Stories of latest outdoor adventures never get old

Outdoorsmen are kindred spirits. They share a passion for hunting and fishing, and they love to swap stories of the latest hunting or fishing trip, along with what’s next on the calendar. It’s part of their DNA.
Having spent quality time with friends and family both hunting and fishing over the years, I get it. The stories I recall from 30 and even 40 years ago are still as vivid as the day they happened. They may be stretched a tad by faded memory or friendly gamesmanship, but that too is part of the fun, as are the sidebars.
I still cringe, for example, when I think about how my high school buddy’s old family station wagon — the Blue Flame as we called it — ended up with shotgun pellets in the door and floorboard after a pheasant hunt. What was startling at the time makes for a vivid memory years later, which is often the case with mischievous mishaps and things that perhaps didn’t go quite as planned.
My outdoor adventures have centered more on the game of golf than hunting and fishing over the past 30 years, though the appeal is very much the same. There are unspoken bonds created on those kinds of trips that become every bit as memorable, and special, as the outing itself.
I’ve been walking down this particular memory lane this week thanks to stories written for ANR’s annual fall hunting special sections. Part II appears in this week’s edition, along with entries from our Super Shot Photo Contest. We launched this project three years ago thinking there were many avid hunters in Hamilton County. Man oh man, did we strike a nerve. Turns out there are a whole lot of folks around here who take their hunting and fishing seriously and love to talk about their latest adventures with anyone who is willing to listen.
This week’s edition includes a feature on Matt Griess’s black bear hunt in the mountainous backcountry of Washington state. I was fascinated by that tale, as well as Matt’s passion for sharing the experience and his hopes of one day passing that adventure on to his kids. Just like my interview with Phil Esslinger a couple months back about his big elk hunt in Arizona, all I had to do was ask one question and the story took off on its own.
Over the past three years, either I or members of our staff have shared stories from Dean Klute, Zach Tesar, Jeremy Burgener, Gene Joseph, Dane Schafer, Ed Winton, Jon Bruner and Glenn Obermeier. Each time the trip highlights, raw emotions and vivid details about the shot, the catch and the reaction afterward are still right there on the tip of the tongue months or years later. That kind of interview ends up being as much fun for us, I suspect, as it is for the storyteller.
There are some wonderful stories to be told by and about the men and women who love the outdoors and embrace the challenge of the hunt, from the smallest of prey to trophy deer and massive elk. Listening to them reminds me that whether it’s a tree stand, a duck blind or a golf fairway, it’s the stories, and the people attached to them, that stay with us always. 
KURT JOHNSON can be reached at kjohnson@ hamilton.net