I wore my spare helmet that is not a lid-locker style that works better for me while hunting because the orange helmet cover would go over its little visor that came with it but didn't have enough of a pocket for my longer neoprene visors on my normal helmets.
Mistake--. I had a good shot at a deer on Friday but I had to put my helmet visor over the scope to keep it from tipping and messing me up to look through the scope. Well when I fired the visor whacked the helmet into my forehead and maybe down on my glasses. I noticed the lump on my forehead right away but Saturday sis was "OMG you have a black eye"
Either the helmet also smacked my glasses into my face when I shot or because I still wore it Saturday but with the thought that I would take it off if I got a shot at anything and it was tipping forward extra and kept pushing my glasses down onto the bridge of my nose and cheeks right under my eyes I ended up with some colorful bruising although there isn't any soreness to go with the 'black eyes'.
And I missed my shot. Pretty sure I jerked up when I pulled the trigger which is pretty stiff. Mom liked a stiff trigger and that is the rifle I was using. I was doing well with keeping a steady bead with the crosshairs on the scope before I fired or I would not have taken the shot. I will have Dad normalize the trigger pull and practice more before going hunting again.
Dad did get a deer. 170 yard shot. He uses a range finder so that is the actual distance. He bought himself a nice lightweight portable tripod to keep a steadier bead because he was not as steady last year just resting his arm on his knee as he used to be. I may need to try using the bog pod and buy one for myself too.
It was the normal frustration on not being able to get out early and although I said "sis and I should go out early by ourselves" Dad went "oh I''l go out whenever you girls want to" except he does not even start saddling until full daylight and we could have got going at least an hour earlier if we were not grooming his horse, helping him and waiting on him on at least 1 or 2 mornings. None of us even saw any elk.
Tuesday it rained overnight. We had planned to just go to town for showers and of course the anti-hunter did not go "oh lets push back the town trip one day, the elk will be out later" *I* thought they would based on just going up there the last 5-6 years and I was right, but didn't push dad and sis to go out.
The other pair of hunters at our camp went out Wed morning and got a cow elk they shot at 10 am w/o even having to walk very far out of camp. We hauled their elk in for them. They had cut it only in half and spent hours dragging the halves downhill and realized they needed some horsepower to get it back to camp. Silly men, it was not a huge distance and they might have managed getting it back to camp on their own if they would have skinned and quartered the elk and just cut the meat they wanted off the ribs and neck and made 2-3 trips instead of trying to drag the whole thing at one go.
As it was CJ hauled the hind quarters + some ribs and the head and neck "my friend is getting into taxidermy and wanted my to bring back the head" and sis led her mare back to camp with the front quarters with some ribs. Normally both hind and front quarters can go in CJs panniers and sometimes the backstraps/tenderloins or sometimes the hunter will pack them out when we haul out someone else's kill. So even though it was just a short distance from camp I think we earned the full hauling fee we charged them.
Dad got his doe on Thursday and on Friday hauled it to town to a place that will hang game in their cooler for a decent price because it was too hot to leave it hang during the day at camp. When I shot and missed, I had just walked out 1/2 mile or less from camp to where deer had been hanging out in the mornings. Grey got all agitated back in his pen at camp and ended up with a spasm/gas colic. Sis and I rode out later that morning and Grey was not right but I didn't realize he was really off until he would not drink at the dam which he loved the water all week and then tried to lay down.
He got a trailer ride to the vet clinic in town which had him feeling better, when we got there and I got some banimine in case the ride did not give a complete cure. He did need the banimine later but then was fine on Saturday. I rode CJ out, but we brought Grey along, with his super light treeless saddle and I ended up riding him most of the way back cuz CJ had lost a shoe and was getting sore and then laid down with me at one point and I didn't know if he was getting sick now or was just being a jerk or what and Grey was obviously back to being 100 percent.
Saturday we rode to a cabin which seemed to be handicap access. I'm going to see if its possible to stay there a night or two. That is about the only way we would be out early enough to see anything. I think dad could get a handicapped note/placard from his Dr. since he cannot walk around on uneven ground. I'd even offer to haul an injured veteran in on horseback if we could stay there too. Otherwise I might look into whether there are outfitters that deal with limited mobility hunters and maybe I could just buy dad an outfitted trip for Xmas next year.
He wants to ride the MDH trail in ND again and I don't really want to burn vacation to do two trips, but I cannot do the hunting trip again any year unless I lay down "sis and I WILL go out early on two days" and you are only going those mornings if you have gotten your horse ready all on your own and are in the saddle when we mount up to go" or if we can get that cabin and sis and I can walk out early and leave him there with good overlook if an elk wanders by a couple mornings/evenings. I get SO frustrated with not getting out early when elk will be out or staying until dusk if we are going to get late starts. *I* do not need to burn 8 days of vacation and put in for tags for deer and elk to just trail-ride 75 miles. If I'm 'going hunting' I want to be really hunting for at least 1 or 2 days of the season.
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