Just when you think the Trophy is yours
The mild fall weather was in full attire. The changing leaves left a colorful witness to my eyes of the beauty that God had let me experience. The air was fresh and free from the smog that had permeated the valley floor from where I had driven. My cause this day was with a rod in hand, a small tiny hand-tied fly to a line, and dawned in waders and vest. I was in pursuit of the beautiful fall colored brown trout of a local nearby river. I could have been a model of an old Herters magazine cover had it not been for my bulging waistline and redneck smile.
Visions of a larger golden colored stream monster with speckled spots and hook lips that were protruded with sharp teeth were racing back and forth in my mind as I made my way down to the streamside to size up the river and make my play. The brown trout were in full spawn that time of the year. With the right presentation of a fly and the soft mending of the line in the swift current, my efforts were soon rewarded with a stiffening of the line and that all familiar bump on the rod tip causing me to lift and set the hook in the jaws of the monster brown.
Well, the stream didn't really produce the monster trout that I was hoping for but I did enjoy several 10-12 inch native brown trout that felt like they were the Loch Ness each time I set the hook. This day was just what a country boy needed. I worked the stream from the bottom on up the canyon. I felt like I was in the Masters own private fish hatchery. Time and time again I would get the perfect drift and the perfect mend in my line only to snag on the tangles that were layered up and down the creekside from dead debris that had littered the brush-choked stream. Fly after fly went into the jungle until I realized that the fish, deadfall, and the river were winning the contest. If I continued this way I'd be back home behind the tying vice for several days trying to recoup my losses.
Fly fishing for me wasn't in the catching and eating but in the catch and release. I had been taught from an early age about the sport of fly fishing and how it would enter a man's soul and he would never be the same again when it came to fishing. So this day and its obstacles were overlooked in the name of all those fly fishermen who had come before me and modeled the code that I now found myself adhering to.
Finally, the fish played me out and it was time to climb out of the canyon and back to my truck. Earlier in the day, I had thought I heard a knocking noise on occasion that I had dismissed as possible construction farther up the canyon or some late season campers, chopping wood or breaking limbs as they made fires for their morning breakfast. As I neared my truck that day I heard a loud whacking type noise that I was unfamiliar with. My eyes searched the steep canyon side walls as I tried to find the source of it. There it was again and this time it was less than a football field length away from my truck. Gazing up the sunlight mountainside I found the creators of the noise in their full glory.
There on the verticle hillside were three beautiful Rocky Mountain Bighorns. Two of them were rams that were battling it out, head to head with horn to horn, for a beautiful ewe that had a bright orange colored collar around her neck. Each ram would approach her and she would shy away and move off thirty or forty feet, only to stop and witness the carnage that she was producing from the warring rams. Again and again, the two full curl rams line one another up and then as if given a cue, they would rear up and plunge into each other with a powerful force.
The result would be a loud smacking sound of hard horn hitting against an equally hard horn on the opposite ram. I watched and marveled at the immense fortitude and strength that these two old boys had in them to continue with such a display of will. The scene would play itself out over time and again until I realized that I had been a witness for nearly an hour to the brawl that had ensued. When I realized what a precious thing I was a witness to, I called my nephew and told him to get my camera and make tracks for the canyon ASAP.
True to form the rams stayed the course and we got some nice pictures. As the time slipped away, the two rams seemed to tire of the contest and about the time I figured one or the other would give way, a new participant showed himself and walked right into the picture and swept the prize off her feet. The two of them sashayed out of the area, leaving the two battered and bruised veterans alone and completely defeated without so much as a hair on their hide removed by the villain. Once again I remember that old Mister Murphy and his philosophy. It goes to show that no matter how hard you try in life to win the hand of that lovely lady, muscles and might can never compete when that slick talking dude with his hair in all the right places enters the scene and she falls for the sound of the coins in his purse.
Later that winter I painted the scene as viewed from my eye. Each time I look at that artwork I remember the two defeated rams as they gazed off into the distance in disbelief as their prized queen of the ridges walked away and into the clutches of that dastardly dude known to them as old slick horn.
This year we have decided to change up the blog and introduce some artwork with some of the stories that I have encountered and produced in a lifetime of enjoying not only the outdoors but my other passion in life, that of art. We will be posting in Grady's Gallery different pieces of artwork with stories that inspired some of the paintings that were produced. Additional books are in the production stages and as they are published we will show them here as well.
I would like to thank all of you for all the kind comments and to those of you that have supported my blog and encouraged me to continue with this passion of mine. May God bless you.
