I have always been a hunter since my teens. I have been lucky enough to draw quite a few Arizona Elk tags in unit twenty seven. It is a rather coveted tag and some folks only get two or three in a life time of applying. I eventually also became a guide, mostly because my love for the hunt and all that goes with it. Bagging an animal is great but the planning and the adventure, being out in the outdoors and seeing the stars at night are worth all the effort that goes into it to create some great memories. I have a lot of great memories and stories.
Like the time I took my wife into the Blue for the first time. She is a doer, she is game for about anything and is not a quitter, she is involved, she understands the packing business and what needs to be done. She also loves to camp cook and I love her cooking. She has become my favorite hunting partner because she always steps up to the plate. She is great, however, she does not always get to go with me. It depends on the arrangement if she goes. It is a lot of work to get a single person and their food and camping equipment in there five to 10 miles, so you don’t take extras if you can help it. But she has gone a lot and unfortunately also has a history of getting hurt. That has not stopped her though. We do ride quite a bit and a lot in the forest on the easy and not so easy trails, but those are just day trips and she always packs a nice lunch.
It was many years ago now. We have been married 21 years and it was in the first year. We planned travel dates and sorted through supplies, made lists and piles and then went grocery shopping for the final time before heading out. She had already made a lot of meals ahead of time and froze them in the sealing bags . Packing and stacking for a week. We packed the horse trailer with as much as we could the days before hand. The day we left she had to work but was getting off early. I picked her up at work all loaded down packing 4 mules in the back. Her work mates wondering what she sees in that sort of thing. But several came out to see the rig and wave us off. She is a bit different than most women. She does not mind getting dirty and we do a lot of DIY, that will be other stories. She also likes to dress up. She always primped and wore hi heels to work and looked really nice and very feminine. I am so happy to have her as mine. She is quite a gal.
We drove six hours and it was dark when we got to our place in Alpine. Took a bit to take the freezing cold off the inside, plus the place filled up with smoke because of the cold chimney not allowing a good draft. But we got it warmed up and settled in for the night. The next morning we got up early and headed down the 191 to the trail head, down the Coronado Trail, part of the original 66. We parked at the trail head and saddled and weighed the packs making them just right. We got the panniers up on each side. It really is very helpful to have two folks for this. You need someone on each side to do it smoothly. Then on goes the top pack and you cover all of that up with a mandy and a diamond hitch. This plan was to get my camp set up for an Elk hunt I had been drawn for coming up soon. We were taking in and setting up tents and packing in feed for the animals for the hunt. We are going in doing our business and coming back out the same day, which is a stretch for a day of daylight this time of year. We had panniers and top packs on two mules, and off we went down the trail. It was November and it was looking like it would be a nice fall and no horrible snow storms to speak of coming for the hunt. For as much as you can trust a weather forecast anyway.
Heading down the trail that starts out high and then drops. The trail started off nice and then we came into a lot of dead fall. Fortunately this part of the trail was flat and plenty wide. I was in the lead on Dude then the two pack mules and then Ollie on Old Red. It was her job to notify me if the packs started shifting. Once they get off center and start to sag it is a wreck waiting to happen. Clara was the rear pack mule and we were off a long ways into some dead fall, (downed trees), trying to go slow and easy. It went on for quite a ways there were a lot of trees down very close together and criss crossed. Ollie hollered at me about Clara’s pack needing to be adjusted. So we got off and tied up and went to fixing her pack. Her cinch had gotten loose a bit and going over all that dead fall and lifting her feet high kinda pushes on the packs left and right. So it had started to go over to one side. It wasn't easy to fix but we got it all tightened and up where it should be. When we went to get back to it is when it happened. Ollie had tied up on the other side of a large but not so huge fallen tree. She was a little slow to get up in the saddle checking her own cinch and I did not realize it. So as I move two steps forward she has her leg over but not in the stirrup. She is leaning forward a bit over the horn and Red decides he needs to jump the log. The horn came up hard and hit Ollie in the chest. She had a two way radio in her pocket that actually came in contact with the horn and we are still not sure if that was better than the horn by itself. I was beside myself waiting for her to catch her breath. She was hurting bad and later come to find out she broke a few ribs. She caught her breath and said lets go. I thought we should go back but she refused. So on we went up and over and down an around. The dead fall finally stopped and the ride was now more relaxed.
The scenery was exactly what I love to look at and I was in heaven. There were pines and junipers everywhere and the best of it was this trail in the middle of me. For awhile we rode right on the high side of a steep deep canyon. You could reach over and easily touch the side of the mountain with your foot. If you had needed to get off here it would be a bit dangerous. There was not any extra room next to the trail, you would have to get off on the high side and then be real careful. The low side was really steep and deep. Fortunately we had no issues on this stretch. Then over and around another hill and we are there. Five hours after we headed down the trail we are where I wanted to set up camp. We set up the tent first. Had a picnic lunch and then stacked and covered the pellets for the animals with tarps. We set up the cots and see the sun is getting low. Time to head out. Ollie is in pain and is starting to stiffen up. Dead fall with a flash light sounds potentially dangerous. This is a dangerous business anyway, I don’t need to stretch my luck if I can help it.
Off we go, back down the trail headed for the truck. Packs are no longer a problem because they are mostly empty so our pace is a lot quicker. We get through the dead fall just before dark but still have an hour to go. I have my headlamp on and it is working pretty well but it is a really dark night, a cloudy night and it actually starts to rain. We did not pack rain gear but we had warm coats on and it was just a drizzle. Trails are not always easy to see in daylight let alone the dark by flash light and we were trying to hurry the best we could so of course we missed the fork in the trail and the gate. Once we decided we went to far we found a spot to turn the string around and pretty quickly found the trail and the truck wasn’t much further. Ollie was beat and cold and wet. She had put in a hard long day and she was hurt. I was so proud. We tied the animals to the trailer and I started the truck to get the heater going to get it warmed up. I set her in the drivers seat and told her to just set there with my finger in her face up close to her nose. She did so for about two minutes and then got out to help and I did not see that in the dark and the drizzle. Then I heard a very specific familiar sound. The one when someone gets hit hard in the jaw. Ollie did not scream but she made a pathetic noise and I went running around the back ends of the mules. I had been at the end of the trailer and her up by the truck. She is standing there stunned and bleeding. I thought she fell, I asked her what happened and she told me she was taking off Reds headstall and he shook his head hard. She knew he was really ear shy but she was too tired to pay attention and he shook his head. His cheekbone hit her in the right eye and the right side of her nose and mouth. I sat her back down and threatened her to get her to stay put. She was feeling bad for Red thinking he was wondering what he hit and in just as much pain. Which he probably was because he also had a rather stunned look on his face. I told him “you did it yourself” I got everything back in the trailer and got in the nice warm truck. Now she is swollen in the mouth and her eye was already turning blue and her lip inside her mouth is cut and bleeding. She says she is fine.
It is not late though, the sun goes down early. It is about an hour back to Alpine. We were up for the weekend to do this task. We planned to have a more leisurely Sunday with some friends that had joined us at our place in Alpine before we head back to Tucson. So you should have seen the look on their faces when she walked in. One gal says "So you think that is fun?" She smiled and laughed through her swelling and bruising saying she had such a great fun time and would do it again. And she would and did for the hunt.
Komentarze