The Claw Hammer Deer

I had to leave early for work this morning and when I left the house it was still dark. While driving to the MARTA station, I rode with the window down, breathed in the cool morning air and watched the sun come up over the city. It was one of those glorious Spring mornings where everything just felt fresh and clean, even if it was Atlanta. For some reason, no matter how old I get, mornings like that remind me of my grandfather. Maybe it's just fact that Easter is around the corner, but it brings back memories of standing beside him at Sunrise Services atop Whitaker Cemetery, looking out over the Mills River Valley while Pastor Sitton read the story of Christ’s resurrection from the Gospels.

My Grandfather, or Paw as we grand kids called him, was a lot of things. A loving husband and father. A deacon in the Mills River Baptist Church and a believer in Jesus Christ. A fire chaplain and a farmer. But above all things I remember my grandfather as an outdoorsman. Of course by time I came along, he was long past his prime as a woodsman and hunter. Arthritis and thirty years of working at Cranston had taken it’s toll on his old worn out knees and by the time I was ready to hunt the steep slopes and narrow mountain ridges of our mountains, Paw simply wasn’t what he used to be.

But he always had a good story. Great stories. Stories about the old days, when he ran traps lines, cut timber and guided deer hunts at The Big Creek Wilderness Camp. Stories when he was a young man and chased whitetails all over God’s country.

One of the more infamous of his stories involves a claw hammer and one unfortunate whitetail doe.

As the story goes, one day Paw was out checking his trap line up on the North Mills River. It was during the early 1960’s, and what money Paw brought in from mink, coon and muskrat hides was an important supplement to the family income. Paw was just above the confluence of the North and South Mills River, checking one of the muskrat traps, when he heard a loud commotion coming from up river. It was the sound of a pack of dogs barking and moving fast in his direction. From the way the dogs where carrying on, Paw knew they had to be running a deer. So he slipped quietly out of the river and concealed himself in the bushes just along the waters edge. The barking grew louder and louder until eventually Paw could hear the splashing of water as well. The dogs were pushing the deer right down the middle of the river. Paw began to hear the splashing of a single, large animal coming straight towards him. Suddenly a large doe came bounding down the river running for her life from the pursuing pack of hounds. The doe leaped right in front of the spot where Paw was hidden. When she caught sight of Paw, hiding in the bushes, she froze out of sheer shock. Obviously, she wasn’t expecting to see a man standing on the side of the river, just inches from her face.

Now of course Paw never said this, but I imagine that old doe probably looked up at my grandfather with eyes full of panic, as if to say, “Help me, dear sir. These dogs are after me and I’m so tired” And I’m sure, other individuals at that moment would have valiantly leaped into the river in front of the pursuing dogs and attempted to save the poor frightened deer.

But not Paw.

As the deer stood up to it's knees in the water, trembling in terror, Paw reached into the back of his hunting coat, pulled out a small metal claw hammer that he used to repair broken traps, and brought it crashing down right between the old does eyes-killing her deader than a door nail.

He then pulled her lifeless body up the river bank and loaded her into the back of his waiting pick-up, much to the chagrin of the barking dogs.

Now before any of you PETA or Humane Society nut-jobs out there get your panties in a wad and start thinking that my grandfather was some heartless killer, you need to consider that that particular deer meant food for his family. Back then, times were hard, and you got food where ever you could get it. Even if it meant knocking a whitetail on the head with a hammer like a Wack-A-Mole at the State Fair.

That’s one of the most important things my grandfather ever taught me-Killing an animal just for the sheer fun of it, is a sin. You always eat what you kill. (With the except of groundhogs of course)

I have no doubt, that my grandmother whipped up some of her usual culinary magic and prepared that doe into one heck of a feast for the Bryson clan. As of this writing, I’ve killed deer with rifles, shotguns, bows and arrows. I’ve even killed a few with a pocket knife. But I have yet to knock one down with a claw hammer. Paw’s still got one on me in that category.

Today Was A Good Day

Ice Cube said it best- Today was a good day.

Today Danielle and I found out that we're having another boy. I couldn't be more excited. Not that I would have disappointed if we had learned we were having a girl, obviously we just want a healthy baby, but the thought of having another boy to be a buddy to Ridge just puts a big goofy smile on my face. Plus, as an added bonus, I still don't have to pay for a wedding twenty years form. Cha-Ching! But it does mean a second hunting rifle in about ten years. I'll take that over paying for a wedding reception any day.

All in all, today was one of those days where I could feel God's love all around me. Today was perfect example of how Life is indeed good and that God truly wants us to be happy. Forget the economy, the stock market, bills, mortgages, and the depressing fact that the start of bow season is still over six months away -forget all of that. Today was a day where I simply sat back and enjoyed the simple things in life.