The big horse stiffened as the cowboy reached his hand out for the bucking reign. "Whoa, now you don't need to get all frisked up," the cowboy said as he put his glove hand on the side of the frightened horse's neck. "We ain't even had breakfast yet and you're starting the day out with a wedge between you and me." The cowboy spoke softly as he pulled the cinch strap up just tight enough to allow his weight in the stirrup. With his left-hand grasp in the reign, the cowboy eased his left boot into the stirrup. With the weight of a feather in the wind, he stood himself up straight and tall with just one leg. Holding this position the cowboy reached down and put his right hand on the saddle horn. Ever so slowly he slid his right leg over the saddle on the horses back and sat himself down very lightly in the seat. As he was picking up the reigns with both hands one of the boys from the W-U shouted out to the cowboy, "Good thing we didn't have to pay for our dusty corral seats or we might have wanted our money back. It's taking you forever to ride the steam off that Roan." A chorus of laughter broke out from all the cowboys that had gathered just to watch the Roan buck. The cowboy looked off to the side and just sneered at the comments directed at his performance.
With a slight nudge of his knees, the cowboy prodded the big horse in the rib section and tapped the underbelly with the tip of his right spur. That's all it took as the nervous horse lost his mind and commenced the dance of all dances. The horse went straight into the air tucked his head and came straight back down with his front legs hitting the earth with a shuddering sound as hoof met soil. Collecting himself the horse cocked his hind feet up under his belly. As they came back to earth he used all of his strength to lung out into the air again with his head leading the way. Across the corral, the giant animal leaped with tail and mane flying in all manner of twisted contortion. Squealing and pissing, the brute hit the side of the corral with his front chest. The side poles and supports shattered and bust from the weight of the big cayuse. He stumbled slightly then regained his position and with nothing but free space in front of him, the wild athlete hit the prairie with all his strength as he tried to poke a hole in the sky at each arch of his back.
The cowboys that had gathered around the corrals were hooting and hollering. They threw their hats at the frightened animal as one of their own tried to stay in the saddle during the onslaught that had overtaken the horse. Leap after leap the Roan horse shifted his weight and contorted his frame in all manner of positions until he felt the weight that had been placed upon his back had finally disappeared. When the horse acknowledged his rider on the ground the whole show came to a halt and the dusty Roan stopped as quickly as he had started. He put his head down and blew air out of his nose, then showed his teeth as he reached for the morsel of prairie grass just to the side of his right hoof. He pulled a section of the wild grass up by the roots and nibbled on his prize as the gallery of cowboys laughed and prodded the fallen victim.
"Maybe next time you'll listen to the remuda boss when he says that old Roan is never going to be a Sunday pony," said one of the cowboys as the fallen rider beat the dust off his sheepskin chaps and rearranged his hogleg and holster. One of the young cowboys came up and handed ole Slim his dirty hat that hadn't made it past the fourth leap. "That was some ride Slim, I thought you had him at one time, I'll get him ready if your gonna give him another toot," he said as he looked in the direction of the Roan chewing on the snag he had pulled from the earth. Just as Slim was about to answer the young man his words were drowned out by the clanking of the triangle as Cookie Bill hit the iron with his blacksmith hammer. "Chucks boiling out of the pot faster than I can keep it in, come and get it before she's turned into prairie chowder you yahoos," he hollered. The whole procession of dust beat cowboys turned and made their way to the wagon and the good smell in their nostrils leaving the Roan to his prairie bladed biscuit. One more notch in the old corral post, thought the renegade Roan as he tongued down his breakfast. That made 43 cowboys that had bit the dirt and the Roan was just coming into his prime.
I've always been a great admirer of the cowboy master artist Charlie Russell. I've seen almost all of his works that are on display from Great Falls to Fort Worth. I have even been privileged to view a few private collection pieces while I was employed by a Texas firm back in the early 1980's. On one of my visits to the Buffalo Bill Museum in Cody Wyoming, I decided to try my hand at one of Charlie's watercolor renderings. I changed a few things such as the foreground and the background hills. I put a rafter S which is my family brand on the right hip and I used an old Heiser saddle model which I inherited from my grandfather Azer. Other than that I tried to capture the essence of the old master and I had a very enjoyable time in the process of this watercolor.
Just recently this author has taken the route that so many have taken before me and shut down a portion of life that has held me well for the past 40 years. Last month, I retired my mind and body from full-time employment and decided to take the leisure life from this point going forward.
Retirement has been hanging around my mind for the last several years and finally, the day came when I just didn't want to work at the pace I had been accustomed to. I looked my affairs over and said to my self it's time to do something else. Part of the decision to leave my former lifestyle behind was the fact that I was sorely neglecting my writing and painting activities which had become a mainstay for my sanity. I will now be able to post in my blog on regular basis articles and stories that come to mind as I have more free time to research and compile these short stories and novels.
I suspect that between riding my horses and mules, combined with a little golf with my family this should keep me active and off the couch. I will now be able to go out on location and experience the sights and sounds that I put into these novels that help make them more lifelike when put into words. I am very excited about this new venture and I look forward to the path it will lead me. We all go down certain trails in life, some are really rewarding and others are not very enjoyable. I plan on making the most out of this opportunity I am blessed with and will do my part to make it a success.
