In response to David Peterson’s “The Campfire Philosopher”, Traditional Bowhunter June/July 2012 The Sixth Sense One year in late spring/early fall, after the kids were back in school, my darling wife Gail and I vacationed in Canada. We started in Vancouver, British Columbia and motored east to the Canadian Rockies. Our intent was to camp in the nice spots and motel when in need of showers, etc. Going north, through the Rockies presents photographic opportunities at every bend in the road. We were in no particular hurry, had no particular schedule and wanted to absorb as much as possible, this being our first trip there. Our only real goal was to make the railroad town of Jasper (OK, you caught me. I’m a closet model railroader too.) In virtually every rest stop and at the entrance to every trail there were wildlife warning signs posted. Most of the verbiage was bear related. Food lockers were in every campground and we saw our first official “meat pole” in a camp known as Honeymoon Lake. The device was a log pole erection in the form of a right-angled, upside-down “U” with its legs buried in the ground, armored with corrugated steel culvert so no claws could gain purchase for climbing. Experience has shown my wife to have a real, proven, non-verbal connection with the world around her and our family. I have learned to ACT when she starts talking in that “knowing” tone. Here, my Sweetie was as care free as a child while I took to carrying my Cold Steel Trailmaster (a very large bladed Bowie styled knife)…everywhere. I also began mumbling regrets at not being allowed access to my 44 Magnum or even my boar spear. Let’s just say I was beginning to feel more and more naked the further we pushed into the mountains. We saw medium sized bear tracks and scat, some coarse dark hair in bushes but little animal life to speak of except the persistent ravens. Have you ever been in the wild while being pursued by crows? I swear, they are just waiting for you to keel over so they can feast unmolested. The poor vultures have a bad reputation. Little is as offensive to me as a circling troop of hungry, black, winged’ vermin praying for some unfortunate’s early demise (namely mine). I have hunted crows for sport. I have one mounted for display as humble tribute to their wariness but I am still annoyed by crows following my every move. Sometime we need to discuss my camouflage experiments with crow hunting. Anyway, the scenery was breath taking but I was less than comfortable with my surroundings. I believe it was our fourth day in the mountains when we decided to pull off the main highway and onto a gravel forest access road to search for a place to have a picnic lunch. The road was rough but we had four-wheel-drive, so off we went. Some eight or ten miles in there was a wide area for parking and trail access. The day wore crystal blue skies, mid to upper fifties and very low humidity. We were hungry and set up quickly for lunch. Afterward, while relaxing in our folding chairs, it came to me how quiet this spot actually was. With the radio and motor off, the greedy chewing over and no talking on our part I could hear the roaring of the blood in my ears. Gradually, I was able to discern the sound of running water in the distance but there was no sound of an occasional breeze, no sounds of bird life (even the crows had been left behind), not even the sounds of insect life. This place was quiet! While the impact of the moment was settling over me, my wife turns to me with big eyes and says, “I can’t hear anything!” I suggested we take the trail toward the sound of the water as we had previously found a bit of The Garden in a very similar circumstance while camping in the Colorado Rockies complete with beaver pond, beavers and humming birds. I was thinking of the camera now. She agreed and we repacked the truck and prepared for a little walk in the woods. The by now usual warnings were posted at the trailhead and we entered the forest. I prefer to walk slowly through unknown areas in the hopes of spotting wildlife that I may be able to photograph. Under the canopy of trees, walking on a thickly piled carpet of moss the silence became deafening. I have heard the term deafening before but I had never actually experienced the phenomenon. The sound of the blood in my ears was over-riding everything except the faint sound of falling water. You could not hear our footsteps along the trail. We stopped often to listen and look but never once saw a living thing except the plants. No birds…no bugs…nada. Less than an hour after we had started on the trail I was feeling so creeped out that I could hardly bear (no pun intended) to go on. I looked at my wife and she was pale. Her eyes were as wide as mine and when I said something to the effect that I felt like we were being watched, she completed the sentence. That prompted an immediate orderly evacuation of the human population on that trail! We never saw anything living other than plants but I will go to my grave knowing we were not alone. Maybe a bear, maybe Cucuy, maybe Sasquatch, I don’t know. All I do know is that we were light on weapons and there was SOMETHING out there and I wasn’t willing to find out what. You could blame it all on my personal lack of intestinal fortitude. You could just say I was a 240 pound chicken. That would all be more or less true. But when I see Gail round-eyed, pale and proclaiming another large being in close proximity, I am a true believer and I start packing. Is that a sixth sense or a collection of primordial survival instincts surfacing to produce the rapid growth of yellow feathers? I don’t know. I don’t care. All I know is I am still here and whatever was out there is still out there. Konrad 6/10/2012
