By: Bears Butt

Bears Butt can find some interesting things when he goes looking.  He found this excerpt from a diary from one of the companies that crossed the plains into the Utah Territory.  You too might find it interesting.

Mormon Pioneer Overland Travel, 1847–1868
Source of Trail Excerpt:
Wood, Lyman Stephen, Autobiographical sketch 1901, 55-58.
Read Trail Excerpt:
It was the 16th day of May 1848, my father with his family and that of Milo Andrus, together with many others again left their homes to proceed on their journey to the rocky mountainsWe continued our travels from day to day nothing of special note other than the usual camp duties, until one night while we were encamped along side of the Platte river, our wagons forming one side, the river the other, with several hundred acres in the enclosure thus made, Our stock were all placed in there, so as to secure them from any attacks that might be made on them by the indians.

The guards or sentinels were placed along outside the line of wagons, with orders to walk their beat first one way then the other until they would meet a fellow guard and report to him of any occurence note worthy. It was orders for guard no 1 to cry out the time of night, every half hour, then no 2 and no 3 and so on until the report that all was well went the entire length of the line every half hour. Each successive guard repeating what the former one had reported. The writer of this happened to be near guard quarters where sentinel no 1 was placed and close to sentinel no 2 who passing on his beat came near a wagon where the owner and his family were supposed to be sleeping as most all the wagons were slept in, one nearby was occupied by a man by the name of Gates, who it seems at this particular moment was indulging in a very fierce dispute with his wife, sentinel no 1 called the time like this, half past ten o, clock and all is well, sentinel no 2 who was very near to Mr. Gates wagon, heard the conversation in there, cried out, half past 10 o, clock, and all is well, “except Gates and his wife are quarreling like hell. Sentinel no 3 reported and so on all down the line which was nearly a mile in length. This publicity was heard by the entire camp who were not already asleep, and didn’t hear the cries of the sentinels. This affair caused a considerable amount of amusement for the next few days. Our camp was large there being something over six hundred wagons and when strung out in line of march would reach something like three or four miles.

While travelling up the Platt[e] river when it was thought feasible, in many places we formed two lines for better protection from assault by the indians.

Our travel was necessarily very slow many days not covering more than from five to ten miles.

One of the greatest difficulties we had to contend with, was the great scarcity of wood, we were compelled to resort to the use of the dried droppings of the buffalo, (that had recently passed along) commonly called, “Buffa[lo] chips”

We encountered many very severe electrical storms, thunder and such sharp lightning, every few days at which time the “buffa[lo] chips” became so wet, we had great difficulty in starting fires to cook our food.

It was truly a novel as well as an amusing sight many times when our captain would give orders for all to prepare for camping for the night.

To see women and children leaving their wagons, scattering in every direction to gather the indispensable buffalo chips, some getting baskets full and some sacks full.

Some of the women would gather their aprons full, some in their arms, as long as they could be piled on, many times holding the last piece in place with their chin.

Nothing of special importance transpiring other than the usual routine.

 

Bears Butt

May 31, 2012

Written on May 31st, 2012 , Uncategorized
By: Bears Butt

Dear Bears Butt:

Thank you for your recent applications for the Big Game Drawing.  Your results are:

Appl # Hunt #                                Result
———————————————————————————————————
202096 6000,    ,    ,    ,    Bull Moose    UNSUCCESSFUL
202095 3066,    ,    ,    ,    Elk Bull      UNSUCCESSFUL
202094 1562,    ,    ,    ,    General Buck  SUCCESSFUL for hunt 1562 Cache
———————————————————————————————-

This was the message in my email last night from the Utah DWR.  It looks like another fine Fall of hunting deer with the muzz.

I hope all my friends also drew a tag and can join in the fun and frolics of a fine hunt!

Bears Butt

May 31, 2012

Written on May 31st, 2012 , Hunting/Fishing/Trapping Stories
By: Bears Butt

This could be the best recipe in the world!  I have not tried it, but from the beginning to the end you are only talking 25 minutes.  Do you like coconut?  Do you like macaroons? I like macaroons.

