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Our latest adventure has taken me to New Mexico to hunt Elk and Antelope with Ashley. Jen wasn't able to take the time off from work, and Krista couldn't miss school so that left me to go by myself. Ashley drew an Antelope tag and I drew an archery Elk tag, and the seasons overlapped by 2 days. I got off the plane in El Paso Texas and it was 102 degrees, I immediately thought maybe I had made a mistake on taking this trip. I hunted Thursday and Friday and then took the weekend and spent it with Ashley. We did a lot of shopping and ate out a few times. Ashley went back to base on Monday so I went back to hunting. On Wednesday morning I walked back up a draw about a mile before light. While it was still dark I had the chance to watch a couple of bulls do a little bit of fighting. It was awesome to be that close to two animals that big fighting it out. By the time there was enough light to shoot, they had moved on up the canyon. I stalked them for 2 and half hours. There was 5 bulls altogether and seemed like at least two were sparring all the time. At one point I was 15 yards from 2 bulls and when they had their horns locked I could hear them breathing. I was in some heavy brush so I couldn't get a shot. It was an awesome experience. I drew my bow back on the biggest bull and held it for a couple of minutes, but couldn't get a clear shot. I finally got a shot and made it count. Tenderloins on the grill tasted very good. 

Ashley came back down on Thursday night so we could head down to look for Antelope on Friday. We had to leave camp really early to get out of the mountains and down in Antelope country. It was hot and dry. We spotted an Antelope about an hour into the hunt, but he was running full speed and not a chance of slowing him down. We didn't see many, but about 11 am we spotted a lone buck feeding. We used my buddy Larry's super secret gunny sack method of stalking up on him. It worked great, to my surprise. Ashley's first shot was at 200 yards and she missed, of course with a muzzle loader 200 yards is a long shot. After stalking up on it again she got a second shot at 200 yards, and this time she hit it. The shot was a little low and farther back than I would have wanted. We stalked up on it again and she got another shot at it and hit it a little high, of course that was my fault for telling her to aim high when it was at 150 yards, and by the time she shot it was only at 80 yards and I forgot to mention not aim high then. But she got her Antelope, and was it awesome to be there when she got her first big game animal. She did an awesome job shooting that muzzle loader, so proud of her.