November afternoon hunt

I had the opportunity to get out this last week and hike up into the Wasatch mountains for a nice afternoon of fresh air. The haze has settled into the valley this week, keeping temperatures down in the valley, while letting the mountain shine in the sun and warm up very nicely. Tuesday afternoon found my son Trevor and I out on the trail to scout for a few mule deer, take a few pictures and just spend some good quality time together outdoors.

We hit the trail by about 11:30 AM and although it was only in the low 40's when we left our house in the valley, at the trail head we hiked, it was already into the high 40's and climbing! We hiked up into one of my ground blinds to stop for lunch and sit and watch the hill side for awhile. The sky was blue as a postcard picture and a slight breeze kept just a little cool, but considering it was the 22 nd of November, one could not have asked for a better day weather wise. Trevor and I had lunch and sat back to relax and watch. The sun felt so good and by 2 PM, the temperature had risen to the mid 50's!

We watched a couple of other hunters drop off the ridge line up above us into a thick grove of trees, hoping they would kick something out to us, we sat tight and glassed the trees for movement. We had worked on the ground blind when we first arrived, building it up more with dead timber and grasses. We held good hopes to see something as the hunters drove directly before us.

Soon, the first hunter arrived right on the trail in front of our ground blind. Nothing had moved, no deer so far. Within the next 10 minutes the second hunter had emerged with still no deer being pushed out. We had heard movement, but seen nothing but hunters. One thing about bow hunting, you get a lot of looking and hiking and a lot less shooting. We hung tight for an hour or so after they left and then decided to slowly skirt the hillside and drop into another valley with a large bowl on the way out.

As we hiked up to the top of the ridge, it was pretty apparent just how bad the inversion was in the valley. I snapped the picture and if you look, you can see we are in the Wasatch mountain and the Oquirrh mountains can be seen in the background almost appearing to float, as the valley is obscured by the haze. We took a deep breath of the fresh air, snapped a few more pictures and headed on to the valley we wanted to scout.

As we hiked out that evening, we both laughed and knew, we had shared a special day in the great outdoors. A chance to bond, a chance to share a chance to just stop and remind each other... just how special the love we shared as a father and son is. Life is short. Take a few minutes and get outdoors with your children. The experience may be one that they remember for a lifetime!