Here is your recipe site!

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/coconut-macaroons-iii/

And go ahead and make up a double batch and share them with the neighbors.  After all, today is National Macaroon Day!

Bears Butt

May 31, 2012

Written on May 31st, 2012 , Recipes
By: Bears Butt

As some of you know, I posted up where I had found a really cool sight for my muzzleloader.  One that would make me the king of the shooting line at the rendezvous and the other shooters would be so jealous they would opt not to shoot against me.

Later in another post I announced I had received the sight.  But was unsure if I had enough time to mount it on the rifle and get it sighted in before rendezvous.  I chose not to mount it.

At the rendezvous it was time to unveil it to the folks most interested in it.  My target was Magpie and secondly Dry Dog.  Both are very good friends of mine and both are accomplished craftsmen of various trades, including gun repair and knowledge of how they work.

My son, Weasel, was there to take a video of my presentation to Magpie and the unveiling of my new sight.  A sight I am very proud to say I gave to Magpie once he saw it.

And for your viewing pleasure:

Bears Butt

May 30, 2012

Written on May 30th, 2012 , Jokes I like!
By: Bears Butt

The National day is a good one today!  National “My Buckets Got a Hole in It”!

That brings a whole lot of conjured up things to my mind.  Singing, Dancing and everything else we do today, and always carrying a bucket around that has a hole in it.

Oh Ya!  I can dig it!

Enjoy your day of holy buckets!  But go out and buy up some beer and don’t cry like old Wilie is doing!

Bears Butt

May 30, 2012

Written on May 30th, 2012 , Uncategorized
By: Bears Butt

National End of the Middle Ages Day!

I’ve often heard about the Middle Ages but never really given it a whole lot of attention.  What does it mean?  When were the Middle Ages?  How did anyone ever figure there was a Middle Ages?  Yet alone, when it ended.

Sir Butt could probably lend us some valuable information because I think that is about when he was around slaying dragons and making safe the paths and roads of Common Ground.  How can I get in touch with him to ask about the Middle Ages?

Oh, Hey!  Here he comes now!

Sir Butt!  Sir Butt!  Can I ask you a question or two?  Good to see you!

Yes!  My good man!  What can I do for you?

Today is National End of the Middle Ages Day and I was just wondering about the Middle Ages in general and if you could shed some light on what it means when someone says “middle ages”.

Well, I’m glad you asked.  If you think about it “middle ages” are the times of your life when you aren’t young any more, but then you aren’t old either.  Aren’t those the Middle Ages?

I suppose you are right Sir Butt!  After all, you are the all knowing one.

Yes you are right!  I am.

In our history books we learned there was a time in the history of the world called the Middle Ages.  Can you tell us about that time period as it relates to mankind in general, in stead of being so specific about one persons age?

If you insist.  There was a time when kings ruled the world.  There were several of them scattered about and each had his block of the world that he ruled over.  In order to keep others from taking his lands, he had to have a slew of knights and servants and a staff of many thousands to keep things going.  The foods of the day had to be planted, cared for and harvested in order for the king to make sure all were fed and kept alive.  Of course the further down the pecking order  the less food you were provided.

As time went on, however, people began to educate themselves and with knowledge came inventions to make life easier.  So eventually, the need for lots of farm workers (serfs) changed because of the way the land was being tilled and harvested.  The kings could then have more food for themselves and did not have to supply the laborers because he didn’t need them.

So where did they go?  They went into the villages and picked up good paying jobs and provided services and goods for others who were gaining freedoms they had never had before.  The kings were beside themselves at first, but then got used to the idea that people should be able to come and go as they wish.  Besides, the kings were smart enough to realize that with trading and travel came funding for them to tax.

