One of the things I love about my job is meeting so many people! I am a people person and I love to talk. My wife has told her friends that I can talk the ears off a telephone pole!

95% of the people I meet on the road are great people and then there’s that 5% that can ruin your day. On my recent trip to the Yukon I had two very different guys I shared my cabin with.

First there was Dr. Shay. He was a dentist from Nebraska and very pleasurable to be around. He was always positive even when his hunt was winding down and he had not taken a moose. Good thing for him is the got a moose on the last couple of days of the hunt! Not only did he get his moose, but he shot a 67″ moose. All I can say is it couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy!

Here is Dr. Shay with his great Trophy!

And then there was John! John was from Hungary and he wasn’t very talkative. When I arrived in camp, John and Shay had been there several days and there hunt was winding down. I moved my things into the cabin and tried to talk to John and introduce myself. He did not even acknowledge my existance. I just chalked it up to the language barrier and walked out. I got to talking to some of the folks in camp and found out that John was the Head of Economics for Hungary and that if his party wins the next elections that he will probably be the next Vice President of Hungary! OK, to me that’s no big deal. I spent 8 years in the Marine Corps Public Affairs. I have served with some great Marine Corps Generals and have even had diner with the King of Norway! This guy puts his pants on one leg at a time and he is no better than me. His position in his country only means that he was born into money.

Over the next couple of days he became a little more open towards me and we started talking about hunting the states. I had found out that he told Dr. Shay that he was scared to come to the U.S. I told him there was no need to be scared, that it was a great country and he would love hunting elk. He asked a few questions about hunting the western states and I actually thought he was warming up to coming to hunt in our GREAT country!

Well the next day things start to go South! He and Dr. Shay were supposed to fly out of camp, but the weather was terrible and they were not able to get out! When I arrived back to camp after a long day of hunting in the snow, I found Dr. Shay and asked him how his day was. Dr. Shay was very upset. He said it’s not been a good day around here, John has gone off the deep end. I said, “what do you mean?” Dr. Shay said,”I was sitting in the cabin today talking to John and John said ‘You know what I think about America? F*#& America!!!!!”

I could not believe it! My blood started boiling and I had to calm myself down! Even though he was thinking it, why would he say it, especially when he was the only guy that felt that way in camp. I told Dr. Shay that if I wasn’t there on official busness I would walk into that cabin and try to shove his teeth down his throat!

Dr. Shay and I took the diplomatic way out of this one. That night after supper we (Dr. Shay, John & Myself) were laying in the cabin. I started a conversation that went with Dr. Shay that went Something like this:

• Me - “I wish I could watch Fox News and see what’s going on in the Real World!”
• Dr. Shay - “Yeah, I wonder what counrty we’re getting ready to handle next?”
• Me - “Well when I was leaving the states I saw where the U.S. was thinking about bombing 1,200 strategic positions in Iran. Heck they said it would only take 3 days to do it!”
• Dr. Shay - “Yeah, Ain’t America great!”

The conversation went on for about 45 minutes and then we went to sleep! Dr. Shay and John had to stay a total of 4 days extra in camp due to weather and John did not speak to anyone after he had his melt down with Dr. Shay. I guess he knew everyone (Canadians & Americans) were very pissed with him and he had better watch it!

Here is a picture of John (Left) and Dr. Shay (Right). Notice how he even closed his eyes for the picture! What a coward! All I got to say is that if this clown is going to be one of the head guys in charge of a country, I feel sorry for the people that live there!

I’m always excited about hitting the road and I love traveling the country filming hunts for your viewing pleasure. But it’s not always the glamorus job you think it is.  The worst part about the job is being away from my wife and two kids.  Believe it or not they actually miss me when I’m gone.  That’s why I try not to schedule any trips longer than two weeks long. Unfortunately this year I have signed up for 2 trips that will be three weeks long. I don’t think the wife will kick me out of the house, but I guess we will find out very soon.

LONG DAYS  - For me, the most tiring part is the long days put in while I’m on the road. We usually get up between 3 & 4 a.m. and do not usually get to bed until 11p.m. or midnight.  A week or two of doing that will wear anybody out. After those trips where I don’t get much sleep I usually come in and “hibernate” for a couple of days trying to catch up on some sleep. The problem I run into when I get home, is that my 4-year-old and 9-year-old are expecting Daddy’s undivided attention. They don’t understand that Daddy has been hard at work while he’s been gone and needs the rest.

The Elements - It seems weather is always a factor when you’re hunting, but my two most memorable hunts have been within the past year. Two weeks ago I was in South Carolina with Ben of Bass Pro’s Next Generation show. We were down there for the opening of deer season. I was very excited about getting an early start this year until I got down to New Zion, SC. They were having record highs while we were there. Of the five days we hunting, it was over 100 degrees four of those days. I would break out in a sweat just climbing in the stand and stay wet the rest of the evening.                            Then there was last Thanksgiving when Allen Treadwell and myself went to Saskatchewan for a Whitetail hunt. The first day was not that bad. Highs were in the upper teens and we sat in two lockon tree stands and hunted the elements. It all went down hill after that.  A cold front came in and the temperatures fell drastically. Allen shot his whitetail the afternoon of Thanksgiving. When we woke up that morning it was -36 degrees and the wind was blowing 12 MPH. That day is by far the coldest I have ever been. We had the luxury of sitting in a box blind with the windows closed and a propane heater. The bad part was that it was 5 degrees inside the stand with the heater going. It was so cold that we had to thaw out our water before we could drink it and basically put our sandwiches on the heater to thaw them out before we could eat. But as Jerry Martin says, ”We were making memories!”

Lugging the Equipment -  The part I hate the most about the job is lugging all the equipment around. Once I load up my pack with spare batteries, tripod, supplies and video equipment I am usually toting around 65-75 pounds. Now I’m no big guy, but the Marines helped prepare me for this part of the job. Yes I have packed this equipment in such beautiful places as Alaska, Canada and Mexico.  It has not always been an easy hike, but I have managed to tote my gear myself with no help and I’m proud of that fact.

The Part I Hate the Most - What I hate the most about the job is getting the equipment in and out of treestands. Usually it is dark when I’m getting into a stand in a new place for the first time. The hunters don’t want you shining lights and I try to make minimal noise. The ultimate worst part of this is that I did not get to hang my stand and that someone else did. These outfitters usually make sure that the Pro Hunter can get into his stand with no problem, but the camera stand usually gets hung quickly and never gets stepped into by the person that is hanging the stand.

 Still, I love my job and would not trade it for anything!