Two boys. Gosh, it seems just like yesterday I was a kid myself. It's a dang short movie, how did I get here so fast?

Another son. Another deer rifle. Another life-time hunting license. Another pair of Danner boots. Another bunk in elk camp.

Life is good.

The Horse Whispherer

Usually around the second day in elk camp our livestock is delivered. When hunting the remote regions of the West, one aspect that is crucial to a successful, and in my opinion, a truly enjoyable hunting experience is the employment of horses. Horses are used in elk camp for two primary reasons, to expand a hunters range and to for packing out meat. To me, there is nothing more exhilarating than riding horseback through the Rockies in the predawn light, your rifle slung at the ready in a leather scabbard by your side and the shrill cry of a bull elk in the distance. It’s enough to cause one’s imagination to conjure up images of what it must have been like to live the life of old Jim Bridger or Liver Eatin’ Johnson, sleeking through the aspen groves on their trusty mountain steeds keeping one eye open for big game and the other for hostile Crow warriors.

Now when enlisting the services of horses, I would advise that there be at least one horse expert or seasoned rider in camp. This will cut down on the buckings, kickings, and nasty horse bites that novice riders may endure. In our camp, this responsibility falls squarely on the shoulders of my father, an experienced horseman who has worked around the unpredictable four-legged beasts most of his adult life. He likens himself to Redford’s character in the THE HORSE WHISPER, but in reality he’s more like THE HORSE YELLER, THE HORSE INSULTER, or more accurately THE HORSE PUNCHER. I don’t mean to paint a bleak picture of my father, he really does love horses, but let’s just say has a short temper when it comes to dealing with them. Spare the 2x4, spoil the horse, he would always say.

Every year there’s usually at least one member of our party who’s hesitate to get on the back of a 1,000 lb animal who’s natural speed is used to gauge the power of professional race cars. A few years ago that individual was my 3rd cousin Mikey. He had been nervous about the idea of horses ever since we began our long road trip to Colorado and at some point along the way, he pulled my father aside and expressed his concern. My father promptly asked him what, if any, experience he had had with horses. Mikey thought about it for a moment and proudly announced that he had once owned a VHS copy of THE BLACK STALLION. Dad knew he had his work cut out for him, but set Mikey’s mind at ease by promising him that he’d personally pick out a nice, gentle horse for Mikey to ride.

Once in camp, my father went to work immediately. We had rented a total of four head of horses from a local ranch outside of Craig and for over the course of the next several hours, he rode each and every one; carefully observing their individual temperaments and disposition, looking for any erratic behavior or flaws in personality. Finally, he made his choice, and led a little bay mare over to Mikey and handed him the reins.

“This little gelding is the sweetest of the bunch, Mickey. She’s perfect for you. Take her for a spin.”

My father helped Mikey into the saddle and watched him walk the horse in figure eights behind the cook tent for several minutes. It wasn’t long before Mikey had her trotting and loping up and down the length of camp, his confidence soaring. My father beamed a wide smile and nodded with contentment of his accomplishment and his newly acquired status in the annals of premiere horsemen, ready to dethrone Marty Roberts himself as the quintessential horseman.

With Mikey, relaxed and now galloping in the saddle, my father turned and entered the cook tent to help the rest of us prepare the evening meal. We had just begun peeling the potatoes for the stew, when we heard what sounded like a ten year old girl screaming at the top of her lungs in sheer terror. We rushed outside just in time to see Mikey atop the gelding, but now looking as if he were competing to the title of bucking champion in the National Rodeo Final in Vegas. Mikey was wailing like a banshee, desperately trying to stay in the saddle, while the mare bucked and spun with the ferocity of professional rodeo stock. It looked as though Mikey was a goner for sure.

Suddenly, without warning the mare broke into a full, flat out sprint down an embankment toward the road. Mikey gripped the saddle horn and hung on for all he was worth. Then as if on a dime, the mare spun abruptly to the right.

Mikey, unfortunately, went to the left.

As if watching a slow motion sports reel, and we watched in horror as Mikey’s body became silhouetted against the cobalt blue Colorado sky, hung in mid air as if he were Michael Jordan and then came crashing down like a sack of soggy potatoes into a sharp, jagged pile of sandstone boulders.

As his limp and seeming lifeless body landed amidst the rocks, each of of immediately began thinking of what passage of scripture we’d read at Mikey’s funeral. Corinthians 3:12 would be a nice choice, I decided. We rushed to his side and miraculously he was still alive and conscious. Fortunately for Mikey we always brought along as a member of our hunting party, a professionally-trained medical physician just in case of such an emergency.

Unfortunately, Mikey was that person.

Mikey was a EMT who flew in medical helicopters back home in Asheville, NC so under his semi conscious guidance, he instructed Cousin Ray in the proper way to pop back into place his dislocated shoulder.