Well, once the taxing came into play, that pretty much ended the Middle Ages as they knew it at the time.  Besides, everyone began to think for themselves and created towns and villages and chose their own leaders of them and then came churches outside the way the king thought.  Chaos was what the kings all thought.  They had to give up their knights and their other servants because someone invented what is known as the long bow and the knights riding along on their steeds could not battle against a line of men with long bows and arrows flying in all directions, mostly at them.

You can imagine the troubles of the day.  Poor kings anyway.  But eventually the people took rule and so the true end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of what we see today.  Still chaotic, but better than being a slave on the farm, working for “the man” in the castle.

Sir Butt, you are a wealth of knowledge!  Thank you for the insight!

Right on my fellow man!  You owe me!  I’m off now to do what you interrupted me doing.

Well folks!  There you have it!  Right from the Butt, Sir Butt that is!  Enjoy your day!

Bears Butt

May 29, 2012

Written on May 29th, 2012 , Just more stories
By: Bears Butt

Got back frum the mountains bout two hours ago.  Been ta rondeevoo ya know an it wuz a heap o fun!  Just like always.  This time we dun had sum rain ta deal with, but heck, that just kept us closer.  It were cold too, but then, just kept us closer yet.

We had sum spectacklar shootin, I must say.  Old Edjukateer, he wuz the one what wuz hard ta beat.  He cud thread that there ball round corners I swear, an hit what wuz spost ta be hit.  I think when they wuz through handin out prizes, he dun had hisself a pack mule full.

An fer a real gud time, we dun went on a venture wherest four of us teamed up and went ta deliver up a message ta the fort Cache Valley.  We dun reel gud on that one an had ourselves a great heap of fun doin it.

My captain was Hot Spark an the other team members wuz, Weasel, Trap Dancer an me.  I’m here ta tell ya, Hot Spark is one heck of a captain.  She dun guided us through the most miserable of savage attacks and we dun cummed out the winners.  Well, we dun cummed out winners, but not the winners what won any prizes.  We wuz behind the winners bout …this much….!  Which wuz way close.  Later we dun found out we dun sum real gud stuff an we dun sum not so real gud stuff but we did perty gud.

Onest we made it ta Fort Cache Valley, we had a heap of savages cummin down on the fort ta make trouble sure.  They had one friendly with them, but in our hast ta take out the problem ones, he dun caught some ball shavins an he didn’t make it out with his hair.  But, I’m here ta tell ya, the rest of them savages will think twice next time.  Corse there won’t be no next time fer them.

In one of the skirmishes I looked up an saw this one savage an he wuz lookin right at me an my hawk cummed out and smashed him real bad.  Fact wuz, I dun smacked a whole heap of savages whut dun had holt of a perty white woman in her cabin.  I dun took real gud care of them all with my hawk.

Whilst I wuz taken care of the savages, Hot Spark wuz callin out orders ta the rest ta git fer safe doins.

We caught us sum real fine plews to an we cached them next ta the river real gud, sos next time we go that way, we kin pick em up an take em ta rondeevoo.

Bears Butt

May 28, 2012

Written on May 28th, 2012 , Just more stories
By: Bears Butt

Wall I’ll be danged.  It be a fine time fer rondeevoo.  Kint hardly wait til I git the team an the wagon on up ta the meetin spot.  Left fork o the Blacksmith is where they is meetin this year an I got a lot o fur ta trade.  Ha!  I even got a story ta tell, kin you imagine me wid a story?

Rain an snow ain’t gonna make no never mind neather, cuz it be rondeevoo time an that only comes onest in a while.  Gittin ta see sum folks what I aint seed in a whole heap of a year.  Got sum drinkin ta do as well an them folks is gonna see me shinin fer sur.

We dun had some what didn’t make it since last time, but then none of us is promised even so much as tomorrow.  So, we will be biddin them so long until we git ta that rondeevoo where they be.

As fer me, well, I’ll be gone fer many days, so don’t fergit ta check inta this here spot long bout maybe mondee er tuesdee.

The wagon is pullin out!

