To Honor the Fallen. To Honor the Brave.

Prior to leaving for our week of elk hunting (I'm still digesting what happened with our hunt and will add an update soon), I witnessed something that will stay with me always. Family, friends and fellow firefighters came from all across the U.S. and Canada to witness names being added to the Fallen Firefighter Memorial in Colorado. Prior to the service, hundreds of firefighters rode in a procession from Denver to the Springs. The honor of respecting those willing to sacrifice their life for another when duty calls was the reason we rode. The reason we came was to say well done and thank you. A small gesture that spoke volumes and worth every moment -

To honor the Fallen.

The emotions that stirred within me during the motorcyle ride are so hard to express. Portions of the highway were closed down completely in order to allow the procession to roll through. Under bridges lined with FireTrucks we proceeded well under normal highway speeds. From tops of Engines, fellow firefighters saluted their commrades below as bikes rolled by below. It was as if everyone was silently saying "thank you" to their brothers willing to stand shoulder to shoulder in the face of danger, and ultimately paying their respect to those who did stare danger down and fought till the end. So we rode -

To honor the Brave.

Upon reaching Colorado Springs, our procession grew in size by several hundred more bikes. The police escorted trail of motorcycles snaked through suburbia with citizens waving and cheering us on to the sound of "thank you" as we passed by.

At the end of ride, the bike procession merged with a row of fire trucks representing various cities. The service in the park began with a prayer followed by the Colorado sky filled with the sound of Amazing Grace flowing from rows of bagpipes, pipes and drums. All for the purpose of one thing -

To Honor the Fallen.

As the bell tolled for each fallen firefighter, a flag was given to one of their loved ones. The bells tone seemed to echo across the mountains as if to say - well done. Well done. You are brave and we honor you and your family.

At the close of the day, firefighters, family and friends all gathered downtown. Bagpipes, pipes and drums took over the city streets and local establishments. It was as if no one wanted the day to end, and so the music played on well into the night....

The entire day was meaningful to me being the wife of a firefighter - knowing that my husband is willing to put his life on the line if that is what is required. I'm thankful and proud of the man by my side. For him, I know that it is not just a job, but a calling.

An Amazing Bull

My husband's friend just forwarded pics of the bull he took last week with his muzzle loader. I simply had to share - this thing is amazing!

Now I am officially psyched for my week long hunt!

Mr. Chuckles

(Remember to pause music at the bottom of the page prior to hitting play)

As mentioned in my previous post, here is a short clip of the bull we encountered last weekend. The video / sound quality isn't the greatest since it is taken from my camera, but you can still hear him answer back from the dark timber below us. The first few bugles are from my husband enticing the bull to respond. I unfortunately cut off the bull's response a bit too soon, because he proceeded to give us about 10 chuckles after he bugled. Since he continued to chuckle all afternoon we nicknamed him Mr. Chuckles.

A couple more days until we will be trying again, looking for Chuckles. We are determined to find him or any other of his friends out there and will continue until we are worn out. As Winston Churchill said.. we will "never, never, never, never, never.... give up." I know that the connotation of this statement has much greater meaning than chasing bulls. However, I believe that whatever goal you are chasing in life should be done with gusto. Chase your dreams. Live out your goals.

That Bull was HOT

We just returned from another weekend hunt in the mountains for elk. No luck this time, however, I think our luck is changing. The weather is beginning to turn and the elk are getting lovesick. Ohh... yes. Bugles are filling the mountainside.

With the knowledge that Saturday morning was opening morning for the black powder boys, the alarm clock was set to 0'dark thirty. We needed to be on the trail early. So, well before the first glimpses of daylight we were headed up the side of the mountain. The stars guided our path through the open meadows and a dimmed flashlight gave just enough light through the dark timber. As we crested the first ridge the sky began to slowly turn from shades of gray into blue. Still no bugles were to be heard upon the sun peaking over the horizon. However, as we reached the next ridge and let out a locator call coyotes answered from just above us. Ugh. We are not hunting coyotes. Then, I heard it. A bugle echoed from across the canyon. Sweet music to our ears!

We had a bugling contest back and forth for quite sometime and realized he wasn't budging. We would have to pressure him a bit. By this time it was late morning, which usually means time for elk to be finding a spot for bedding down, so we thought it would be a good idea to sit tight on the ridge we were on and wait him out. We didn't want to push him out of his bed and planned on chasing him after his afternoon nap. However, this bull was HOT. He kept bugling all afternoon. I have never heard an elk do this before. We could even hear him raking the trees and chuckling long drawn out chuckles. I tried to capture some of it on film from my camera, but only got a bit of his bugling. (I'll do better next time) Finally, as Big Al was stirred from his sleep by one of this bulls rants from down below, we decided we had better make our plan of attack.

We checked our wind and decided it would be best to try and skirt the canyon and make our way just below the bull for our attack. As we were just about 1/2 way down the canyon, we recognized a cow call as none other than a primos hoochie mama call. Yep, as we were napping and waiting for our elk to do the same, some other hunters had also moved in. Now what?

We decided to hunt "our" bull anyway. Although, our plan wasn't as aggressive as our initial plan would have been because we still wanted to be ethical in our hunt. So, we waited to see how the bull would react to the other cow calling. He seemed a bit undecided in what to do. He wasn't responding to the other cow calls, but he sure liked the husband's bugling. It seemed that he wanted to fight. So, back up the mountain we went. We were going to try and get above him this time. Upon reaching the spot were we initially started, it seemed like the plan was going to work. However, mother nature had other plans. It began raining. Then sleeting. Being prepared with rain gear and snacks, we were going to wait it out. As we shivered together under a pine tree eating sunflower seeds, the skies finally began to clear. However, by now diminishing daylight was becoming our enemy. With one last bugle from below we said goodbye and slowly made our way down the mountainside with flashlight in hand.

