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Oh yes - The Good O'le Days!

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Oh yes - The Good O'le Days!

Old 08-09-2016, 05:48 PM
  #1  
Spike
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Default Oh yes - The Good O'le Days!

I love to Biggame hunt, but times, they are a-changing fo show. The unavailability of tags and the expense is through the roof these days. I feel sorry for a lot of younger folk trying to do this sport and at times it makes me sad for them. But it is what it is, so we might as well make the best of it and enjoy what we can while we can...

Anyway, I wrote a couple stories about the Good O'le Days of how it used to be in my early years. I'm sure some of you older folk will relate and remember a lot of this stuff from years gone by...

Hope you enjoy and hope some of ya'll will write a memory or two here too... So here we go...

Story #1 : I member the 1st year we ever went to Colorado huntin. I'm from Missouri and Dad was readin Outdoor Life and a Jack Oconner article. Jack said if'n you wanna hunt a bunch of deer go to Rifle Colorado and head west and you'd find a bunch of um.

Dad says to me, "Jack wouldn't lie to us, so let's go. We'll leave at daylight Wednesday." Dad always felt like he knew Jack Oconner even though he never met him. hehe.

So I show up at daylight, but Dad's O'le 64 Ford twin I beam pickup that we're gonna drive is stuck in the Hog pen. I hooked the Mules on it and finally got it out about noon. We loaded our stuff and headed west, but only made as far as Joplin MO. that 1st night cause we blowed a tire out.

The 2nd day we got us one of them folding travel maps from the Gas station and headed across Kansas at a top speed of 45 mph, cause if you went any faster than that, the old truck would get the high speed shimmy's and bout put you in the ditch.

Dad had built us pickup camper to sleep in out of plywood and used C-clamps to hold it on the truck. On day 2 we was cruising along and met an 18 wheeler and the gush of wind blowed the plywood camper plumb off the truck and in the ditch and all our stuff was scattered up and down the highway..

We got us some nails and nailed it all back together and made it to Dodge City Kansas that night...

On day 3 we finally seen that sign that said "Welcome to Colorado." Somebody had told Dad that if he was ever in Rocky Ford Colorado, to buy some of them Honey Doo Watermelons. Dad talked about them melons all the way out there and when we got to Rocky Ford, he just couldn't wait to git him some of them melons. He bought a whole big box of um and while I would drive, he'd eat them melons.

I member seeing them big piles of what looked like Taters to me, but come to find out, it was Sugar Beets piled up 50 yards high and a quarter mile long. We'd never seen nothing like it. Ya'll ever seen them piles?

Anyway, by evening of day 3 we made to where we was huntin. It took us 3 full days to git there and nowdays folks do it in a Quad Cab F350 Diesel at 80 mph in about 18 hours flat.

The next morning I was fired up and ready to shoot Deer, but Dad had the full blown shiiitts from eatin all them Honey Doo Melons. He couldn't even walk 30 yards without having a blowout. I'm talkin high speed projectile kind of blow outs.

So he didn't do much walkin that day, but I hunted hard.... and low and behold Jack Occoner hadn't lied to us. They was deer as far as the eyes could see. I never in all my life seen so many deer. We had a buck tag apiece and several doe tags and I was knockin um down right and left.

But Dad still hadn't left camp because of the melon shiiitts. He had an old Japanese Army rifle he'd traded for somewhere, but it had the rifling shot out of it and sometimes the bullets would hit the target sideways makin an oblong hole. He shot at several deer but I don't think he even hit the mountainside.

But there was so many deer that finally an old wide horned buck ran by him at 10 yards and he stuck that Jap rifle out and killed it. I still got it mounted on the wall to this day. It's a 32 inch 5x5.

Dad had sold a load of Hogs and seen to it that I had Winchester model 70 30:06.. It was a killing machine, but like most stupid kids I sold it and bought a motorcycle. I've kicked my azz a thousand times for that. Broke my dang leg on the cycle too.