In the end, Mikey only suffered a dislocated shouldered which Cousin Ray quickly popped back into place. His sore shoulder didn’t keep him from hunting and on that particular trip, Mikey killed the biggest bull in camp, a nice 6 x 6. For the next two seasons, Mikey would show up in camp and each time would ask my father to pick him out the gentlest horse in the corral and over the next two years Mikey suffered a slight concussion from being thrown, was bitten in the left shoulder, and kicked repeatedly. Mikey still hunts with us but has sworn off horses forever much to the chagrin of my father.

Papa and Doc

I never knew my great grandfather but his name is spoken in almost hushed reverence in our family. Over the course of my life I’ve heard numerous stories about the man, from the time he was kicked out of the Methodist Church, or “churched” as the old timers called it, for partaking of too much corn liquor or the time he whipped my twenty something year old grandfather with the mule reins just for back-sassing him while the two were plowing. By all accounts, Papa Bryson, as they used to call him, was quite a colorful character, personally I always imagined him to be a cross between John Wayne in Hatari! and Tommy Lee Jones in Lonesome Dove.

But it was Papa Bryson’s skill as a deer hunter that set him apart from other men. My grandfather once said that Papa Bryson, was undoubtedly one of the finest deer hunters in all of Mills River Valley.

Pappa Bryson died in 1948, one year before my father was born. My Dad never knew his grandfather but I wanted his name and legacy to live on. So on May 7th, 2007, when my son, William Ridge Bryson, was brought in to this world, we named him after my Great Grandfather. I’m also hoping that by giving him his first name, a little of Pappa Bryson’s deer hunting magic will rub off on the little guy.

***
Now it wasn’t that long ago, when deer season meant a great deal more to the residents of the Mills River Valley than just mere recreation; it literally meant survival. Hunting put much needed food on the table for dozens of poor, hard working families. The Bryson’s were no exception. My grandfather used to tell us stories of when he was a boy, sneaking into the woods with Pappa Bryson to hunt deer out of season just so they could make it through the winter. Together the two of them would set out on foot from their home on South Mills River to a small hunting cabin located at the head of Turkey Springs- a journey that totaled some ten to fifteen miles in length. They would return home weary and exhausted several days later, their hunting coats over flowing with fresh venison tenderloin, shoulders and hams; enough to feed the large clan of ten.

Now shooting deer out of season to feed a hungry family was one thing but trespassing on another man’s property to simply satisfy your desire to have a large trophy rack hanging over your fireplace was something entirely different. And apparently Pappa Bryson had a fairly notorious reputation in the community as a trespasser.

Now by most accounts, Pappa Bryson was an educated man, he could read and write as well as other folks, but for some odd reason he had a hard time deciphering signs which read, NO TRESSPASSING and NO HUNTING- a reading deficiency that routinely landed him in hot water with local game wardens.

A story that is still told around dinner tables in the Bryson family is the time Papa Bryson and Dr. Greeenwood had a run-in with one particular game warden while trespassing on the Biltmore Estate. During the turn of the Century, the Vanderbilt Family, who constructed the world renowned Biltmore House, owned practically all of Western North Carolina, some 125,000 acres in total. Nearly every square inch of their properly was prime deer hunting land and strictly off limits to the general public. To enforce their No Hunting policy and to discourage poachers, the Vanderbilt's employed a small army of private game wardens who systematically patrolled their vast property on horseback.

Now Papa Bryson routinely snuck onto the estate to hunt with his good friend Dr. Greenwood, who at the time served as the local doctor for the community. Dr. Greenwood was known a gifted physician, who as the story goes once amputated a man’s leg with a carpenter hand saw and a kitchen butcher knife. He also served as head of the Mills River social club with he and his wife hosting extravagant parties at their South Mills River home. He was known far and wide as a fine, upstanding citizen, a pillar of the community. But the good doctor also had another reputation, that of a fanatical trophy hunter and sometime outlaw poacher. Apparently when it came to deer hunting his addiction knew no boundaries nor property lines.

It became common knowledge throughout Mills River that come deer season, Dr. Greenwood and his partner in crime, Papa Bryson were usually to be found somewhere creeping around the Vanderbilt Estate in search of big game. In fact, they had so man encounters with the estate's game wardens, the two men actually became somewhat close acquaintances with many of them.

On one such trespassing, er, I mean hunting trip, Papa Bryson and Dr. Greenwood were sneaking along a path somewhere deep within the Biltmore estate, when they spotted the head game warden coming their direction on horseback. Without being seen, the two quickly slipped off the trail and concealed themselves in a laurel thicket. They pulled bandannas up over their faces to hide their identities in the even they were spotted and had to make a quick retreat. As the warden passed by the spot where the two men were hidden, without as much as turning his head the warden said out loud, in an almost friendly greeting, “Hello Bryson. Hello Greenwood,” and merely continued on his way.

