work and while cutting my grass and today again at the range to help break them in more quickly. You need well broken in boots for the terrain on these elk hunts, but I hope to be okay. My toenail bruises are mostly gone from my last trip when my boot soles came off and I had to duct tape them back on, increasing the room in my boots, causing my toenails to push into the toe box of my boots while walking down hill. It didn't really hurt, and the lovely dark purple color matches almost any hunting ensemble.
Ready to go. Talk to you soon.
Burris Elk Hunt 2009
I checked zero on the "Devil Gun" at a range on the way to camp. No issues. Good to go.
I kind of hoped that I'd get a gentle knock on my cabin door by a cute little maid when it was time to wake from my feather bed. She would put a cup of good coffee on my bed stand with a coy smile and offer her best wishes for a good hunt while she clicked on the morning news. With a twirl of her skirt, and a turn of her perfumed ankle she would be gone, leaving me with, "Your breakfast will be ready at your leisure, Sir."
Instead I was led to a dilapidated 100 year old trapper's cabin with no running water, and a "bathroom" that consisted of a two hole privy outside with a finicky propane heater and wood slat walls that fit so loosely they looked like horizontal prison bars.
The twisted stairway leading to the cabin's upper level must've been designed by Salvidor Dali, with its queer illogical angles and abysses and precariousness. I drunkenly climbed them until the whole scene came into view. There were three green cots about four feet apart under a half wood, half tin roof in a room about the size of a prison cell with plastic sheeting for a window and a single electric light bulb hanging from a strained fixture that must've come from Edison's junk drawer. A sleeping bag was later thoughtfully provided. Three of us snorers slept in this room, another four downstairs, and three or four more in a tent outside. It is a prerequisite to be able to snore obnoxiously before being invited to any hunting camp, apparently.
My hunting companions were a few folks from Burris, who sponsored this hunt, and a couple of Joes like me. International flair was represented by a large distributor from Germany, and another from France.
We were with Trout Creek Elk Hunts, not too far away from Steamboat Springs, Colorado, in the great Rocky Mountains. Brad and Brenda Carnahan are the owners and operators of this operation based on the Knott ranch, with a total of almost 9000 huntable acres. Brad has lived the elk hunting life forever. He's as skilled and tough and physical as you would suppose a person in his profession would be in this 10,000 foot elevation.
There were no posers or pretend people present.
The first morning of any hunt is usually the hardest, mostly because you don't know what to expect, exactly, and therefore you don't know exactly how to dress and what to bring.
It was in the 20s when we woke up before 6.
When sled dogs in the Iditarod race leave their starting areas, they don't do so on a bed of white snow. The snow is brown because the dogs know they will be exerting themselves and have no need to carry around extra weight in waste. So they relieve themselves first. Smart humans do the same. If you are slow to wake in hunting camp, just gather the gumption to drop trou over a frozen wooden slat in a windy privy when your testes are so cold they retreat into your belly, and the sleet pushed in by 40 mph winds smacks and settles on your goose-pimpled thighs and builds up and coats your legs until it looks like you're wearing goat hair pants. Icy baby wipes make your sphincter tingle and your eyes water. There are no books or magazines in this dark box with a temperature approaching absolute zero. There is no electricity, so your slobber drips down whatever flashlight you clench between your chattering teeth. (In most cases it was an excellent Streamlight Keymate...highly recommended!)
Breakfast was a granola bar or fruit with a pot of coffee split between a gaggle of hunters in various states of dress. Make a sandwich or two from stark ingredients and smoosh them into whatever room you have left in your backpack. You'll be gone all day, so you better have everything you need. Lots of water. You must stay hydrated, you must stay hydrated, you must stay hydrated.
I was scared and apprehensive like I always am when I have to perform, and I know what I expected. I've been taking this hunt very seriously, but I still knew that I would fail miserably to automatically assume peer level of these acclimated, mountain goat-like iron muscled and weather balloon-lunged indigenous guides and elk hunting practitioners.
I carried my old fleece backpack, repaired several times over with dental floss, filled with all my emergency equipment and two one liter bota bags. I like bota bags because they're soft and flexible, but mainly because you can squeeze the air out so the water doesn't slosh around and make alarming noises. Quiet is so key. My sticks were Bog-Pods, the best I have used so far. My soft case during local transportation was a Kolpin Rhino. I used the excellent new Bushnell Legend 1200 ARC rangefinder. I keep my ammo in an Uncle Mike's Open Buttstock Shell Carrier.
The first day was freaking brutal. A couple of miles up a damn fine angle, carrying my pack and gun and shooting sticks. Then it got steeper. And went on forever. I was soaked from the inside out like I took a shower in my clothes. The guys leading me were monitoring my breathing (more like gasping) constantly, and taking it as easy on me as they could afford. For a long while I could only go ten or twenty yards at a time. My legs wouldn't work as designed anymore. I actually cried out a couple times, "Mama, make it stop...!", but to no avail. I hope nobody heard me. I was spent. I can walk for days on level ground, but this was ridiculous. When we reached the summit I was okay again. We glassed for hours and saw lots of cow elk, but no bulls. My tag was for either sex, but antlers are kinda nice. I removed some clothing (which any smart person would've done first) and sat and stewed in my soaked base layers until I dried out as much as possible. When my shakes became severe enough I added another layer, then another, and so on until I was comfortable.