Here is a small short story that happened to me back in the fall of 1982 while traversing the Bob Marshall Wilderness of Montana. I had left our Utah Valley for the pristine wilderness that lay adjacent to the beautiful Flathead Lake area in northern Montana. I was going on an elk hunt with several friends and we were hauling our horses into the trailhead area near Swan Lake. The weather that year was very enjoyable. As we unloaded and prepared to pack our animals near the start of the road-less area, I couldn't help but notice the absolute beauty of the surrounding forest dotted with conifer, aspen, and cedar. The smell in the air from the morning frost still on the bushes, and grasses, as we saddled up, was very welcome to my senses.
I had been looking forward to this hunting expedition for nearly a year. We had planned the hunt 8 months prior and when it became a reality my thoughts were constantly thinking of how it might unfold. Every waking hour I would find my mind working over small details in planning the event from my perspective. Finally, the day came as we motored our horse caravan through Utah, Idaho and into central Montana for the experience of a lifetime.
Back in the eighties the 'Bob' as it was known, was still in a state of prime untouched wilderness. Very few people traversed its trails and the mountainous country was nearly as it had been for the previous century. There were only three or four main trails into the area and they had been carved out long before by Native Americans and 18th-century explorers looking for the treasures they had heard that existed. You could ride one of these trails and never see another human being which is not the case in today's environment. Today the area is littered in the summer and fall months with hikers, climbers, and outfitters packing their clients into the area for trophy animals and fishing rewards.
During the fall months, you will find dozens of guided hunters in the area looking for deer, elk, and sheep hunting opportunities. From one grass park to the next the trail is littered with horses, mules, and campsites. This was not the case the morning we set off from the trailhead back in the fall of '82.
Traveling nearly 16 miles one way into our campsite on horseback, I never saw another camp or human being on that trip. We had the whole place to ourselves. As we ventured into the grand area we couldn't help but be excited about the prospects of the hunt of a lifetime. Oddly looking back on that trip it never dawned on me that during that long horseback ride into the wilderness we never even saw a squirrel along the way. The area was void of game animals and it took several trips into that area over various other years to understand why. The area is so vast that you could hunt several large canyons and grass parks and never see a single animal or track. And then you could travel another 5 miles or more and run into a canyon or valley teaming with game. The overall size of the wilderness lends itself to this type of hunting.
To be successful you need to be able to move camp every two or three days or set up spike camps 5 to 10 miles from the main camp. This will lend itself to more success over a longer time frame. That year we were rookies in the big scheme of things and we were caught up in the grandeur of the mountain and our surroundings and thus we were not rewarded with Bob's offerings.
As we set up our camp on the edge of a stand of conifers we hobbled the horses in front of the camp in a large meadow which we called a park. A small stream about 10 feet wide meandered its way through the park and followed the trail back many miles before it spilled into a beautiful alpine lake. As we had traveled past this lake earlier in the day, I noticed fish hitting the surface and so I had decided to spend at least one evening with my flyrod at the spillway waterfall.
We set up our camp very quickly and everyone decided to go off in one direction or another and hunt until dark. This way we could meet back for dinner and compare notes on tracks and what each of us saw. I made my way out and across the meadow to the far side of the park. I was working my way up the streamside looking for fish in the pools when I stopped cold in my tracks. There in front of me was a bear track, unlike anything I had ever seen. I was used to the black bear tracks of Utah and Idaho but I had never seen one of this size. I knelt down to examine the track and realized it was nearly double the length of my hand and if I turned my hand sideways it would touch the width of the track.
Cautiously, I surveyed my surroundings as I realized the track had been made that morning as we were packing into the meadow. Seeing nothing I made my way up the stream. I could see where the bear had moved in and out of the stream obviously looking for fish. I left the area and hiked up to a good lookout and spent the rest of the afternoon up there in the rocky crags overlooking the valley below me and the opposite side canyon. About dark, I made my way back to camp with nothing to tell but the story of the big bear track.
After several days of hard hunting, we were on the smelly end of what some call being skunked. The cost of the trip alone would have brought us several hundred pounds of prime beef for our families had we stayed home and used our brains. But man cannot be measured by consuming a domestic animal such as the modern beef cow. He has to lose all sense of reality and go off gallivanting across three states spending nearly two months pay on a wild-haired idea that was concocted without consulting his better half and using any common sense. The lure of the adventure was all too inviting and reasoning was null and void of any conversation that any of us had while planning this escapade.
There we sat night after night by the campfire telling old tales of hunts in the past. Not one single soul had chambered a round on this excursion let alone actually scoped an animal. The animals in our neck of the woods had made an exit to greener pastures. Nobody wanted to admit it but we fell into the category of soon to be eaters of tag soup.
