After a week off from hunting, due to Shawn's being on call, we headed back out to give it another try. The weather was still pretty warm, although getting cooler at night, so it was a pretty comfortable weekend to be out enjoying the fresh air. Shawn and I are both amazed at how easy the hiking has become too!
The girls love the camping, but have been harder to convince that the hunting piece of it is fun. We knew it was going to be one of our last weekends out, so we attempted a Saturday evening hunt as well. As you can see from the pictures below, it was a little too much for the girls! After not having taken a nap earlier in the afternoon (like their Daddy), they were pretty wiped out!
Our best shot of getting any elk this bow season came on Sunday morning. As we were glassing for elk on a ridge, Shawn spotted two bulls a couple ridges away. He used the cow call, and I think a little to both of our amazement's, they actually responded! As soon as they heard the call, they stopped what they were doing, turned around, and started making a b-line down into the ravine in our direction. Shawn and I quickly got the girls on their feet and went to head them off. When we got to the ridge and valley that would intersect them we stashed the girls in a thick clump of cedars and stalked down to try and get a good shot. At this point you could hear the two bulls just crashing through the woods and brush. When we got down to where they should have come in to the valley, we couldn't hear or see them at all. And that was it! We figure that we dropped down behind them as they were high-tailing it to where we had been! Lesson learned, we should have just stayed put and they would have come straight to us. We never did see them again either. Although we blew that chance, we learned something new and it was neat to see how quickly they move and how they respond!