Bears Butt

May 25, 2012

Written on May 25th, 2012 , Just more stories
By: Bears Butt

Today I thought I would let you in on a little secret I learned while on the youth turkey hunt a few weeks ago.  Wapiti and I were assigned to assist the cooks, Chef Dave and One Lisa.  We were pleased to be a part of that team.  I learned a whole lot that weekend and so I wish to share one of my learned lessons with you on this site.

This is a recipe for “Breakfast Burritos”, I had never had a breakfast burrito in my life until that weekend and to be a part of putting them together for the hunters, guides and other guests was a real thrill.

I don’t claim to be the quickest of learners, but there were subtle things happening around the cook shack that I did pick up on and now I will share them with you.  Some of you reading this will say “DUH”!  And that’s ok.  Others will say “I never thought about that!  That is a good idea”!  (so there DUH people)

To begin with, you are the master of this creation.  So get creative.  Just because I chose to use bacon and sausage in mine today, you can use whatever you like.  For instance, bologna, vienna sausages, tuna fish, steak, Limburger cheese…it’s all your choice.

If you choose to use bacon, I strongly suggest you fry (cook) it until it’s crispy.  Otherwise your guest (and you) will be pulling out strings of bacon as you eat it.  First off Emily Post would not approve in her eating etiquette book and secondly, it just is not appealing even to a mountain man to see such a grotesque scene so early in the day.  Ok, cripsy bacon!

So here goes:  You will need eggs, meat, cheese and flour tortilla shells (12 inch) and aluminum foil.  Of course you will need a bowl and a couple of pans to cook in.

Plop those eggs in the bowl and give them a good whippin!  Make sure all the yolks are broken, on the hunt, Wapiti missed one.

Did I say CRISPY bacon?

Here I have crumbled up the bacon and am in the process of breaking up the sausage.  The sausage is cooked, but not crispy, just done.  These two meats were my choice for today and they will be put in with the eggs and mixed well.

I’m a lazy guy at times and I chose to use pre-shredded sharp cheddar cheese this morning.  You can shred your own or leave the cheese out if you wish.  Here is an idea, slice the cheese and have it ready to put into the wrap at a later time…good idea Bears Butt!

I plopped in cheese until I felt it was enough.  Who measures?  Go with your gut feeling and then mix it all up.  Next it will be poured into a frying pan and scrambled until done.

MMMM.  Looks good don’t it?  Depending on how hungry you are at this point you might just grab a fork and start eating.  To heck with the tortilla shells.  But I did not do this and so, we will continue with the recipe.

For my meal today, I needed two wraps for breakfast, but with the upcoming weekend camping trip I needed four more since we will be enjoying two breakfasts while at the rendezvous.  I did mention we were going to the Cache Valley Mountain Man rendezvous this weekend didn’t I?

And so, I pulled out 4 sheets of aluminum foil, each about 15 inches long.  Trivia:  When did “tin foil” change to “aluminum foil”?  Answer:  For a very short period of time in the mid 1950’s tin foil was available to the general public, but most of us were very poor and did not ever use it.  About 1955, Renolds Metals Company started producing sheets of aluminum foil, which was a lot cheaper to make and therefore we could afford to buy it.  A lot of folks today call aluminum foil tin foil out of habit.  Most of us who lived with tin foil will be long gone and folks will have to read something like this to even know it existed.  Let’s get back on track.

These sheets of  “luminum foil” will be used to wrap up my breakfast burritos so that while camping I can just lay them on the grill and heat them up.  Coffee at that point will mean more than eating and after the coffee I’ll be hungry.

So now it’s time to heat up the tortilla shells.  You do this because when they are hot you can fold and roll them and they won’t break apart.  You aren’t actually cooking them, just heating them.  Flip them over and make sure they are good and hot and pliable.

Place the heated tortilla shell on the aluminum foil sheet.

Add a portion of the egg scramble.  Notice how I have put it on the shell toward one edge and made sort of a long line of the egg.  Long line of egg?  Well in relative terms it’s sort of a long line of egg, at least it’s toward one edge.

