In what would seem to be a contradiction, we got completely skunked hunting this weekend and I still had one of the best weekends up there I’ve ever had.

Getting to spend two days running in a truck with the man I really like will do that though. Talking about it and deciding that we really want to give it a shot will do an even better job of it. He likes his privacy, so I’ll leave it at that, and try to keep telling hunting stories, but hunting’s not what’s on my mind about now.

 

 

There weren’t many hunting stories to tell this weekend anyway. We turned out the dogs on Saturday and they went off into a miserable deep hole, and we didn’t get the last ones out until 11:30. I’d long since gone back to camp and cooked dinner for those poor guys who dragged in after all that time. On Sunday morning, they struck in exactly the same place; could have been a resident bear feeding there at night or we could have been up for another long day. But that time, they went in a different direction.  

 

By the time they treed and I got there, everyone else had beat me. Sometimes you’re the closest one to the dogs; sometimes you’re not. But nobody was looking concerned and there weren’t any dark spots peering out of the tree. In fact, the dogs didn’t seem to all agree which tree they should be barking at. Todd’s guess was that they’d treed a bobcat or a fox, and that he was hiding in there. After looking a lot, yelling, and pulling the dogs off to see if they’d pick it up again, that was the end of that day.  

 

I had to pack up camp and move the trailer too. We’d been in there too long, according to the resident ranger. He seemed to be OK with us just moving them across the road for a while, so that’s what I did. I didn’t set up there, just parked it. I’ll be back up on Friday and will put it back where it belongs. I hope he noticed that it was moved though, I don’t need a ticket.  

So now I’ve got to try to kick my brain into gear to work again. At least it’s a short week, and I get to go back up Friday. I can’t get enough of that place.