DRAFTSTUD
Well-known member
Travo and I left Shreveport, LA about 5am Sunday morning and drove to a "Place" north of Ruidoso, NM in about 14 hours. We would have made better time had I been able to find a station to pull into in Roswell, NM to get diesel, but most of them were the pumps crowded together with no swing room for a F250 and a 33' horse trailer! Since I had a half a tank we went on....until we ran out of fuel!!! Poured what I had in and left again....started running out again, but was able to coast into Capitain.We arrived at the campground and it was kinda weird as the road was lined with old shacks and junk, then some nice homes......mostly junk. I think these were old Mining claims. Once we got past that we came upon the Horse Camps, Travo and I set up right in front of a Corrall with a nice Bathroom to the side of it.
After we unloaded and cleaned up the Stall area and made sure evervthing was ready we made a short drive around just looking, just looking not to hit the Mule Deer and Elk ! They were everywhere! I think since a Hail Storm had just past through and the temps we clost to 50 degrees it had every thing moving, I almost had a woody myself!
The next day we drove into Ruidoso and met with Larry Cordova, who is a biologist in the Smokey Ranger District. He told us the bears were right now Grubbing and trying to hit any berries that they could find. He stated that when our hunt started to concentrate on live water and Oak Thickets early and late in the day. We compared maps as to where I had thought the bears might be and he said I had really done my homework. (With the help of my HT Buddies).
The first Trail we went down came to a large flat rock right on the curve of the trail, so I told Travo "Let's find something a little more to our skill of riding" Well Chit! The next trail was a rocky SOB, but we handled it just fine and saw some really pretty country, but it did not have the opennings that I was looking for to have the Oak Thickets. It has been my past experience that the small oak trees need a fringe area to get out of the shade of the larges trees, so you need a little bit of openning to let them grow.
After we left that trail we were riding along the creek and I saw a Cinnimnon Colored Bear cub walk out into the creek. Instead of saying "Travis, there's a Bear"....I said "TRAVIS, THERE'S A BEAR!!!!!'. Well it was my first Bear! After we saw to the horses we drove a large loop though the National Forest, we saw everything. One place we saw around 40 cow elk with their spotted calves, we saw bull elk, Mule deer, ect. It really made Travo's day!
The next day we took a trail that the Biologist and I had agreed would be our best bet, but first we had to find a way around a stretch of private property, that proved to be very easy and the trail was real smooth, it had a great stream flowing though it and was real grassy with alot of Oak thickets! As we rode Travo pointed out a group of Elk scattered on the Mountain up from the stream, I looked the other way and they were on our other side also! Riding our horses next to a pretty stream with Elk on both sides, how much better does it get!
We had to leave the next day, as I woke up I looked out the living quarter windows to check on the horses I saw there cow elk 10 yards from us, I woke Travo up to show him and when we looked out the other window there was a Big Bull in Velvet, but he was the largest of the bulls that we saw on our trip. We left there at 9am and drove into the driveway at 10:30 pm. John & Travo...Bear Hunters!
(My sorry azz camera took no clear pictures that would have enhanced this post, Sorry Nut!)