We will be back.

It was a hard hunt yesterday and I'm sore today. But it is a good sore. My muscles have already begun to process the lactic acid build up and I'm no longer thinking about how tired and sore I was when I woke up this morning. It will be a long week at work knowing that I soon will be spending an entire week on the mountain come Saturday. I'm ready to hit the pine filled hills again to search for elk.

Oh.. and we woke up to snow on the mountain tops. Maybe. Just maybe. We won't have to hike as high up next week. But if we do, my legs are getting used to it. I think it may be a good idea to bring the pack frames with us this time! (Being optimistic here) I can't imagine how tired I would be having to climb up and down those "hills" in one day. It would be worth it though.

Altitude "Sickness"

One thing to consider when hunting at higher altitudes, is the limited amount of air supply. Sometimes it makes you act very strange. For example....

I'm not sure if Al is singing a rendition of "Climb Every Mountain" or just gasping for his next breath of air.

We are planning on hiking to the top again this weekend since we now know the elk are hanging out at higher altitudes. I think my wish for snow is not too far off either. The forecast is calling for high of 59 and low of 38 where we are headed. I'm ready!

Could it Please Snow in September!

Reluctantly I'm back home from the mountains. We've decided to pack up camp and rethink our strategy. There is still just under a month until our elk tags expire, so I'm not worried. It is just a bit of a let down to get all pumped up and have your vacation plans deflated. It has been tough hunting so far. We've been all over the mountains in the area we've been hunting. The elk are still not playing fair. It is just barely pre-rut. The bulls don't seem to even be responding to cow calls.. at least the area that we've been hunting. We did run into another hunter that had packed in above timberline. He let us know that the elk are truly in the area - they are just up very high. It is simply too warm and therefore the elk have no reason to come down from their mountaintop views. (I don't blame them.)

So, depending on whether or not I can rearrange my work schedule at the last minute, we may postpone our elk hunting a bit so we can try and time our hunt for when the elk are bugling. I have mixed emotions on this. I want to be hunting - now. But if waiting means we will be back during the rut, it is worth the wait. If I can't reschedule my vacation, then the husband and I will be packing up and heading back to the mountains to do some serious hunting. If I have to go to the top of the mountain, bring it on!

Here's to wishing that the weather would change - a little snow would be nice. I'm simply not ready to go back to the "real world" and would prefer to just hunt for the entire month of September. (*Ahem* - like some people I know.)

Dessert at Elk Camp?

Is it possible to have dessert at Elk Camp?

Why yes, it is:

Dump Cake straight from the camper oven.

Be back in a week with an update on our elk hunt.

Mountains, Glorious Mountains

I absolute love being in the mountains, and could be perfectly happy in a little mountain cabin in the middle of the woods. We stumbled on this one during our scouting trip. It's a little small, but very cute. It needs a little work though, considering all the aspen trees growing INSIDE the house. And I'm thinking either it is so old that the hill grew into it or someone mighty small lived here. I'm not that tall and can't walk under that door frame. I'm sure that it was a cozy little home for some lucky soul at some point in time.

Anyway, even though we didn't get a chance at any elk last weekend the benefits of just being out there is worth it in my opinion. Here are some pics from one of the areas we hunted and will be hunting throughout this next month:

The big boy that did this damage is worth chasing after

Checking the gps

A view from the top

We hunted the timber just below the first bald spot on this mountain across the way. We wanted to get a better picture of the area, so we hiked to the mountain ridge from across the valley. It really helped to get a good perspective of the area we are hunting

We picked up a few deer sheds. There is deer in abundance in this area. We've seen several very nice bucks within a stones throw away. The funny thing is none of us have deer tags this year. Go figure! It is still fun to see them.

The Trees are Not Cooperating

With all the hiking that we've done lately in the mountains, there have been plenty of blooper moments. I have been trying to catch a few on my camera since it has a video option. You have to be quick though, b/c these precious moments happen when you least expect them. A couple of us have hit our heads on tree limbs which I am *ahem* proud to say started the trend. During our weekend of scouting I nearly knocked myself out by running into a downed tree, to which my husband promptly responded with "are you okay?". Upon learning that I only gave myself slight whiplash and I would recover, the next immediate comment was "well, watch where you are going." Wrong answer! To the women reading this, I'm sure you can relate. At moments like this, all you want is sympathy and not the manly response of "let me try and fix what you did wrong" or "offer you suggestions on how to avoid that in the future". Urr... makes my blood boil. Sympathy. Just give me a little sympathy, kiss my boo boo and all will be better. Okay, I'm done ranting now.

So, in order to prove that I'm not the only one that these priceless moments happen to, I've been trying to document everything. I guess I've had the camera out a little too often, which is apparent by Big Al's reaction when I attempted to capture his blooper on film:

Here it is... Big Al falls to the forest floor after splitting a log in half:

Disclaimer: Mild profanity included. I haven't cured the guys from using certain words.

Oh... and Al hit his head on a tree limb this weekend also. Thank you very much - it isn't just me this kinda stuff happens to. And the benefits of being in possession of the camera... your bloopers aren't caught on film.

(P.s. I know I promised more pics of the area we are hunting - I'll post them tomorrow... promise! I'm having issues with loading the video clip I took from the top of the mountain.)