I took a siesta from about 11 to 1 like all the big game animals do out there, and it was the first time I ever fell asleep in the woods on purpose. Falling asleep in a tree stand doesn't count. Upon waking I looked over golden aspens and emerald pines on the mountainside across from me and felt like I was in a Northern Woods Corona commercial, where you throw your cell phone over a snowy cliff. There wasn't any cell phone service available out there anyway, and it was days until I was able to talk to My Shirley. My days were long, and we spent up to 16 hours a day in the mountains.
Most of the guys had killed their elk by the third day, but I passed on a smaller bull and had no other shots. I had the area to myself one day around 11 AM, and Brad and then Brian, one of my hosts (and now friend) thought it would be a good idea for me to sit on a patch of mountain until nightfall. The following is an excerpt from my notebook:
"This sucks. I'm freezing on a mountainside by myself. It's 12:30 PM and the snow is blowing sideways from all directions at once. I started getting dizzy so I drank some more water and had a sandwich and some jerky. I have never worked so hard for an animal in my whole life. Boot camp was harder, physically, but not by a lot. Quite a few guys have killed their animals, and I wish it was as easy for me as it was for some of them. My legs are particularly spent. Steep, steep, steep. Rocky footing. I'm glassing a few mountain sides and valleys and I have hours to go. I'm frozen and whipped. 2:50PM. I saw six cows running towards me. I got my camera ready, and two came within ten paces of me. Very exciting! They saw me and bolted before I could get a picture."
Since I've been lost in states, countries, and continents, it was no surprise to me when coming back down the mountain that evening I got a bit turned around. Call me Magellan. Couldn't have been more simple, but everything looks different in the dark, and as an added bonus, it was raining again. Classic. I had a radio, and a couple of the guys set me straight. My old Browning boots took a powder that night. They probably would've lasted a few more years on level ground, but the soles started coming off both of them. I would use duct tape to hold them together as long as possible, then toss the old friends away.
On one of the last days, Brad was going to take charge of me. He told me the night before that I had better massage my thighs, because I was going to get the full experience. Oh, joy. I massaged my thighs from the inside with some Crown Royal and ibuprofen.
Woke up with a headache, but not from booze. The altitude sickness really blasted one guy for a day and a half. You could see it in his eyes. My batteries were drained. I was pretty well used up. I asked Brad if we could just do two "downs" instead of an "up and a down", but he said no. I had learned by now to start my climbs with just the minimum of clothing so I didn't sweat so much.
Brad saw some animals on an opposite mountain side before sunrise. I don't know how he saw them because I couldn't even see my boots. He said, "Here's the deal. If we go after them and you shoot one, I won't make you go back up the mountain." I was game, and the path was treacherous. By the time we got within 600 yards the dawn was breaking. We took a breather and glassed. My 10x42 Euro Diamonds were superb performers, and we saw a nice bull clearly in the distance. We started after him, but then Brad froze. A lone cow was watching us from a couple hundred yards away. Caught us cold. We were static for many minutes until the cow decided nothing was amiss, and went away. We then heard a bugle from behind some aspens from an animal we hadn't noticed. He came out slowly and majestically. His giant black head reared back with a piercing bugle, and the smoke billowing from his nose and mouth was surreal. I wasn't winded, and I had a tree close by to use as a rest. Brad called 280 yards. My second yardage line was 275 yards on my 2-12x40 Six-X, and I rested the gun, took a couple of breaths, and the trigger on my Weatherby broke cleanly. A 180 grain Winchester Power Point at 2950 fps destroyed two lungs. He trotted a few yards, then let his back end fall, then his front, and it was over. A nice mature 6x5 elk and one of God's most magnificent animals. I thanked the powers that be for the opportunity to take this animal, and we went to work getting this mammoth creature into a freezer.
He was on a pretty steep hill, and Brad took his antlers and pulled him down into a ravine where we could get an ATV. His billy goat of a son, Tate, was there also, and they both climbed back up the mountain side on their way to the ranch. True to his word, I didn't have to, so I waited until they came back. I had already gutted the animal, like I do most of my game. Brad said that out of over 100 elk taken, I was the only client who ever asked to clean his own animal.
More surrealism. Brad brought his three sons back with him. He dug holes in the ground for the rear tires on his ATV so as to lower the machine, and we muscled the beast on top and strapped him on with cinch straps. I sat on top of the elk trying to avoid getting an antler up my butt, and his three young kids were hanging on the front luggage rack. Later on his tired rottweiler hopped on, also. So on this ATV we had two adults, three kids, an elk and a rottweiler. Weird, man. Unforgettable and funny.
On the way to the airport we stopped and picked up a 50 pound box of frozen elk meat and I checked it in as luggage.
I had backstraps for dinner last week with mushrooms and onions, and burgers last Saturday. The meat is outstanding.
My thanks to the whole Burris crowd for the invite, fabulous folks one and all. Also to Brad for his exceptional prowess and patience with me, and his lovely wife Brenda whose cooking was a delight! They head up a family of kids who would make any parents proud. I enjoyed the company of some first class hunters, had some laughs, and some aches. Guys, please excuse any poetic license.
I have never been on such a physically demanding hunt. I completely enjoyed it. I lost some inches in some places and put it on as muscle in some others. I feel as fit and strong as I have in years. I am so blessed for these opportunities.