Thanks Giving!

This morning at 5:30 I crawled out of bed, put my hunting gear on and walked downstairs to wake dad up. I carried our rifles up and soon Aaron, [a family friend] drives up. We all pile into our truck and are on the rode. We drive into the Bridger mountains. There were spots at least a foot of snow. Why did we do this, you ask?

Elk Hunting.

So far my first Elk has eluded me, but this time I was ready. After about an hour we stumble on some tracks, some several days old, others fresher. We followed the tracks to an opening where several animals have been living. Suddenly I saw something. I motioned for my dad to look where I saw it. He looked for awhile.

"All I see is that tree stump" He said. I looked again, and true, it is a tree stump.

We didn't end up seeing anything but a couple more tracks.

Well, who knows. Maybe next time I'll get my Elk.

So, it's today we remember the Pilgrims escaping England and persecution, who came here to practice their beliefs; those who had more than half die through the winter, who, with friendly natives like Squanto would have all died.

Who knows where the turkey got its name?

It was named by one of the first Europeans to set foot on American soil, Luis De Torres, who sailed with Columbus in 1492. He wrote, in Hebrew, a letter home describing all the exotic animals, including a 'peacock'. The Hebrew for peacock is Tukki, translated into English Turkey!

Happy Thanks Giving!

Bowling!

Tuesday we went bowling. This was mine and Molly's second time bowling, and mom and dad hadn't gone in a while. It was so much fun! At first I did really bad, than I did o.k, than really bad.

We played two games, and my dad came in first place, then mom, and I can't remember the rest. I got a total of 120 points.

Afterwards, we got pizza.

Kylie comes back!

Tuesday the 17th Kylie came back from collage from Omaha, Nebraska, after spending three months away. After we got back from the airport, we piled down stairs and watched the 'Muppet's'. It was good to see her again. She'll be here 12 days, then she has to leave.

Antelope hunting

Last Sunday my Dad, Molly and I went antelope hunting in eastern Montana. We only had two orange vests so I wore one of my dads orange shirts over my coat.

We had to wake up at 4:00 am and got to the hunting spot around 7:30. We hunted until 9:30. After not seeing a single antelope at all, we drove down to Forsyth, Montana and there had lunch.

Afterwards, we drove back down to our hunting spot and sat in the car, scanning the area for antelope with binoculars. Not only did we not find any antelope with binoculars, we didn't even see any regular ones.

At around three, we started heading back home when we spotted a herd of antelope, almost half a mile away from where we could hunt! We then drove home and got there around 6:30, sadly with out any antelope.

Flu

A couple of days ago we all came down with the flu. I was hit especially hard, spending three days just laying on the couch, too sick to move. But now I feel much better, as does most every one else.

A Pheasant hunt

A couple of weeks ago I returned from a five day Pheasant hunting trip in South Dakota with my dad, two of my cousins and my Uncle.

The twelve hour trip there was no fun, I must say, mostly as I couldn't reach my back-pack with my books in it. We finally reached Winner SD at nine and after checking in to a R.V park, set up our pop-up camper. Afterwards me, Dad, Zack and Josh [my cousins] played hearts while eating cookies. After awhile we went to bed, final score Dad:23, Me: 24, Zack:29, Josh 46 [I think I got the scores right].

In the morning after breakfast we drove over to our first hunting spot and waited for 12:00, when the season starts. Finally we set out, me using my dads 12 gauge since I didn't have the right shells with me. Chewy, our 10 year old lab got up 3 birds in the first couple of minutes. They flew away before I could get a shot at any one of them. Then he got one more up and, with my first shot of the hunt, I killed my first pheasant. I was the only one to get a bird that day.

Towards the end of the day we drove over to a spot to ditch hunt [hunt the ditches on either side of the rode]. Dad shot a bird a ways from the truck and Uncle Chal asked Zack to drive it up to let Chewy out to look for the bird. Zack drove the truck, however in to a mud hole where it got stuck. After awhile of trying, me and dad were elected to walk the mile and a half to the nearest house. After half a mile it got dark. Finally we got to a house who could help [or, rather the guy in the house could help.] He offered to drive us into Winner so we could grab our truck, as his was not big enough to do it. We borrowed a chain from the R.V park and drove out there. We finally got the truck out then drove back to the R.V park to drop the chain off and get some desperately needed sleep.

In the morning Dad got eggs and turkey bacon and bread and we had that for breakfast. Than we headed out to hunt. The first spot Chewy got up a bunch of birds [and I missed them] and even Dutch, my non-hunting English Setter, pointed a couple. Uncle Chal Got one. The day went by quickly and ended with only Uncle Chal getting a bird. While me, Zack and Josh played poker, my dad made steak, potatoes and sour-kraut for dinner. [YUM!]

The next day we had eggs and turkey bacon for breakfast. The day went by with several misses, a couple of hits and the birds running off [I kid you not!] and more misses. My dad shot another, but we couldn't find it. It ended up only Uncle Chal got any birds, again. We went back to Winner and had Tacos, Burritos and salad, all home made with home made guacamole. [YUM!]

In the morning after breakfast we unpopped the camper, and said good by as we had to leave that day. After another 12 hour car ride, we got back home.