As a kid, every time I heard that story, I could help but to think of the coyote and road runner cartoons. After so many times of trying to catch those two, the warden finally accepted the fact that Papa and Dr. Greenwood was a fact of life and went about his day.

Trail of Tears

I've never been what you'd call a violent person. Like the old saying goes, I'm more of a lover than a fighter. I've only been in one actual fight in my life and that was with Frank Painter in the 6th Grade. Frank had refused to become a casualty of war after I clearly riddled his body with invisible bullets from my plastic Uzi sub-machine gun during a backyard reenactment of Rambo: First Blood Part 2, and so the two of us went fisticuffs.

Since that day, I've never had any reason to fight or do bodily harm to another human being, except for the time I was tempted to shoot my Cousin Ray in cold blood after he walked me and two others to complete and utter exhaustion while on an elk hunt in Colorado.

It was 1997, my first ever elk hunt, and on the second or third day out, Dad and I heard Ray shoot several times down around Saw Mill Creek. The two of us hiked to the edge of a high ridge from which we had heard the gunshots, but there was no sign of Ray or any dead elk. But several hundred feet down below us, at the bottom of a steep, rocky gorge, we caught a faint glimpse of what appeared to be the body of a dead bull.

"Oh Dear Lord," sighed Dad shaking his head, "Ray's done went and killed an elk down in that hole. It'll be midnight before we get back to camp."

After spending the better part of an hour, maneuvering, and sometimes sliding uncontrollably, down the side of the mountain, Dad and I arrived at the bottom of the hole, where we found Ray and his son Junior gutting the elk. It was late in the afternoon and the sun was already on its downward slide towards the horizon. The decision was made, after the elk was field dressed, for Dad and Ray to head back to the top of the mountain to get the horses in order to pack out the elk before nightfall. Junior and I would wait buy the elk until they got back.

In hindsight, Junior and I should have started the long process of skinning and quartering the animal in our fathers’ absence, but this was our first hunt and there was still plenty of daylight left to do some more hunting. Plus, we figured, how long could it really take to hike back and fetch the horses? This was our first experience of judging distances out in the West, where things appear much closer than they actually are.

It was close to dark by time Dad and Ray returned with the two packhorses. An hour and a half of backbreaking work later, we had the panniers loaded with elk shoulders, hams, and tenderloins.

"You boys ready to climb?" asked Ray while tying the bull’s antlers to the back of his packhorse.

I stared up at the steep grade before us. It looked as though it went up and up for eternity. Junior and I looked at each other and whispered in unison, "This is going to suck."

The word suck doesn't even begin to describe the next several hours of that night. Torture. Agony. Misery. Anguish. Those words I believe come a bit closer in defining our following ordeal.

We started up out of the gorge, which by the way since that day has been called Ray's Hole, around 7PM. I lead one of the pack horses, a buckskin quarter horse whose actual name I have long since forgotten, but who seemed determined to step on the back of my foot with other step. About an hour into the trip I quickly renamed the horse, Stupid. By the end of that night I was ready to shoot Stupid in the head. As much as I smacked, beat and jerked on his reins, that retarded animal was intent on crushing every bone in my foot.

For next several hours the four of us clawed our way up the vertical slope in the direction of the 1144 trail which would lead us back to our vehicle. Our legs and lungs were burning and screaming "Uncle". Dad and Ray were in the lead stumbling along in the darkness, followed by Stupid and myself. Junior brought up the rear. As exhausted as I was, I kept telling myself that Ray and Dad had already made this trip once today. I had to hand it to them; they were in really good shape for guys their age.

Sometime around hour number three, the slope leveled off and we topped a small ridge. We stopped for a quicker breather.

"Finally!" I thought. "We've found the 1144 Trail. I won't be long now till we're back at the truck headed for a warm meal and a soft bed."

Unfortunately, this was not going to be the case.

Dad was also leading a packhorse, walked over the Ray where I overheard these dreaded words: "You have any idea where the trail is?"

Not the words I was hoping to hear.

Although they had walked these mountains dozens of times over the years, they were now apparently having a difficult time navigating the terrain in the dark. Finding a narrow, one-foot wide walking path in the middle of the forest, was turning out to be the equivalent of finding a needle in a haystack.

And so for the next several hours, similar to the Israelites exodus from Egypt, we wandered aimlessly in the wilderness. Only in our case, neither Dad nor Ray was turning out to be Moses. And what was even more frustrating was that even after we found the 114 Trail, we would still have a long and steep hike ahead of us until we reached the Promised Land, which in this case was the Bear's Ear parking lot.

