The next morning we were back on our rock to catch that buck we had seen the night before, but he didn’t read the script, and never showed up. We spent the rest of the morning and the early part of the afternoon putting boots to the ground and still hunting down into the timbered canyons that dropped off of the open ridges. We spooked some deer, but never had any shot opportunities. Once we hit the creek, the steep vertical walls made hiking up and out a physical challenge that had us seriously wondering “do we WANT to kill a buck down here? We finished up the evening glassing the backside of the ridge we had spotted the buck on the night before.
The only action we had that evening was a little buck some bear hunters had kicked out of a thicket above us, and a one of the hunters who walked past us twice, before he spotted us. We both silently giggled at his appearance as he was carrying two rifles. When he glimpsed us he remarked “NO BEAR, NO PIG!” loudly in broken English.
Clearly our evening ambush was a bust. Another long walk back to the truck in the dark by head lamp was followed by a hot meal before we turned in.
