After a night of brutal storms, 8 hours of rain and snow, we awake to bluebird conditions. Can we get enough coffee and calories to get our legs back under us for the climb in search of ptarmigan? These are the days that test you. Camping above 12k in thin air after multiple climbs. Days…
Battling unseasonably high temperature approaching 80º while trying to get everyone accustomed to low oxygen at high altitude. The bird dogs are managing, even with packs full of gear.
The season has arrived, time for legs and lungs to start firing. Doing a few acclimation and scouting hikes, looking for flat ground, verifying surface water and making sure that preparation for these hikes has taken hold.
It’s the second day of the upland season and I am in a pre-dawn traffic jam. I’m following a string of crimson taillights up a dusty grade and poor excuse for a road. I’m unsure exactly how long the line extends at this point, but we are all crawling toward a pin on a map…
Sitting here in camp staring at these two peaks in Arapaho National Forest. In the last week the dogs and I have visited both. It seems somewhat surreal, not that there is anything particularly outrageous about either. They aren’t the tallest or most dangerous. But the scale is so incredibly different from this low vantage…
I’ve been accused in the past of trying to make every bird hunt a “religious experience.” I laughed it off when first cast. But the truth is, that jab has stuck with me. I’m unsure why. But in the interest of being utilitarian and simple: I set up camp at the base of some mountains…
We all have limits. But that edge is never static. It’s a river that rages perilously close or meanders docile and aimless in the distance. Most people are perfectly comfortable keeping a healthy distance—there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. But there is something about that torrent that is captivating and revealing. What we see…