Stuff
I guess, off the top of my head I can think of 4 different experiances I have had thru the years, a couple early in my life and the last 2 more recent. I guess a certain amount of living to older age really can be attributed to luck or someone looking out for you or a combination of both.
The first time I was probably 19 and on one of my first ever Javelina hunts. I grew up without a dad and while I had a few mentors thru the years, on this trip it was just me and a friend of mine the same age.
We were in unit 21 in Az. hunting off the Verde River and for some reason, we thought instead of going back thru the same canyon we had hiked in, climbing out would be a better idea. Nothing bad happened in the end but it wasn't for lack of trying. I can remember what was probably a 1/2 hour or 45 minutes of terror, as we belly crawled our way to the top of this lose rock covered mountainside grabbing plants to keep from falling to our deaths in the river below. Crazy kid stuff, but it wasn't our day to go. I can still remember how much fear I felt.
Second time was two events in one trip, probably a year later, another Javelina hunt. We had had no success on prior hunts, to that point Javelina were a myth. I had never seen one dead or alive. Javelina season in Az can be blue-bird weather or rain, rain and more rain, it seems to alternate each year. That year it had rained in bunches, we where in school and couldn't make it out opening day, we got up opening evening to see two pigs hanging in another camp. We got so excited we decided to take off right than and there and find some for ourselves. It was maybe 45 minutes before dark, just our guns no other equipment. I had never been there before, my friend had and he said we could hit the wash at the bottom cut the 2-tracker and walk back to camp in the dark. It sounded ok, but in practice we missed the road and it was a moonless night. We had sweat shirts on and not much else to keep warm. We ended up spending most of the night making a lean 2 and used prickly pear pads for shingles. We finished about 2 in the morning and crawled in to try and stay warm. If it had rained that night, we probably would have died from exposer. It didn't rain, once the sun came up, when we climbed out of the canyon we where maybe 400 yards away from camp.
Not having enough we went back out and it did start to rain and rain hard. I got soaked to the bone and was hypertheimic. My buddy and I had split up and he was smart enough to go back and get his truck and come back and look for me. I was on the verge of not being able to think straight when I heard his truck horn. I can remember how much pain I was in when my fingers started to warm-up again. It hurt so bad, I had tears in my eyes. Once we got back to the tent, I climbed into my sleeping bag and slept for the next 18 hours.
This one happend 3 years ago on the San Carlos reservation, we had pig tags in unit C. The weather was crap and I should have went out the way we went in, but I took the high road. We battled our way for 15 miles of downed powerlines and washed out roads and raging washes. We hit an area on the road that had been washed out. It was 6 feet across and 4 feet deep. I tried to skirt it, but we got buried to the frame in mud. We spent 3 hours trying to dig free, but it wasn't going to happen. It started to snow, 3 maybe 4 inches. I had been in this area before and I was almost positive that we were a couple miles from hardtop and a couple more miles from an area we could get cell service. It was almost dark and I decided we would spend the night in the truck and hike out in the morning, but I all I could hear running thru my mind was people who leave their vehicles end up dead. We had plenty of gear, food and water, so I spent most of the night thinking of things to bring with us if I was wrong, to survive on.
Morning came and we started hiking, turned out we where only about a 1/2 mile from the paved road, we had walked about 400 yards when a truck came by and they gave us a lift to the Nantac Rim, where we could get cell service. We where a day late and our wives had already call the San Carlos Game and Fish. They sent a ranger to get us and he took us back to my truck and winched it out and we where on our way home. I can remember how good it felt to be sitting on the Nantac Rim, all snow covered looking at the amazing beauty of the surrounds knowing that we were going to be ok, while waiting for the ranger to show.
The last one was more along the lines of Ron in Az's. I like to hunt in a unit down on the border, it has a ton of Coues. We where 8 miles from Mexico, we had a great hunt, we where into deer all day. I had my friend on about 110 inch buck, he was about 200 yards from getting into shooting position when the big buck and his buddy took off like a bat out of hell. If you have ever hunted down there all the passes have trails running thru them going north and south, the trails from the volume of human traffic are worn smooth and a foot wide in places. Well to make a long story shorter 15 UDI's came thru the same small canyon the bucks where in and blew my buddies chance at a Coues deer of a lifetime. We got back to camp that night and had one more chance the next day which would be the last day of the season. For the 2 days we where there Border Patrol had trucks and Helos running all thru that country, it wasn't very quiet or peaceful.
The next day we hiked a highpoint and I glassed up a nice buck, I sent my friend after him and the buck boggered out. I watched him rebed and got my friend to about 20 yards over the course of a couple hours, but the buck took off like a rocket and he never even had time to get his gun up. At this time we were running out of time. I glassed up one more buck just before dark, he was able to close the distance and kill him just at dark. As I was heading over to help him we got litup by a border patrol Helo using a searchlight.
That country at night is a scary place to be. We both made it to the deer and boned it out. We saw a flashlight for a couple of seconds about 500 yards away from us. Between seeing the UDI's, the Border Patrol in trucks, on foot and in Helo's knowing we where probably 3 miles from our truck, it was really pretty scary coming out. I carried my 9MM in my hand but if 5 or 10 folks had meant to do us wrong, I could probably have killed two or three before they got my gun away from me and gave me a 9MM enimma. I love that country and it has a ton of deer, but you put your life in your hands going down there. Take Care, JLG.