Three days left during our 10 days stay, I decided to saddle my good horse up and trail off into the north for most of the day. I wanted to hunt up near the end of the park which was nearly 8 miles from our camp. I took a small lunch and left before daybreak riding old Rebel up the trail and out into the park heading north looking at the stars in the heavens. It was frosty cold and quite uncomfortable but back in my youthful days you just suffered and acted like you were some kind of Daniel Boone.
As I think back on that morning and age has caught up with me, I wouldn't even leave my bedroll nowadays. Heck, I wouldn't even have made the 16-mile ride let alone chopped wood for a solid week and ate C rations when we ran out of food on the 8th day. Looking back I would have worn myself out just loading up the trailer and went back into the house and had a nap.
That morning I got so cold that I peeled off the main trail and rode up into the timber so I could dismount and get a small fire started to warm myself up. It was still fairly dark so I felt like another half hour wouldn't slow my hunt down. I rein hobbled the mare and busted up some kindling and in no time I had a small glove warmer fire going on the ground in front of me. Sitting there eating cold biscuits and bologna made me really homesick that morning but I kept the code of the west and toughed it out.
As the morning light started to hit across the meadow, I could see I was nearly a mile up on one side of the park in a spotted piney area with a good view of the north end of the meadow. I decided to sit tight and see if anything came my way out of the timber to feed on the grasses below. I remember the sun streaking down through the pines as I got to my feet and stood in its warmth. What a morning I thought as I fumbled through my saddlebags looking for my watercolors. I'll just sit here and take some notes and make a sketch or two that beautiful morning.
I was completely engulfed in my artwork when the mare lifted her head and blew hard out of her nose. I looked up at her not more than four feet away from me and told her to serve a towel with the shower next time she blew her nose. A long time before this trip I had been taught that when a horse or mule had their ears pinned forward and was looking off in a direction that you had better take notice. The big mare was fixated on something behind me and off to my right side.
Slowly, I turned around and looked in the direction she was looking but I couldn't see anything. Thinking it might be a herd of elk I stood up and walked to her side and pulled my rifle out of the scabbard. I stepped in front of her and knelt down to scope the area in front of me and up the timbered slope.
I was not prepared for what I was about to see. Caught completely off guard and totally by surprise, I could see the outline of a large brown colored ball of fur coming down the slope in my direction. Now in a moment like this, your brain plays tricks on you. As I knelt there I realized I was less than forty yards from the biggest Grizzly bear I had ever seen. I quickly chambered a round as wild ideas traveled from one point to another in the crossways of my mind.
The big bear was meandering back and forth through the timber and didn't seem to have a purpose in mind. As he walked I could see his yellow-brown eyes and his huge head as he licked his lips in a kind of a nervous manner. Several times he would set his right paw up on a downed lodge pole and I could see the claws protrude from him as his weight pushed down on the log. He never made a sound and had it not been for the mare, I would never have known he was even in the neighborhood. I kept the rifle on him the whole time as he walked past us. He finally got level with us and turned his head to the side and looked directly at me. I guessed the distance to be about 15 yards or 45 feet. That's the distance I walked off after he left the area.
After just a brief pause and a look in our direction, the old boy just walked down through the timber and out into the meadow. He crossed the stream and dug along the bank several times looking for something but found nothing. He continued up and across the valley and into the canyon on the far side of the park nearly two miles away. I never took my scope off of him the whole time until he was completely out of sight.
Literally cleaning out my shorts and putting my racing heart back in my chest, I sat down and made my brain remind me of the whole scene. I was amazed that the mare had stood still because the bear could have been on top of us within two seconds when he looked our way. I guess he was just as surprised to see us as we were with him. That or he was nearsighted. The wind was in our favor but I had been sitting by a small fire for over an hour so he must have smelled something. I will never know what he thought and why he left well enough alone. I'm just glad that I didn't have to shoot him or have a fight with him.
I made a small watercolor of the scene before I climbed back in the saddle and made my way back to camp with the story. Later in life, I painted an oil painting from memory that resides in my daughters home of that big ole boy sashaying down through the timber like he was king of the whole enchilada.
Yes, we went gameless on this one and returned to lick our wounds and our hunting pride. We returned several years later to the Bob and found some success in a wintry scene that bodes for another story at another time. I have attached a picture of the painting for all to view and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did as I lived it those many suns ago.
An Unforgettable Sky
Of the Old Master Russell
With a slight nudge of his knees, the cowboy prodded the big horse in the rib section and tapped the underbelly with the tip of his right spur. That's all it took as the nervous horse lost his mind and commenced the dance of all dances. The horse went straight into the air tucked his head and came straight back down with his front legs hitting the earth with a shuddering sound as hoof met soil. Collecting himself the horse cocked his hind feet up under his belly. As they came back to earth he used all of his strength to lung out into the air again with his head leading the way. Across the corral, the giant animal leaped with tail and mane flying in all manner of twisted contortion. Squealing and pissing, the brute hit the side of the corral with his front chest. The side poles and supports shattered and bust from the weight of the big cayuse. He stumbled slightly then regained his position and with nothing but free space in front of him, the wild athlete hit the prairie with all his strength as he tried to poke a hole in the sky at each arch of his back.
