I'd hunted with this guide before, in previous years, he was an OK guy. He was having some heart issues and sent us out with his son and another guide I didn't know.

We left around midnight and drove mostly up the mountain for a few hours. Got to our destination around 3 A.M., it was super dark and around 40 degrees out. First off these guys kind of wave toward the east and say your shooting tower is that way. I ask how far, thinking I might walk past it. They said just go that direction you'll see it. It turned out to be south of east and well over a mile away, just blind luck I eventually found it, after walking maybe half the distance through dew wet waist high Rape fields. I was pretty much soaking wet from the waist down

Temperature plummeted to around freezing or below, wind picked up to around 30 MPH and sideways sleet was blowing in through the windows into the tower, it was an open tower from the waist up.

I knew I was getting a bit hyporthermic, pulled out my blanket, then my poncho, then put my feet inside my rucksack and curled up into a ball. Looked around for some better cover and there wasn't any. I was planing on waiting for first light and then making my way back to the truck.

I eventually decided I had to get out of that place and headed mostly west. I really have no idea how far I walked, but eventually saw a light in the distance and headed that direction. I eventually found a farm house, the guy and his wife were nice. I don't speak Czech or Russian, they didn't speak English, German or Spanish, but I guess just by looking at me they figured out what was going on. Everything after that is a blur, just a few lucid moments for the next thirty hours or so.

I'd been colder for longer, much longer, I figure it was just me not sleeping enough for days, eating right, the altitude and maybe the drastic temperature change that sent me into serious hypothermia.

I'm guessing another hour or so outside and I would have been Buzzard food.

Woke up in a warm bed, under a down blanket, my clothes cleaned, my rifle cleaned and my wallet laying on the bed stand. Seriously these people didn't have much, between my rifle and my wallet there was a years wages for them. They could have dumped me in a ditch and then pleaded ignorance.