I've thought about that huntin trip a lot since. I had that nice Model 70 and Dad had that old worthless Jap rifle... Aint that just like a Dad to see to it that his son has the good stuff?

Anyway, we loaded our deer and headed for home and Dad talked about how Jack Occonner was the greatest man alive all the way home.

Each year since then when I pass by Rocky Ford , I chuckle when I think of them Honey Doo Melons... hehe

Somewhere there about Gunnison there's a Café owner that I owe an apology too, cause Dad plumb totaled out his restroom...

Anybody else member when they was deer everywhere out there?
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Old 08-09-2016, 05:58 PM
  #2  
Spike
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Story #2: Not long after me and Pop went that first time to Little Hills and Pee-ance creek we made plans to go back. After all, we could git some more Honey Doo melons and might even run into Jack O'Conner too. hehe.

Pop had a good friend named Sap Benson and Pop said he wanted to go with us this time. I kinda protested but gave in when pop told that Sap had a GENUWINE packin Mule that would pack out all them deer I'd be shootin. That plumb sold me on Sap goin with us.

Pop had traded trucks by this time had a brand new 71 ford with a 390 engine in it. But it was a 2 wheel drive. We couldn't spring for 4 wheel drive for at least another 15 years.

So me and Pop and Sap Benson headed out and I sat in the middle ,straddling that 4 speed gear shift with no power steering on it even when new... and Sap was ridin shotgun.

Now Sap was a wiry looking feller what had just one eye. The other one got shot out in the war. Pop said Sap wouldn't actually hunt, but he'd pack deer out for me and he'd skin um. That suited me just fine , cause all I wanted to do was shoot deer anyhow.

But I sure was disappointed when I seen Sap's so called Pack Mule. She wasn't nothing more than a dad gummed donkey what wouldn't weigh more than 200 lbs soaking wet. But Sap was offended when I said something about it, so I shut up and let it go...

Her name was Martha and she followed Sap around like a kid and even stayed in the house a lot with him at home. When it come time to Load her, Sap just told her to git in the truck and Martha just jumped up in the back. We didn't have no rails or nothing and Pop just tied her to the window guard on that truck and away we went. Martha's head stuck over the cap as we went down the highway.

I told Pop I didn't know if that was legal or not, but we headed for Colorado anyhow. Sure nuff the Highway Patrol stopped us and ask about that donkey. But Sap explained to him that she was a pet and told her to lay down, which she promptly did, and that convinced the Highway Patrol to let us go. I recon they figured Martha was more like a dog than a Mule.

Anyhow, we got into Gunnison and stopped to buy some groceries. That's when Sap informed us that since he hadn't bought nary a drop of gasoline, he would git the groceries and cook for us all. His only request was that Pop buy the beer. So We agreed and went to the Liquor store while Sap shopped for Groceries.

Now back in them days we couldn't git Coors beer in Missouri, so it was kinda like a delicacy to us Hill folks and Pop bought a big bait of it and put it in the truck with Martha. Not sure why Coors beer wasn't in Missouri back then but it wasn't..

I have long since learn the error of my ways and stopped drinking any alcohol now. But back then it just seemed like the thing to do when a feller was goin huntin.

Anyhow, Sap had the groceries already bought and loaded by the time we got back. He had put them in a couple of coolers and I made the bad mistake of not checking what he'd bought. More about that later.

So we finally got to camp and didn't have much car trouble on this trip like the 1st time, except for Martha a pooping all over everything.

So we set camp and got ready for some supper and that's when I discovered that all Sap had bought for groceries was some that long summer sausage and some Taters. I mean not nary a dang thing else!

I commenced to chewing his asss about it, but he said we'll be fine. He called it Donkey Diick and Taters and he cooked up a big skillet of it for supper. I got to admit it was purdy dang good, but the problem was I didn't want it 3 times a day! Thankfully Mom had pack us some biskets and homemade jelly for the trip or I'd been sick to death of Donkey Diick and Taters. We finally made a trip into town later I replaced the menu with some decent food 3 days later.

