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Regards,
Old3eyes
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Sometimes I just sit and think. Other times I just sit.
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The best BBQ I ever had was in The Kaimanawa Ranges, central North Island, New Zealand. Smokey camp fire food after the best hunt of my life. I was only 18 years old and was passionate about deer hunting. I was constantly thinking and dreaming about hunting deer, but up to this point in my life, I had actually never seen one. I would see foot prints and droppings, but never would I see a real, live animal. I was starting to think they were mythological creatures that just existed in my imagination. I was hunting with my brother and a friend about March, back in 1980. We were camped out at the foot of Mount Umukarikari, about 5000 feet above sea level.
Our strategy was to watch the bush edges around sunset. In theory, the deer would come out of the forest in the failing light to eat the tasty alpine plants up above the treeline. I was dressed up with a swanndri, balaclava and woollen gloves, but it was absolutely freezing. I found a prominent rock formation and sank down into it to get out of the wind. From this vantage point I had a view of the valley beneath me. At about 200 meters the mountain top veered down in a somewhat precipitous fashion, deep into the valley below. I sat there shaking in the cold, scanning the horizon. The sun began to sink out of sight and the light grew dimmer. After about 20 minutes of waiting the still silence of the chilly mountain air was broken by the clattering of hooves on shingle. Surprised, I looked up. There, about 180 metres away, stood a female deer with several yearling males (spikers). My hands started to shake with excitement. I lined up my rifle, a Lee Enfield .303 of WWII vintage, and placed the crosshairs of the scope on her chest. She was looking straight at me. Before I could fire a shot she moved forward and another group of deer emerged from the forest edge behind her. I could not believe it! I was looking at a mob of about eight deer. This female was obviously the leader of the group, and she was clearly ill at ease; I think she had detected that the silhouette of the rock formation that I was lying on did not look right. I thought if I shot her first, I might have a chance of getting some of the others in the confusion. I squeezed off a shot; boom! It sounded like canon fire in that chilly mountain valley air and the sound echoed across from the surrounding mountain walls. The deer clearly did not know where the shot came from, as they scattered in all directions. Several ran straight towards me, some ran perpendicular to my location, and some scuttled back into the forest. I had spent my youth hunting rabbits so I was quite a good shot with a rifle. In what was just a few seconds of mayhem, with deer sprinting in all directions, I managed to shoot four deer. I could not believe it.
That night was a full moon and a clear sky. By the time I had gutted the deer all the light from the sun had gone but the moon light was very bright. My brother and friend, who were both about 1000 or more metres from my location, came over to see what all that shooting was about. They were gob smacked; this 18 year old boy had managed to shoot four deer in just a few seconds. The three of us carried the four deer back to the campsite. Quite a tough haul, it was.
We got a roaring fire going. Chucked some venison steak, deer liver, and beef sausages onto the hot plate, and let them sizzle away. The combination of freezing mountain air, the physical effort of carrying the deer, and the sheer excitement of it all made me ravenous. Those smoky flavored venison stakes were the best I ever tasted. The next day we spent eight long hours carrying all that meat back to the car. That was my best ever BBQ!
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Most of the posters in this thread are just like chimpanzees on MDMA, full of feelings of bonhomie, joy, and optimism. Fred99 8/4/21
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