The cowboys that had gathered around the corrals were hooting and hollering. They threw their hats at the frightened animal as one of their own tried to stay in the saddle during the onslaught that had overtaken the horse. Leap after leap the Roan horse shifted his weight and contorted his frame in all manner of positions until he felt the weight that had been placed upon his back had finally disappeared. When the horse acknowledged his rider on the ground the whole show came to a halt and the dusty Roan stopped as quickly as he had started. He put his head down and blew air out of his nose, then showed his teeth as he reached for the morsel of prairie grass just to the side of his right hoof. He pulled a section of the wild grass up by the roots and nibbled on his prize as the gallery of cowboys laughed and prodded the fallen victim.
"Maybe next time you'll listen to the remuda boss when he says that old Roan is never going to be a Sunday pony," said one of the cowboys as the fallen rider beat the dust off his sheepskin chaps and rearranged his hogleg and holster. One of the young cowboys came up and handed ole Slim his dirty hat that hadn't made it past the fourth leap. "That was some ride Slim, I thought you had him at one time, I'll get him ready if your gonna give him another toot," he said as he looked in the direction of the Roan chewing on the snag he had pulled from the earth. Just as Slim was about to answer the young man his words were drowned out by the clanking of the triangle as Cookie Bill hit the iron with his blacksmith hammer. "Chucks boiling out of the pot faster than I can keep it in, come and get it before she's turned into prairie chowder you yahoos," he hollered. The whole procession of dust beat cowboys turned and made their way to the wagon and the good smell in their nostrils leaving the Roan to his prairie bladed biscuit. One more notch in the old corral post, thought the renegade Roan as he tongued down his breakfast. That made 43 cowboys that had bit the dirt and the Roan was just coming into his prime.
A Change in the Wind
Retirement has been hanging around my mind for the last several years and finally, the day came when I just didn't want to work at the pace I had been accustomed to. I looked my affairs over and said to my self it's time to do something else. Part of the decision to leave my former lifestyle behind was the fact that I was sorely neglecting my writing and painting activities which had become a mainstay for my sanity. I will now be able to post in my blog on regular basis articles and stories that come to mind as I have more free time to research and compile these short stories and novels.
I suspect that between riding my horses and mules, combined with a little golf with my family this should keep me active and off the couch. I will now be able to go out on location and experience the sights and sounds that I put into these novels that help make them more lifelike when put into words. I am very excited about this new venture and I look forward to the path it will lead me. We all go down certain trails in life, some are really rewarding and others are not very enjoyable. I plan on making the most out of this opportunity I am blessed with and will do my part to make it a success.
Here is a small short story that happened to me back in the fall of 1982 while traversing the Bob Marshall Wilderness of Montana. I had left our Utah Valley for the pristine wilderness that lay adjacent to the beautiful Flathead Lake area in northern Montana. I was going on an elk hunt with several friends and we were hauling our horses into the trailhead area near Swan Lake. The weather that year was very enjoyable. As we unloaded and prepared to pack our animals near the start of the road-less area, I couldn't help but notice the absolute beauty of the surrounding forest dotted with conifer, aspen, and cedar. The smell in the air from the morning frost still on the bushes, and grasses, as we saddled up, was very welcome to my senses.
I had been looking forward to this hunting expedition for nearly a year. We had planned the hunt 8 months prior and when it became a reality my thoughts were constantly thinking of how it might unfold. Every waking hour I would find my mind working over small details in planning the event from my perspective. Finally, the day came as we motored our horse caravan through Utah, Idaho and into central Montana for the experience of a lifetime.
Back in the eighties the 'Bob' as it was known, was still in a state of prime untouched wilderness. Very few people traversed its trails and the mountainous country was nearly as it had been for the previous century. There were only three or four main trails into the area and they had been carved out long before by Native Americans and 18th-century explorers looking for the treasures they had heard that existed. You could ride one of these trails and never see another human being which is not the case in today's environment. Today the area is littered in the summer and fall months with hikers, climbers, and outfitters packing their clients into the area for trophy animals and fishing rewards.
During the fall months, you will find dozens of guided hunters in the area looking for deer, elk, and sheep hunting opportunities. From one grass park to the next the trail is littered with horses, mules, and campsites. This was not the case the morning we set off from the trailhead back in the fall of '82.
Traveling nearly 16 miles one way into our campsite on horseback, I never saw another camp or human being on that trip. We had the whole place to ourselves. As we ventured into the grand area we couldn't help but be excited about the prospects of the hunt of a lifetime. Oddly looking back on that trip it never dawned on me that during that long horseback ride into the wilderness we never even saw a squirrel along the way. The area was void of game animals and it took several trips into that area over various other years to understand why. The area is so vast that you could hunt several large canyons and grass parks and never see a single animal or track. And then you could travel another 5 miles or more and run into a canyon or valley teaming with game. The overall size of the wilderness lends itself to this type of hunting.
