Pennsylvania Game News - December 2013 - 21

and went. And then it was the week
of Thanksgiving.
I seem to recall that it was a really
nice celebration on Thanksgiving Day
with my wife's family, as it had been
two years since we had had the chance
to gather in this way. But, honestly,
it's all kind of a blur in comparison
with the days that followed. The next
day, Friday, we said our goodbyes in
the late morning and con- t i n u e d
on eastward another
two hours to Snyder
County, where we
were able to surprise
my Dad, who hadn't
been expecting us
until later in the day,
on the construction
site where he was at work.
The look on his face said that
he was more than ready to be
back together for an opening
day. We were also able to
take care of some important
business, purchasing my nonresident hunting license at the county
courthouse in Middleburg, and even
at the nonresident rate, it felt like a
real bargain.
On an absolutely beautiful Saturday
morning, it seemed too good to be
true as Dad and I took a trip to Shade
Mountain to scout around a bit. Being that I was the "guest" from out of
state, and had only a few days to hunt,
Dad insisted that I take up my watch
at a location where he had scored on
a nice buck the previous season, while
he would move farther east to the
next gap, where there was also some
promising sign. I would be watching
several well-used trails near the top of
what was locally known as the Boyer
Stone Gap. And, sure enough, as we
DECEMBER 2013

were quietly hiking into the stand,
we caught a ﬂeeting glimpse of a large
antlered buck. A good omen?
Visions of clear and crisp opening days from the past filled my
thoughts, but Pennsylvania weather
has absolutely no respect for the personal schedule of a local boy turned
out-of-stater, and opening day that
year dawned windy and rainy. I can
still recall that I was wet within the ﬁrst
hour, even under my rain
gear. By mid-morning,
the thick fog for which
Shade Mountain is
known also had arrived, limiting visibility to no more than 20
or 30 yards in any direction. By early afternoon,
I had managed to see three
does, but had heard only a few
shots, mostly from the base of
the mountain, probably below
the fog. At 3 p.m., Dad and I
met up and decided to leave for
the day and await the more favorable
forecast for the next day. As we started
down the forestry road, barely able to
see beyond the hood of the vehicle,
we agreed that it might just be a day
to match that ﬁrst day of the season
back in 1979.
As I rolled out of bed on Tuesday
morning and hurried downstairs to
check the conditions, it was already
clear that this was going to be a different day, with a sea of stars shining
brightly in a moonless sky. As we ate
and dressed, Dad and I felt sure that this
would be, in effect, the "ﬁrst day" for
most hunters - at least those who had
the time off work to continue hunting. And, sure enough, as we turned
off of the highway and onto the Bald
21
Pennsylvania Game News - December 2013

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