After the 176 time Stupid stepped on the back of my foot was ready to kill my cousin Ray. Why on Earth did he find it so necessary to kill an elk in such a remote and steep place? Honestly, he couldn't have picked a worse place in the entire freaking state of Colorado. And the elk he shot wasn't even all that big. It was a decent 4x4, but nothing to warrant this kind of physical punishment. For a 360-class bull, yeah, I could see it, but for the rack he had tied on the back of this horse, No Way!

My thighs, calves and lungs all felt as though they were being subjected to red-hot pokers. Every fiber in my body was screaming with exhaustion, yet we continued to climb-each of us in our own private purgatory of pain and suffering. At one point, my cousin Junior, who for the last several hours had been bringing up the rear, came trudging up beside me. We was huffing and puffing like a asthmatic suffering from a collapsed lung.

Give…me…my…rifle,” he wheezed. “I’m going to kill him.”

I stepped in front of Junior as he went for the rifle scabbard strapped to my horse and prevented him from extracting his 30.06.

“No, you can’t shoot him, Junior. He’s your Daddy.” I said although the thought had crossed my mind at least a dozen times over the past couple of hours.

“Well, fine! That’s it I’m done!” Junior shouted, loud enough for us all to hear. He then slumped to the ground like a gunnysack of potatoes. “The heck with all of you! You can just come pick me up here in the morning. I’m not walking another step.

The rest of us just keep going refusing to look back, at this point is was survival of the fittest; the Law of Nature. A weaker member of our herd had fallen by the wayside, yet we simply ignored him and kept on marching.

“Fine stay here,” hollered Ray. “But you’ll freeze to death before sun-up and the coyotes will eat what’s left of you.”

I figured this would be the last time I would ever see my cousin again, yet I was too tired to say a proper “good-bye.”

“Can I have your rifle?” I puffed as I trudged onward. Junior just laid there in a crumpled heap on the forest floor, mumbling obscenities.

It was now down to just three of us. My blood sugar began to plummet to dangerous levels, I hadn’t eaten anything since noon, and I began to wonder if I would soon be joining my cousin as coyote’s cold breakfast. Then suddenly from up ahead, I heard Ray shout.

“THANK THE LORD! If it aint the 1144!”

We had found the elusive trail, our expressway back to a warm bead, food and civilization. Maybe I would live to see another sunrise after all.

Finding the trail seemed to give a much-needed boost to our morale. We now had adrenaline and hope pumping through our veins. With our spirits now lifted and a newfound spring in our step, it wasn’t long until we found the our truck at Saw Mill Creek. Glory Hallelujah. Praise the Lord. We were saved.

We stumbled to the horse trailer on what little strength we had left in our legs. I can honestly say, that never in my entire life have I been more exhausted than I was at that particular moment. Just as we were loading our equally fatigued horses into the trailer, a figure emerged from the woods, limping and cursing like a drunken sailor. It was Junior. Apparently the thought of wild coyotes scattering his frozen bones all over the mountainside was too much for him to bare and he was able to muster the strength to follow us out.

Seeing my cousin, whom I’d shared many memories with since childhood, reappear from the forest alive and well was a relief, though I was somewhat disappointed that I wouldn’t be able to keep hi rifle.

Through out my career in corporate advertising, I’ve had the privilege to travel all over this great nation and dine in some of it’s finest restaurants, but I can honestly say that the Dinty Moore Beef Stew we ate in camp that night was probably the best meal that has ever passed over my lips. After dinner, I dropped in bunk and was asleep before my head even touched the pillow. No, scratch that, I think was asleep before I even entered the tent. I think someone just pointed me in the right direction and somehow I managed to find my bunk.

I have hunted that same area around Bear’s Ears several times since that god-awful night and I have yet to shoot an elk anywhere near that hole Ray lead us into. And I have made a promise to myself that I never will; no matter how big his antlers are. I hope to never again have to endure Ray’s Trail of Tears.

The Darwin Awards

Every year the Darwin Awards are handed out to certain individuals who have followed Charles Darwin’s theory of “nature will weed out the weakest and dumbest.” In other words they’re awards given posthumously to all the idiots out there who have killed themselves doing really stupid things, usually right after uttering the words “Hey, y’all watch this.”

Past winners have included a parachutist who jumped out of a plane at 20,00o feet but somehow forgot to strap on a parachute, an avid jogger who was so “in the zone” he accidentally jogged off a 200 foot cliff, and a karate student who thought he could fight a full grown male lion at a local zoo-his remains, which included just an arm and a leg, were found the following day by zoo keepers. But my all-time favorite Darwin Award winner is the guy who decided it would be a good idea to snack on a dynamite blasting cap. Here’s the actual story:

A man at a party popped a blasting cap into his mouth and bit down, triggering an explosion that blew off his lips, teeth and tongue, State Police said Wednesday. Jerry Stromyer, 24, of Kincaid, bit the blasting cap as a prank during a party late Tuesday night, said Cpl. M.D.Payne. "Another man had it in an aquarium, hooked to a battery, and was trying to explode it," Payne said. "It wouldn't go off and this guy said, "'I'll show you how to set it off."