To be successful you need to be able to move camp every two or three days or set up spike camps 5 to 10 miles from the main camp. This will lend itself to more success over a longer time frame. That year we were rookies in the big scheme of things and we were caught up in the grandeur of the mountain and our surroundings and thus we were not rewarded with Bob's offerings.
As we set up our camp on the edge of a stand of conifers we hobbled the horses in front of the camp in a large meadow which we called a park. A small stream about 10 feet wide meandered its way through the park and followed the trail back many miles before it spilled into a beautiful alpine lake. As we had traveled past this lake earlier in the day, I noticed fish hitting the surface and so I had decided to spend at least one evening with my flyrod at the spillway waterfall.
We set up our camp very quickly and everyone decided to go off in one direction or another and hunt until dark. This way we could meet back for dinner and compare notes on tracks and what each of us saw. I made my way out and across the meadow to the far side of the park. I was working my way up the streamside looking for fish in the pools when I stopped cold in my tracks. There in front of me was a bear track, unlike anything I had ever seen. I was used to the black bear tracks of Utah and Idaho but I had never seen one of this size. I knelt down to examine the track and realized it was nearly double the length of my hand and if I turned my hand sideways it would touch the width of the track.
Cautiously, I surveyed my surroundings as I realized the track had been made that morning as we were packing into the meadow. Seeing nothing I made my way up the stream. I could see where the bear had moved in and out of the stream obviously looking for fish. I left the area and hiked up to a good lookout and spent the rest of the afternoon up there in the rocky crags overlooking the valley below me and the opposite side canyon. About dark, I made my way back to camp with nothing to tell but the story of the big bear track.
After several days of hard hunting, we were on the smelly end of what some call being skunked. The cost of the trip alone would have brought us several hundred pounds of prime beef for our families had we stayed home and used our brains. But man cannot be measured by consuming a domestic animal such as the modern beef cow. He has to lose all sense of reality and go off gallivanting across three states spending nearly two months pay on a wild-haired idea that was concocted without consulting his better half and using any common sense. The lure of the adventure was all too inviting and reasoning was null and void of any conversation that any of us had while planning this escapade.
There we sat night after night by the campfire telling old tales of hunts in the past. Not one single soul had chambered a round on this excursion let alone actually scoped an animal. The animals in our neck of the woods had made an exit to greener pastures. Nobody wanted to admit it but we fell into the category of soon to be eaters of tag soup.
Three days left during our 10 days stay, I decided to saddle my good horse up and trail off into the north for most of the day. I wanted to hunt up near the end of the park which was nearly 8 miles from our camp. I took a small lunch and left before daybreak riding old Rebel up the trail and out into the park heading north looking at the stars in the heavens. It was frosty cold and quite uncomfortable but back in my youthful days you just suffered and acted like you were some kind of Daniel Boone.
As I think back on that morning and age has caught up with me, I wouldn't even leave my bedroll nowadays. Heck, I wouldn't even have made the 16-mile ride let alone chopped wood for a solid week and ate C rations when we ran out of food on the 8th day. Looking back I would have worn myself out just loading up the trailer and went back into the house and had a nap.
That morning I got so cold that I peeled off the main trail and rode up into the timber so I could dismount and get a small fire started to warm myself up. It was still fairly dark so I felt like another half hour wouldn't slow my hunt down. I rein hobbled the mare and busted up some kindling and in no time I had a small glove warmer fire going on the ground in front of me. Sitting there eating cold biscuits and bologna made me really homesick that morning but I kept the code of the west and toughed it out.
As the morning light started to hit across the meadow, I could see I was nearly a mile up on one side of the park in a spotted piney area with a good view of the north end of the meadow. I decided to sit tight and see if anything came my way out of the timber to feed on the grasses below. I remember the sun streaking down through the pines as I got to my feet and stood in its warmth. What a morning I thought as I fumbled through my saddlebags looking for my watercolors. I'll just sit here and take some notes and make a sketch or two that beautiful morning.
I was completely engulfed in my artwork when the mare lifted her head and blew hard out of her nose. I looked up at her not more than four feet away from me and told her to serve a towel with the shower next time she blew her nose. A long time before this trip I had been taught that when a horse or mule had their ears pinned forward and was looking off in a direction that you had better take notice. The big mare was fixated on something behind me and off to my right side.
Slowly, I turned around and looked in the direction she was looking but I couldn't see anything. Thinking it might be a herd of elk I stood up and walked to her side and pulled my rifle out of the scabbard. I stepped in front of her and knelt down to scope the area in front of me and up the timbered slope.
