Friday afternoon about 1:00 Chris and I were just doing some errands when Steve (Taylors dad) called. His phone was cutting out really bad and he said something about a deer and needing help. We couldn't understand him so he text us. He had hit a deer and needed help trying to find it. We called my mom to see if she would be able to pick K up from the bus stop and loaded up the 4 wheeler and headed out.
The fog was starting to roll in but thankfully it didnt last.
They were down a trail that is kind of a bad one so we took the 4 wheeler just to make sure we could make it down there. About 5 minutes into the ride Chris asked how we ever lived with out a side by side and only a 4 wheeler. On the wheeler we could carry less stuff, we had more wind chill, it wasnt as fast as the side by side and we got beat up a lot more by the road. We froze on the way in. The air was so cold.
Steve and Kelly were hunting together and had gone down hiking looking for the deer. Kellys wife Cindy met us at the sign next to the American Mine trail. Chris and I went down the trail and brought out Steve's 4 wheeler with all their gear on it. They had shot the deer from the area of the trail and it had gone down into the thick towards the bottom.
Taylor was on his way up too and was about 20 minutes behind us. We called him from the sign and he was just getting on his wheeler at the parking lot. We figured we would head over to Little Prairie and wait for him there. I rode Steve's wheeler and we all slowly headed to the next trail. We sat and waited for Taylor so we could all go down into the bottom together. And we waited.. and waited.. and waited.. We were starting to worry since he should be MAYBE 15 minutes behind us. We should at least see him coming across the basin road and it had been 30 minutes. Finally we saw him coming across and when he got to us we asked him what took him so long.
Turns out he got into his wheeler from the lower parking lot and started up the trail, He saw a girl that was maybe 5 minutes ahead of him limping and a guy walking a little bit ahead of her. The girl and guy were riding together on a wheeler and rolled it down the hill just after you pass the first gate. The wheeler had landed on her calf and bruised it pretty good. Taylor stopped and checked her out (she was ok and alive, just bruised up) and gave her a ride back to the truck. Then he went and picked the guy up and shuttled him back to the truck too. THEN he was finally able to head up to where we were.
After he got to us we headed down the trail to the bottom. Kelly had been texting Cindy some so we knew they were on the trail of the deer, they'd jumped it up once more and were trying to get where they could find it. They were following a really good blood trail and said they were 'in the thick down the hill.'
Cindy knew where they shot from so we went to the bottom to see if we could see them.
We hadnt heard any response from them at all since we left the American Mine trail. We made it to the bottom and tired to contact them but no luck. We hiked out to a little clearing and started looking for them. You think it would be easy to find 2 adult men all in blaze orange but the trees and bushes are SO THICK.
We knew they should be on the hillside across from us somewhere.
The view to the west
If you look at this picture the big rock pile in the middle go to the right where the pine trees are and the rock cap is on the hill. Thats about where they were when they shot the deer.
I sat on some rock piles and watched one hillside.
Chris and Taylor hiked to that big rock for a better vantage point down into the canyons.
Cindy stayed closer to me to watch in the middle
You cant tell but Taylor and Chris are actually on the rock pile. After a good hour of searching and trying to contact them Chris and Taylor finally saw them on the hillside and flagged us over.
Cindy and I hiked to the middle of the rocks and out on one of the ledges. The boys were on the other side of the rocks. Chris was yelling directions to them for the best way to come up the hillside. IT WAS STEEP. These pictures do it no justice at all. You can see how Im standing and how the trees are growing.. and its a long ways down.
Chris and Taylor met up with us and we watched until the guys popped out on our side of the canyon. Then they headed down to go meet them and help them carry their stuff back up.
It was a steep down there. One of the guys went to fall when they were walking up hill and all he had to do was put his hand straight out to catch himself. They were walking about 10 feet and having to stop. Steve and Kelly were EXHAUSTED.
They didnt come out with a deer. It had started at where they shot at all the way across the hillside, down into the thick heavy brush that is over our heads and down into the bottom of the canyon. They were following a good blood trail for quite a while and then the trail just stopped. They searched around the last blood for over an hour and couldnt find anything. Some of the places were so thick Steve was having to crawl through the bushes on his hands and knees. The guys looked like hell. We gave them some more water and they were covered in sweat. They were so soaked they had to take off their wet clothes and put some of their extras over it so they didnt chill so bad. It was pretty cold out.
It was 5:45 by this time. They had shot it about 9 in the morning. Finally called us at 1 and they made it back to the bikes about 5:30. Thats a LONG day of hiking through that crap. We loaded up on the bikes and started the trail out. We ran into another decent buck on the way out. Watched it for a while, the shot didnt connect. It was so cold out Chris couldnt keep an eye on the deer through his binoculars because he was shivering so bad. We picked up Steves bike, added another layer of clothes on and by this time its pretty much dark by the time we got to the basin sign. We had a long cold ride ahead of us and finally made it to the truck about 7:30.
It was a long day but so much fun! We were just so excited that Steve called for us to go help him. No better way to spend a night!
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