Time for our Annual Elk Hunt

The elk hunting season is upon us and so the conversation at our house has centered around camping and hunting for the last few weeks.  Wesley is trying to get his hunting gear in order.  He was referred to a site called CamoFire and he faithfully checks it when he wakes up.  They offer new deals on hunting gear at least once a day.  If you have an avid hunter in the family, you might want to check it out.

Seth is coming home from Ohio for the occasion. He’ll be here a week and then he returns to Ohio for about 3 weeks and then he’s coming home!!  He had his 19th birthday last week and so we had to mail him his birthday gift.  We gave him anything we could think of that would help him on his drive back to Arizona:  a gas gift card, sunflower seeds, trail mix, beef jerky, & homemade granola for the 3 day drive.  We also included a picture of a big Kaibab buck and wrote, “Awaiting YOU in Arizona”,(he’s hunting Ohio deer right now, so we wanted to remind him of the big bucks Arizona has to offer), and included a picture of an elk and then one of his own dear family. 

Hunting camp is a big deal in these parts.  It’s the only time a lot of us get away to go camping so we like doing it once a year.  This year we have about 62 people going, 18 of them are hunters.  You usually go to the woods to get away from the noise and hustle and bustle of life but I have more quiet here at my house than I think I will at hunting camp! 🙂  But it’s a good time even if you do come home smelling like a campfire.

All of join together for an evening meal and I do the planning of that.   This year I’m making chicken & potato packets one night  and grilling them over wood coals.  Others are bringing sides. I don’t think I had really thought it through when I sent the menu out to everyone.  Originally I planned to take some oven grates we have around here and dig a shallow area in the earth just wide enough for the grates.  Our grates would have only held 36-40 pieces of chicken.  I’m doing a lot more than that – about 90!  Clearly I needed another plan.  The latest idea is to take some hog panel fencing, cover it with chicken wire and put my aluminum packets on top.  It will be a most interesting grill since it will probably be 6-8′ long and setting on the ground.  I’ll try to remember to get pictures and post next week.

We have a travel trailer that I’ll be sharing with another lady and her girls.  Most of the men will be sleeping in a wall tent that has a wood burning stove in it that keeps them warm until the fire burns out.  The rest of the group have trailers, although there will be a few regular tents.  Those are the really tough campers!

You won’t be seeing me here at Treasuring the Moments for a few days but I’ll be sure to catch up with you next week. Oh, if you have never heard an elk bugle you really have to see this.  It’s video footage of elk bugling in Rocky Mountain National Park .  Elk bugle the most during the mating season (the fall of the year).  It’s an awesome sound to hear when you’re out in the woods.