I might add while being instructed by Chef Dave, he never said to put the egg toward one edge, he just instructed us to put egg on the shell.  Perhaps Chef Dave thought we knew about such things.  He gave us a lot of credit, but we had no clue.

Next is the wrapping of the shell.  One Lisa was there to assist us with the proper way to wrap these bad boys up and she taught us well.  I think she could see in our unguided ways we did not have an inkling of a clue as to what we were doing.  And so, what you are about to see is One Lisa’s method.  It holds a lot of credibility and lends itself well to the eating of this meal.

You start by folding the edge closest to the egg over and around the egg.  Next you fold the bottom of the shell up and over the egg and begin to roll the whole thing up until it’s completely wrapped. (Thank you One Lisa for this lesson).

This is the “open end” of the wrap.  And One Lisa went on to say we are going to “guide our guests into eating the open end”.  I did not understand what this meant until we wrapped the whole thing up in aluminum foil.  You will see shortly.

It’s a wrap!

You could pick this up and eat it right now and life would be good.  The folded end keeps the contents all captured up in a nice tortilla roll and off your new shirt or out of your lap.  Pretty cool huh?  (DUH!)

Now let’s save this one for camping.  We will wrap it up in aluminum foil.

One Lisa said to follow the same guidelines to wrap them in the aluminum foil as we did to wrap the tortilla shell around the egg.  So, fold the close edge over the wrap, roll one time, fold up the edge (same edge as is folded on the wrap) and roll the whole thing up.  Simple!  (for you others DUH!)

And to finish off what One Lisa said, “we are going to guide our guests into eating the open end”…..simply fold over the open end of the foil!  How cleaver!

One Lisa, you are amazing!

And we continue doing this until all the tortilla shells are wrapped around all the egg.  These four breakfast burritos are going to rendezvous while these other two are going to be todays breakfast.

As for how to heat the camping ones up well it’s quite simple (DUH), just place them on the grill and heat them up.  Don’t forget to turn them a couple of times and remember THEY WILL BE HOT!

A word of caution….DO NOT PLACE THE ALUMINUM WRAPS IN A MICROWAVE….to heat them.  All heck will occur inside and it will fry the unit up, probably causing a fire, certainly would not be good for the food and your butt would be in very serious trouble.

This recipe is a “Thank you to Chef Dave and One Lisa”!  Both are members of the United Wildlife Cooperative organization, check them out, membership is free and you can join today!  http://www.unitedwildlifecooperative.org

Bears Butt

May 24, 2012

 

Written on May 24th, 2012 , Recipes
By: Bears Butt

Just for your information.  Some of you probably know this, some probably not.  But with the upcoming Memorial Day Weekend we should know that the reason for the holiday is not cooking hot dogs and having a weekend of fun outdoors, it was set aside as a time to remember those who have passed on ahead of us.

The holiday started as a remembrance of all the Americans who passed away during our most troubling of times, the civil war.  Hundreds of thousands of volunteer soldiers and non-volunteers who died believing in what their cause was.

The holiday has since become a time to remember all who have passed on, not just from wars and foreign struggles, but everyone who has passed.

The American Flag always comes to mind when I think of Memorial Day.  With that the name of the person who made the first one…Betsy Ross.

Next comes the “Pledge of Allegiance”.  All of the words of that pledge come to mind, but who was the author of that wonderful pledge?  Most people in American don’t know, and that is a sad thing.  Why is it we remember Betsy Ross, but not Francis Bellamy?

Just something for you to ponder.

Bears Butt

May 23, 2012

Written on May 23rd, 2012 , Uncategorized

BearsButt.com | Stories, Ramblings & Random Stuff From an Old Mountain Man is proudly powered by WordPress and the Theme Adventure by Eric Schwarz
Entries (RSS) and Comments (RSS).

BearsButt.com | Stories, Ramblings & Random Stuff From an Old Mountain Man

Just some of my old stories, new stories, and in general what is going on in my life.