Obviously these are not the best and brightest examples of the human race and its probably just as well that these individuals have been eliminated from our gene pool.

Now personally, I've never known any Darwin Award winners, (thank goodness) but I have met several people in my lifetime who will probably be nominated at some point in their lives. The following story, which was told to me by my father, is about two such individuals. It took place several years ago in elk camp in Colorado.

Two old boys by the name of Gerald and Carl were out elk hunting one day, when they came across a large hole in the ground.

“Hey Gerald, what do you recon is down in that hole?” asked Carl.

“Don’t know,” replied Gerald, “but I’m pretty sure it ain’t no elk.”

“Well, there’s plenty of elk to go around,” said Carl, “But it ain’t every day a feller comes across a big ‘ol hole in the ground like this. There might be Injun gold down in there.”

“Injun gold?”

“Why sure, them Injuns had lots of gold. Why do you recon Cortez and all them Spanish fellers came over here in the first place?” said Carl. “Now when I lay down, you grab me by my ankles and lower me down in that hole.”

Gerald highly doubted there was any Injun gold down in that hole, all he wanted to do that day was to shoot a nice 5x5 bull, but he did as he was instructed and lowered Carl slowly down in to the dark hole.

“What do you see Carl?” Gerald asked.

“Can’t see much,” Carl hollered from inside the hole. “Smells real bad down here too. Hold on, let me turn on my flashlight.”

Several seconds later, Carl began kicking, thrashing and squalling like a banshee.

“FOR THE LOVE OF PETE! PULL ME UP, GERALD! PULL ME UP!”

It turned out, that when Carl flicked on his light, he found himself nose to nose with a large hibernating black bear sow. Now fortunately for these two intellectual brainiacs, they were able to escape without waking up the sleeping bear. And thankfully that year’s Darwin Award List didn't include the caption: “North Carolina man’s head bitten off by startled hibernating bear.”

Alive and Kickin'

One of the great things about the Wild Meat Supper back home, other than the mouth-waterin' vittles, is the stories one will hear around the supper table. You get a bunch of gray-haired old timers sitting around swapping hunting tales and you're liable to hear a whopper sooner or later. I thought I had heard just about every story there was to be told about my late Great Uncle Sid, but I was proven wrong Saturday night.

The following humdinger was relayed to me by Don Westmoreland.

As the story goes, one day sometime back in the late 1950's, Uncle Walt and Uncle Sid were cruising the back roads of Mills River in Uncle Walt's old car. They came around a curve and they spotted an big fat doe standing on the side of the road. The fact that it wasn't deer season didn't deter the two brothers in the least, and as Uncle Walt jammed on the brakes, Uncle Sid slid his rifle out the passenger side window and put a bullet right behind the old doe's ear, dropping her like a sack of 'taters. Quick as flash, Uncle Sid hopped out of the car , drug the deer's lifeless body across the road and shoved it into the back seat. Uncle Walt hit the gas, before the game warden came along, and headed for the house as fast as he could.

But they only got about half way home when the deer suddenly sprang back to life in the backseat. Apparently Uncle Sid's bullet didn't kill the deer but just sorted stunned the poor thing, knocking it unconscious for a few minutes. The old doe, after waking up in the back seat of an old Chevy, obviously freaked out. It commenced to kicking and thrashing like crazy-trying to escape the moving vehicle. Uncle Walt, afraid to stop the car in case the game warden was to pass by, simply kept the pedal to metal and his head down trying to dodge deer hooves. Uncle Sid on the other hand was throwing haymakers at the does head and doing his best to subdue panic stricken deer. Needless to say, old doe nearly beat the two brothers to death before they finally manged to get it home where it was properly disposed of.

I suppose my Uncle Walt and Uncle Sid gave new meaning to the term Fast Food. (insert bad joke drum roll here.)

Wild Meat Supper

The Mills River Methodist Church's annual Wild Meat Supper was held last Saturday night and by all accounts was a colossal success. I believe the final tally of people served was somewhere around 280 and I was told they had over 60 people on a waiting list if seats came available. The fellowship hall of the church was crammed to absolute full capacity. If they had tried to fit any more bodies into that room I'm sure they would have been in violation of the fire ordinance. Fortunately, half of the Mills River Volunteer Fire Department was in attendance.