But Sap was worth his weight in gold for skinning them deer. I'd knock um down and here'd come Sap and Martha to skin and pack um out. I didn't even have to gut um. Sap did it all.

But I'd kilt 2 old doe deer on one hillside that was steeper than the Matterhorn. Sap finally got o'le Martha up there, but he made the mistake of strappin both them doe deer on her back.

Martha was a little o'le donkey and with both deer on her, she looked like that little dog in the Grinch Stole Christmas movie, where Grinch tied them reindeer horns on him and then attached the sleigh to him.. hehe.

Martha's belly was pret near touching the ground, so I talked Sap into letin her drag them deer off that steep hellsih hillside to some flatter ground below, and then packing um out one at a time.

So we did, but we'd miscalculated how much more the deer weighed than Martha... and when we started down, the deer passed her and all I could see was mule hide and deer buttholes tumbling in a dust heap.

But thankfully they hit a snow patch and that little donkey skied down the hillside just as pretty as you please and stopped right on the trailhead.

Sap seen he'd overdone Martha, so he boned them 2 deer out, and packed um that way.

Sap just had one eye and didn't shoot guns , but he had a bone handle knife always on his belt. One day a herd of deer came around the mountain and I shot one of the biggest looking ones and at least 200 deer went on past us.

We was sitting on a rock, maybe 15 feet high so we had a good lookout. As all them deer passed on both sides of the rock we was sittin on, Sap bailed off the rock and on the back of a big fat doe. He cut it's throat with that knife and kilt it dead. I've never to this day seen guy kill a wild deer with just a knife, but Sap sure did it.

Now I know some of ya'll readin this is prolly saying we should be arrested for stabbing deer and overpackin a tiny little Donkey. But you got to just understand it was just a lot different back then. So don't go raggin at me about this.

Thanks for readin about the good ole days.

Last edited by Longshot349; 08-10-2016 at 05:52 AM.
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Old 08-09-2016, 05:59 PM
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Spike
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Oh, one more thing about Martha I forgot to mention... When we was in Gunnison, I'd bought me one of them Blaze Orange hunting vest. Them things wasn't no good when they was brand new, cause they got stiff as a wood's pecker when they got cold.

Then they'd make them awful scrapin noises when you walked through scrub oak with limbs rakin at ya. You could hear a guy comin in one of them vest a mile away.

But it was my 1st vest and I was proud as I could be of it. Well, turns out I just got to wear it one time, cause that night I laid it down too close to Martha and she ATE it! Alls I had left the next morning was the collar. hehe

Well that's all for now.
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Old 08-09-2016, 07:23 PM
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Welcome to the site! You should write a book of your stories!
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Old 08-10-2016, 04:12 AM
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Some great tales which really made me laugh. I have driven the same routes you mentioned including the Rocky Ford area. We didn't eat any of the melons though...I have the same problem when traveling without eating them. Welcome to the forum and for sharing your stories.

Last edited by Champlain Islander; 08-10-2016 at 04:14 AM.
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Old 08-10-2016, 05:50 AM
  #6  
Spike
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Thank ya fellers very much fer the welcome and the nice words!
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Old 08-17-2016, 04:12 PM
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enjoyed reading your stories. Thanks for sharing.
-Jake
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Old 08-18-2016, 06:47 AM
  #8  
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welcome to the site
and I do really miss the days of the past when hunting was an adventure and not a commercial of sorts
no need to have the latest and greatest things, was just you , hunting and having the best of what you could
I recall when stories like these were what hunting magazines were about too
unlike again modern magazines, which are all add's even the stories in them, all marketing crap, with little on skills of a true outdoors-man
more relying on gadgets today than ever in ever aspect of life it seems to me? sad I say
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