By: Bears Butt

Photo by Addie!

Winemaker and I took Windy’s kids and joined Weasel and his family up for a campout at the Hardware Ranch over the weekend.  The Cache Archers were holding a weekend long 3D shoot and archery golf shoot and we wanted to play.  It seemed right to camp over and be close to the action.  There had been a very slight rain storm that blew over late in the afternoon on Friday, and when we arrived it was just enough to have settled the dust.  It was going to be a cold night though!

What was evident right from the start was all the work that the Cache Archers had put into setting up the target ranges.  They had two distinct coursed of 3D targets set up and each course had 20 targets to shoot at.  Big ones and little ones, but it doesn’t matter if it was big or small, it still took someone to hike that target up the mountain and anchor it down.  Flags were also tied out indicating the safe trail from one target to the next.  That was one heck of a lot of hard work!

As for me, I wanted to shoot in the event and take pictures as we went, what happened was my camera decided it didn’t want to let loose of the pictures that were stored on the disc and so I could not use my camera.  I resorted to using my phone a few times and then relied on two of my Grandkids to take pictures and hopefully use theres.  Most of the pictures in this story are taken by McKenzie or Addylin Zundel.

Saturday morning we began with some breakfast burritos heated over the camp stove.  That little bit of smoke flavor sure made them taste good!  When breakfast was completed we headed over to the registration room to get signed up and learn a little about the rules.  We had never been to a 3D shoot like this one before and were quickly told to relax and enjoy ourselves out on the course(s).  The kids under 11 got to shoot for free and we wanted them to join in on the fun.  Everyone in camp was going to be walking the course and only Winemaker and Hot Spark would just walk to see what it was all about.  The rest of us would shoot.  So, we had 7 shooters in our group.

That caused us to be slow in moving and we let several groups go ahead of us at different points in the trail walk.  It also caused us to watch the arrows as best as we could so we could find them should they happen NOT to hit the intended target.  But, with all arrow slinging sports, the arrows some times have a mind of their own and go where we didn’t want them to go.  Before the day was out, my collection of arrows was down 3 to the bush gods, lost forever, and 4 more in need of various repairs that caused them to be un-usable.  Was it fun and worth the loss of arrows….ABSOLUTELY!!!!  I will know for future shoots like this one to bring lots of arrows that could be “sacrificial” in nature.

From high on the hill you could see the staging area which was the camp and the parking lot.

A prettier setting could not have been made!  Thank you to the management of Hardware Ranch for allowing this to be done on your property.

The range courses were set up with stakes at which the shooters were to position themselves.  There were two different stations for each of the targets, one a little closer than the other.  I’m not sure why they set it up that way, but as time goes on I’m sure I’ll learn.  What we did as we progressed was let the younger shooters, Addy and Chase pick the spot they wanted to shoot from for each of the targets, while the rest of us stayed back by the stakes.  We kept it safe at all times and usually, but not always having the older shooters go first and then moving up for the younger shooters to shoot.  We found that Addy likes a bit of a challenge in the shooting part, while Chase liked to “sneak in close” for a guaranteed kill shot.

 

 

 

So, while Chase liked the close in shots, some of us had to shoot some pretty long shots like this one at two elk down below us.

A shot I would never take in real life with a bow.

So, once we were done with the first course we took a bit of time out for lunch.  Most of the kids wanted to stay back at camp rather than hike around and we had already had a talk with them about the lost and broken arrows.  I only had six left in my quiver that were good enough to be shooting and only two of those I would sacrifice at long range shots or where it was nearly guaranteed to have an arrow break by hitting rocks.  You know how I shoot and the arrow is always at risk of injury.

Well, we decided that Conner, Weasel and I would be doing the shooting on the second course and any of the kids that wanted to tag along could.  We started out with Kenzie, Addy and Chase and soon it was just Kenzie and Addy.  With just 3 of us shooting the course went by quickly and about half way through we found ourselves waiting for the groups ahead of us.  That was fine, it gave us time to enjoy the scenery.

One of these days I’m going to surprise myself by hitting what I’m trying to hit.

When you consider we were each shooting two arrows at each target and you count 5 arrows, 9 out of 10 times it is one of mine that missed.

This is a picture of the parking/camping lot late in the afternoon on Saturday.  Lots of folks were there to enjoy the shooting and the nice weather.

Hey, where are my arrows?

These are the two photographers, Addy and Kenzie, Kenzie doubled as our score keeper!  Good job on all counts girls!

Don’t bother looking for my arrows to be sticking out of this guy.  He was just far enough away I had to elevate a good bit and the cross wind helped move my arrows very far away from the intended target.  That’s ok, I have come to live with it.

I had this buffalo scared!  And after I shot and went down to retrieve my arrows, they were laying in the dirt even with the Caribou I had just missed earlier.  Oh well.

One thing is certain, the scenery was beautiful!

On each of the two courses they have at least one target where the arrow is in grave danger should you miss the target.  These rocks “eat” arrows when they hit them.  Someone ahead of us had one of their arrows eaten and they placed it in the curl of the horns!

I had to look for both of my arrows and lucky for me, they both hit short and glanced into the rocks.

Later in the course were two very long range targets.  The elk was about 85 yards while the white circle was 101 yards away.  I told Kenzie to give me two zeros on my score sheet as my arrows wouldn’t go that far.  We did manage to find two arrows when we went down there to pick Weasel and Conners up.  We turned those arrows into the Cache Archers Club in hopes of someone getting them back.

 HEY!  I hit one!

HEY!  I hit another!

But, the classic for me happened way back toward the beginning of this course.  There was a small bear with his back to the shooters and two red dots up on the shoulder blades.  The object, of course is to hit the two red dots.  Chase says to me, “Hey Grandpa!  Shoot the bear in the butt!  That would be funny!”  Well, it wasn’t because I tried, but the outcome looked like this:

What a fun day it was.  We got a lot of hiking in and by mixing it up with the shooting of arrows, the hike wasn’t really noticed….well, not until later when the stiffness settled in.  I need to get out and do some exercise before the turkey hunt.

Chase is six years old and just beginning to write.  Weasels truck is so dirty, the kids were using it as a “canvas” for their art work.  Chase joined in with this:

Berz But……Close enough Chase!

A fun time was had by all!  Thanks for all the work you did for our entertainment Cache Archers!

Berz But

April 20, 2015