The food as usual was fantastic. We dined on deer, elk, buffalo, wild turkey, pheasant (which was a little too dry for my tastes) bear, and wild trout. Ridge especially liked the elk pasta and Mom's spicewood cake. My personal favorite dish of the meal was Dad's cube steak. It was melt-in-your mouth delicious. I was particularly careful however, when selecting my deer steak while going through the serving line. I had watched Ray earlier in the day preparing the meat and saw him cutting off sections and smelling it before putting it in the frying pan.

"Some of this meat's pretty old," he said, when he noticed me watching him trim the suspicious meat. "Been at the bottom of the freezer for a couple of years. I done believe some of it's gone bad."

That's the thing about Ray-the man will not waste venison under any circumstances, even if it has the potential to cause an outbreak of salmonella poisoning.

After the dinner, there was an auction that benefit the Methodist Youth Mission Outreach Program. Donnie Goode served as auctioneer. The majority of the stuff auctioned off was junk donated by folks around the community, that came straight from their basement or attic. But there was some highlights: Dad donated two hand-built bird houses and a rabbit gum. Some guy donated an old .22 single shot rifle and off course there was a variety of baked goods from some of the local women in the community.

Dad's two birdhouse went for $50 bucks and the rabbit gum went for $45. One of Aunt Mid's secret recipe cakes sold for a whopping $120. We were told that a couple of years ago, Mac Wiggins paid $400 dollars for one of her cakes. Pretty impressive for a cake. I sure do miss Aunt Mid. I wonder if she's baking cakes up in heaven for Uncle Walt?

the t-shirts I designed for the event were also a big hit. Bud ran the table were the shirts were being sold and at one point during the dinner he came over and whispered in my ear that they were selling like hotcakes.

All in all it was a great night, and Danielle and Ridge both had a good time as well. A lot of money was raised for a good cause and I believe everyone involved enjoyed themselves. It's always great being back home with friends, family and good food.

Until next year...

Snow Blind

Danielle, Ridge and I were up in Mills River this past weekend for the Wild Meat Supper Saturday night. (More on that later) We woke up Sunday morning at Mom and Dad's with reports of a snow storm rapidly moving into the area. Obviously we wanted to get a head start on the storm and get back home to Atlanta as quickly as possible, so we hastily packed our bags, said some quick “good-byes,” and hit the road. Our timing couldn't have been better-just as we entered Atlanta city limits, the snow started to come down in sheets and proceeded to pile up for the next several hours.

Our hasty evacuation from the mountain this morning reminded me of another time the Bryson Clan was forced to retreat from a blinding snowstorm.

Back in 2006, we were in our usual elk hunting grounds in Routte National Forest, just north of Craig, Colorado. On Opening Morning, our hunting party dropped down into the "Honey Hole," a little valley tucked secretly away in the shadow of Bear Ears Mountain that's typically teaming with large herds of elk. As usual, we got into a mess of elk that morning and by the end of the day, most of us had filled our tags. The weather was postcard perfect that first morning-everything an elk hunter could ask for: clear blue skies, that could inspire a George Strait song, elk bugling in the timber and golden aspens quaking in a crisp, gentle breeze.

We spent the rest of that glorious day and the following day, packing meat out of the our little valley and back our base camp situated at the base of Black Mountain. But on the third day of the hunt, the weather took a turn for the worst.

Just before dawn, Ray and his wife Ramona, who along with my mother had made her first trip to elk camp, left camp to head back out and hunt. Ray had killed a bull on opening day but Ramona still had an unfilled bull tag. Ray had decided to take her to a spot just below Bears Ears to see if any of the elk we had gotten into opening morning, were still loitering around the the vicinity. At first light, about an hour after they had left camp, it began to snow. It began gradually, as just a mild flurry, but by ten o’clock it had turned into a hard snow shower. The remaining members of camp, which included Mom, Dad, Joe and myself walked around camp enjoying the white stuff. It was the first snow any of us had seen all year and for me, living in Atlanta, it was probably also the last snow I’d seen this year.

As the snow began to accumulate on the ground, the four of us went about having care-free snowball fights, building snowmen and snapping photos. Snow showers are not uncommon in the high country –they blow in on a moments notice and are often over as quickly as they started. Over the years of elk hunting, I’ve come to learn that weather in the Rockies can change on a dime and I recall many hunts where one minute I’m stripped down to a t-shirt in sixty degree heat and just a few hours later, I’m freezing my rear end off in a hail storm.

And so the morning snow storm were were experiencing, didn’t seem out of the ordinary, after all, we had just enjoyed warm, pleasant temperatures just two days earlier. But after several hours of watching the snow pile up around camp and the storm not showing any sigh of relenting, we came to the conclusion something just wasn’t right. It was then we decided to see what the Weather Service had to say about the proceedings.

We switched on the the old AM radio in the cook tent and the first thing we heard was a static-laced weather alert being broadcast over the Buckskin Network. It turned out a weather advisory was in affect for the mountains of Northwest Colorado, with projections of ten to fifteen inches of accumulation over the next twenty four hours. We immediately knew we were in trouble.