I was not prepared for what I was about to see. Caught completely off guard and totally by surprise, I could see the outline of a large brown colored ball of fur coming down the slope in my direction. Now in a moment like this, your brain plays tricks on you. As I knelt there I realized I was less than forty yards from the biggest Grizzly bear I had ever seen. I quickly chambered a round as wild ideas traveled from one point to another in the crossways of my mind.
The big bear was meandering back and forth through the timber and didn't seem to have a purpose in mind. As he walked I could see his yellow-brown eyes and his huge head as he licked his lips in a kind of a nervous manner. Several times he would set his right paw up on a downed lodge pole and I could see the claws protrude from him as his weight pushed down on the log. He never made a sound and had it not been for the mare, I would never have known he was even in the neighborhood. I kept the rifle on him the whole time as he walked past us. He finally got level with us and turned his head to the side and looked directly at me. I guessed the distance to be about 15 yards or 45 feet. That's the distance I walked off after he left the area.
After just a brief pause and a look in our direction, the old boy just walked down through the timber and out into the meadow. He crossed the stream and dug along the bank several times looking for something but found nothing. He continued up and across the valley and into the canyon on the far side of the park nearly two miles away. I never took my scope off of him the whole time until he was completely out of sight.
Literally cleaning out my shorts and putting my racing heart back in my chest, I sat down and made my brain remind me of the whole scene. I was amazed that the mare had stood still because the bear could have been on top of us within two seconds when he looked our way. I guess he was just as surprised to see us as we were with him. That or he was nearsighted. The wind was in our favor but I had been sitting by a small fire for over an hour so he must have smelled something. I will never know what he thought and why he left well enough alone. I'm just glad that I didn't have to shoot him or have a fight with him.
I made a small watercolor of the scene before I climbed back in the saddle and made my way back to camp with the story. Later in life, I painted an oil painting from memory that resides in my daughters home of that big ole boy sashaying down through the timber like he was king of the whole enchilada.
Yes, we went gameless on this one and returned to lick our wounds and our hunting pride. We returned several years later to the Bob and found some success in a wintry scene that bodes for another story at another time. I have attached a picture of the painting for all to view and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did as I lived it those many suns ago.
An Unforgettable Sky
The year was 1983 and the college football season was in full swing. At that time in my life, I worked for a metal building company that was an international corporation and I was based out of Utah. My job took me to various parts of the United States, Canada, and Mexico. The main headquarters was in Houston Texas, with another large facility in Nashville Tennessee. My boss was located in Nashville so on occasion, I was requested to travel down to the southern states and participate in various builder conferences and meetings.
Football was a large topic of conversation down in the south at that time and everyone was allied with one college or another. During my trips to that portion of the country, I would get a glimpse of just how dedicated some of these fellow workmates of mine were. If you didn't readily agree with one person's choice of college memorabilia that decorated the offices in their work setting, you might end up with an enemy on your hands. These people were dead serious about their team, regardless of whether or not the team was terrible that year or not.
The Tennessee plant had many employees from all over the South and Midwest states. They were gathered together there for their engineering skills and trades. With them, they brought their favorite home team logos along with all the past and present history of football for their team of choice. Arguments around the break areas were commonplace and no matter how good your team was that year, someone would always bring up the past and some type of argument would ensue. Most of the disputes were friendly enough but I saw a few that nearly went to fisticuffs over meaningless pride.
That particular year, my home team of BYU was on a firecracker roll, defeating everything in its path. When the mighty Miami Hurricanes laid down in the trail and BYU prevailed over them, I knew we were on to something special that year. As it played out, I had bragging rights for the next 4 months and everyone had to eat a piece of the old defeatist pie. Everywhere I went that year and on most of my phone conversations, all I heard was how BYU was not going to go undefeated and that the crown would be given to someone else. It got so bad that I would avoid certain characters that I knew were just laying in wait after each weekly victory to argue their point.
About the middle of November, I was summoned by my boss who had played for Indiana and was a huge Hoosier fan to travel to Arkansas for a builder development conference and stay for the week. I dreaded the trip and tried every way I could to get out of it to no avail. I knew the torture that awaited me as BYU was rolling up a score on several smaller schools that couldn't measure up to the Lavell Express that year.
When I arrived, the talk was BYU this, BYU that, and it got to the point where I wanted to sack several obnoxious individuals if they continued their rants. There was one individual, and I'll spare his name as he will probably read this and remember his wounds, that just wouldn't leave BYU and its success alone. Constantly, he buggered me until I had finally had enough. I waited for the opportunity at a large luncheon that we both attended and finally under duress, I made my move. Looking back on it now, It was foolhardy of me, but I crumbled to the constant pressure.
As we were all gathered at a lunch table in the town of Stuttgart Arkansas, the noisy nuisance made his usual pitch about BYU schedule and how they were in a weak division and as soon as they played anyone with any real talent the win streak would end. Slowly everyone at the luncheon table glanced my way as if I needed to battle his statements in my own defense of my team. There were at least thirty managers, engineers etc. seated around me and everyone waited with baited breathe for my next comment. Even my own boss was grinning like a hyena as he looked at me with those Hoosier eyes.
