Hello out there fellow Elk Camp Alums. I thought it would be interesting to hear from some of you about how you set up your Elk Camps. I'd like to hear about your superstitions, your campsites, your stories, your meal choices, your choice of dry camp or by a stream, etc., etc.
I'll start by sharing a bit of our camp.
We have a couple of favorite spots in NE Oregon. Both are at the edge of fairly large meadows. We set up wall tents complete with carpeted floors, working kitchens and wood heating stoves. The wall tents are, in our humble opinion, the warmest, nicest, most comfortable way to set up a cold weather camp. Usually we are at the site 3-5 days before season opener and set up tents and head out to cut firewood for the duration of the hunt. This generally takes a couple pickup loads of Tamarack or Lodgepole. Once the tents are up and the fires are burning it is time to go about the pre hunt rituals of scouting, cleaning, planning, mapping, dreaming and generally just hangin' out waiting for the day we head into the woods to find our quarry.
These are great days. Taking in the scenery, sharing old stories that never seem to get old. Showing off that new piece of gear that ya just couldn't do without. (how we ever made it before, I'll never know). Planning out the meals for the following evenings. (this is important stuff, we usually eat pretty well, and we do enjoy our steak and salmon and yes even pizza from the coleman camp stove oven). We are still sleeping in on these days, because 4-bells comes early and we'll be doing plenty of that soon enough.
You also have to decorate the tents. This can mean a multitude of things, but we enjoy elk tapestries, the carved woodbox, the "what happens in camp, stays in camp" banner, the "hamms beer 'Welcome Hunters'" banner, and an antler or two hung from the rafters, just to remind us what we are looking for.
Well, there is a taste of our Elk Camp. Tell me about yours.........................................
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Time to drop back in on Elk Camp.
ReplyDeleteFor years now, around 25 or so, we have been using wall tents at Elk Camp. I'll never forget the first attemp at setting up a wall tent. We were headed to one of our favorite haunts with my huntin' buddy's dad and and his huntin' partner who was best known for the huge amounts of chili and onions he would consume.
I had an old wall tent that had been my father's. The walls were about 2 1/2 feet tall we had no poles or stakes. The idea was to cut (or scrounge) poles in the woods to set up the tent. Well we set this thing up and rolled a couple logs up against the sides and figured we had it made.
Of course, it starts to rain and we didn't bring any dry wood with us to keep the old sheepherders stove going. So we're out scrounging for wood and moss and whatever we can find to keep the old tent warm. Everything in the woods was soaked so keeping a fire going wasn't gonna work cause first of all you have to be able to start a fire. What we did have was an old electrical cable spool that we were using for a table. We cut up the spool with a hatchet and burned our table.
Well, things got worse. It then started to pour, not just rain, really pouring. Then the wind started blowing, blowing stuff all over, including our wall tent. Now we are soaked, our sleeping bags are wet, our gear is wet, this is just not good!
We grab gear and head to my buddy's dad's pickup camper. Now this is not a large camper and there are already two people in the camper. They gave us a hearty chuckle, considered our dilema, and invited us in. We were pretty cramped, but at least we were able to get dry and finally get a few winks of sleep. We had a fine mess to clean up the next morning, and believe me, we have come a long way since that first wall tent experience.
I guess you gotta learn somehow, but the school of hard knocks isn't always my choice.