Right about then Ray and Ramona pulled into camp.

“We better get outta here right now,” advised Ray who was drenched in melted snow, “or we’re going to be stranded up here till the Spring Thaw.”

At that, we started breaking camp as fast as we could go. It was a literal race against the clock-we had to get off the mountain before the roads back down to Craig became impassable.

As we torn down the tents and packed our gear, a fierce electrical storm blew in over Black Mountain. Bolts of lighting flashed and thunder boomed directly over our heads while the snow continued to come down in buckets. I still have nightmares to this day of desperately trying to disassemble the metal frame of our cook tent as light bolts popped and slammed into the nearby hillside. I just knew that any second I was about to take jolt of 1.21 jigawatts of electricity and possibly be hurled back to the year 1955, similar to Doc Brown's DeLorean.

While Joe and I were breaking down the tents, Ray and Dad were discovering a new problem-the snow chains they had brought, were not the right size for the tires on the horse trailer. This was extremely bad news since we had a steep, ten mile climb from camp to the top of Black Mountain. With the snow piling up and a trailer without chains, there would be know way for us to haul our rented horses back to Sombrero Ranch.

The decision was made that Ray would ride one horse and lead the other, back to the main road where we would tie them up and inform Sombrero Ranch of their location. It was the only option we had-we would never make it up the mountain with the extra weight of two horses in the back.

So as the snow continued to pour, and while the rest of us packed gear in the truck, Ray set off into the storm with the horses.

The task of breaking down the tents was also becoming a problem. We had successfully taken down the cook tent and stored it away in the back of the horse trailer, but we were having difficulty breaking down our sleep tent. The tent itself is an enormous, antiquated canvas monstrosity from the Korean War era. Because of it's sheer size and bulk, it's usually a an eight-man job to disassemble it. We were trying to do it with just three of us. The snow was piling up on the collapsed tent faster than we could fold it up. Finally Dad gave us the official word to abandon it.

"Just leave it," he barked. "We'll never get out of if we keep fooling around with it."

And so we aborted the operation, and within just minutes, our old Army tent that had kept us sheltered from the elements on many an elk hunt, was buried under a thick blanket of Rocky Mountain powder.

In just under two hours, we had completely broke camp and stored our gear away in the back of Dad's Chevy and the back of the horse trailer-a new elk camp record. With everything stored away and snow-chains on the back of the pick-ups tires only, we all piled into the truck and started up the long, steep grade to the top of Black Mountain. We picked up Ray where West Prong Road intersects the main road. The horses were tied and eating peacefully, awaiting extraction from the storm from Sombrero Ranch, who Ray had just called a few minutes before.

Inside the truck, you could cut the tension with a dull butter knife. We hoped the chains and the Chevy 4-wheel drive could get us to the top of the mountain. Our biggest fear of course was sliding of jackknifing on one of the road's narrow, snow-covered switchbacks. Inside the truck cab, we held our collective breaths as Dad navigated the truck through the blizzard, mile by mile and the only sounds were the soft, whispered prayers of my mother in the backseat.

Eventually, after what seemed like an eternity, we successfully reached the top of Black Mountain. Our blood pressures returned to normal levels and we each let out a thankful sign of relief. The God Lord had most defiantly been listening to Mom that day.

But what we found at the top of Black Mountain was a sight that I thought I'd left far behind me in metro Atlanta- a snarled, rush hour-style traffic jam. Apparently every hunter in the high country was trying to escape the wrath of the storm. It was a full scale evacuation, with what had to have been a hundred 4 wheel drive vehicles, lined bumper to bumper, heading down to lower elevations. As darkness descended on the mountain, an endless procession of red glowing tail could be seen snaking it's way clear to the Craig city limits.

Sitting in the traffic choked road, we eventually passed by a thundering herd of over hundred horses, that were being driven out of the high country by several cowboys and outfitters. We learned later, that the horses we had left tied next to the main road, were part of this herd and made it safely back to their ranch.

The winter snows had officially made an early and unexpected arrival that year and had placed a premature end to the first hunt of the season. Fortunately for Dad, Joe, Ray and myself we bagged our bulls early but unfortunately the weather had spoiled the trip for many an elk hunter.

That evening in Craig, the six of us found a couple of vacant rooms in the Holiday Inn. The hotel was packed to the gills with displaced and dejected hunters who had also evacuated from the storm. We spent the rest of the evening drying clothes that had become drenched in our retreat form camp. We dined on Wendy's hamburgers and fell asleep watching cable in the cozy confines of our dry and snow free hotel room.

We were each thankful for our safe exodus from the mountain that day and I'm sure each of us said a special quiet prayer to the Big Man upstairs that night.