Well, the words just spilled out of my mouth and before I knew what I had said and realized my pride had just tucked my brain in my back pocket. I blurted out the challenge of challenges, 'Care to put your money where your mouth is?' Only I didn't stop there. I was on a roll, so I went after the one thing you don't do when you're on a tight family budget. I let out the ole 'Are you all talk and no show?' That is the one statement that you can't get out of no matter how hard you try. That statement is the ultimate slam, cut, degrade, bottom of the gutter insult to another fans pride for their team. It begs for a comeback just to make things level. I received the look of looks from the culprit. As he swallowed down the last of my swirling toilet flush and looked around to size up the insult, he brings out the one thing I didn't want when the volleys were being fired between us. He said to me, "How about a two hundred and fifty dollar bet that your team doesn't go undefeated the rest of the year, let alone have a chance at the National title. Oh, and how about double that if they win or don't get the National title?"
All the eyes around the table now shifted from one brainless fool to the other as I could feel the heat of the moment. For a small country boy from a rural farm town in Lehi Utah, that moment ranks right up there with the dumbest thing I ever did in my life, to that point. With my old alma mater, BYU sitting on one shoulder and the conscience of a family man with a stay at home wife and three small children and not a pot to piss in on the other shoulder, wouldn't you know I chose the path of least resistance and folded under the pressure. Reaching out my meager hand, the only satisfaction I gained from the whole deal was that my nemesis was a smaller man and when his hand hit mine I gave it the old Captain Crunch of handshakes. He got the message that I was not happy with the outcome as I made my point.
Now, I know how this might look to some of you reading this post. How could a BYU alumnus, Mormon raised young man fall into the category of the Devil's cauldron, and risk money he sorely needed on the home front. Well, you had to be there to understand how stupid the whole thing was. I have never seen a dumber Jackass than the one that I was looking at later that day. I glanced in the bathroom mirror of my Hilton hotel room while my mind went back and forth about how I would come up with the dough since the odds were overwhelmingly against me.
I had resolved myself to a small part-time job for a while until I had squared my account and with that, I tried to put the foolishness out of my mind. I was haunted by the last thing my boss had said as we were leaving the luncheon and heading to our hotel rooms. He patted me on the back as we climbed into the taxi and said, "Southwick, I didn't think you had it in you. I sure hope you beat that Jack, but BYU ain't got a chance in hell of winning it all." I swallowed hard as I knew that the odds were not in my favor and he was right.
After the luncheon and the conference, I was invited to some old-fashioned duck hunting in the duck capital of the world. We traversed over to where the Arkansas river washes into the Mississippi, south of Stuttgart. We were ferried out in duck boats to a wooded area and set up behind decoys and temporary blinds. The area was flooded with tall trees all around us. The ducks would come swooping in through the trees and it was the best duck festival I have ever entertained in my life. Those boys back there have a piece of duck hunters heaven.
As the sun set on the second day of hunting, the sky filled with a glowing fusion of colors that dazzled the mind. The colors were so intense that even the bark and leaves on the trees glowed in an orange ball of fire. I have never in my life, to this day seen a sunset like that one and it defies logic as to how it came about, but it was breathtaking, to say the least. The pictures that I took of the scene almost make the prints like they were photoshopped, but that type of technology didn't exist back in 1983. I brought the pictures home and later in life I painted an oil painting of the scene as I remembered it and with the aid of my pictures. Each time I gaze on that painting it takes me back to the scene of the duck hunt and the hotel luncheon. Little did I know at that time, but I was on a course to be able to talk the talk and walk the walk in the BYU annals of fan in your face for the next year.
Now, all of you reading this story know that I was relieved of the stupid wager of the moment and that the BYU team went undefeated and won the National Championship. But what you don't know, was that my dumber partner in the dumb Mormon wager of all time turned out to be a number one fan for all time and Graduate alumni of the University of Michigan. We had no idea that it would turn out BYU vs Michigan for the title but that is how fate jumps in the game and takes its turn at humbling the mighty. Here I'll interject the score just in case the loser is reading this post and needs a little reminder. BYU-24 Michigan-17. And I only fleeced him for $250.00. This was against the wishes of my boss, who wanted to see this guy really eat the crow and pay the double bet.
Yes, I had bragging rights around the water cooler for the next year, but I kept it pretty low key. I was still nursing the bullet wound that had narrowly missed taking my numbskull off after the famous handshake and the bet. I had prevailed by the skin of my teeth and the lesson was a one and done for me as far as sports betting was concerned. I returned to a normal life and the only time I wince at the thought of my mule-headed accolades is when I see the sunset painting and it takes me all the way back to that day.
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