The Archery Project
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The Archery Project
Mountain Madness: A First-Timer's DIY Elk Hunt
What does it really take to leave the comfort of sea level and dive into the unforgiving world of DIY elk hunting at 9,000 feet? In this raw, insightful conversation, Joe Kolaszewski takes us through his transformative first backcountry elk hunting experience in Colorado—a journey that tested his physical limits, mental fortitude, and fundamentally changed his perspective on what it means to be a hunter.
The adventure began months before setting foot on the mountain, with targeted training sessions and strategic preparation. Yet nothing could fully prepare Joe and his hunting partner for the reality of high-altitude hunting, from the immediate physical effects of elevation to navigating terrain that made every mile feel like three. As Joe candidly admits, "You have to be comfortable being uncomfortable"—a philosophy that became their mantra throughout the 14-day expedition.
Listeners will discover the critical gear decisions that made the difference between success and failure, from the unexpected importance of proper hydration strategies to the game-changing benefits of merino wool. Joe shares intimate details about their day-to-day challenges, from coping with temperature swings ranging from 70°F days to 16°F nights, to the complexities of reading elk behavior and deciphering bugle communications.
Perhaps most valuable are the honest reflections on what constitutes a successful hunt. Despite not harvesting an elk, Joe considers the adventure "100% successful" for the experiences gained, skills developed, and the profound shift in his hunting philosophy. His enthusiasm for this more active, challenging style of hunting is infectious—transforming him from an Eastern whitetail hunter to someone who's now hooked on the Western mountain experience.
Whether you're planning your first backcountry hunt or simply curious about what it takes to pursue elk in their natural environment, this conversation delivers practical wisdom, heartfelt storytelling, and a genuine love for the ultimate fair-chase hunting adventure. Come along as we explore the mountains not just as a hunting destination, but as a transformative testing ground for the modern hunter.
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All right, we're back in the game. Joe Kaliszewski, is that right?
Speaker 2:That's right dude, that's like my favorite last name.
Speaker 1:I'm not going to lie, I walk around talking to Joey. I'm like Joe Kaliszewski is coming in.
Speaker 2:That's right, man.
Speaker 1:Fresh, kind of off the mountain. We did a podcast not that long ago, an episode of the show, but you went out West for 14 days, yeah, back country. Since then, a lot has happened to. I mean, we had you just retired, that's right, just retired on the 29th, that's right. And you spend a lot of time, you know, after this massive hurricane that's coming through and helping out there. So a lot going on, man, but we want to recap your adventure out West First time elk hunting.
Speaker 2:Very first time.
Speaker 1:DIY back country rough living from sea level to 9,000 plus feet in elevation. Yeah, how was it?
Speaker 2:It all started with us was the preparation. Talking to numerous individuals, buddies of mine, who have been out west multiple times trying to figure out and not being afraid to ask a question hey, how do I do this? Listen to me, you know bugling. Listen to me, kyle calling, critique me, you know, hurt my feelings, make me a better hunter. Um, being humble with it really is what it came down to. When it came to the preparation, um, I'd say we started working out pretty hard, maybe like three, four months in advance. Every Sunday we'd meet up, shoot our bows, do like a run shoot lift type thing, doing like circuit stuff.
Speaker 1:There's like only so much preparation you can do from sea level. There really is like to elevation to prep for altitude.
Speaker 2:There's nothing that I have found out you can do so I've read a few things on it.
Speaker 1:They say like heat training is really good, but still I just don't think. Because you know, cody, uh, gr Griffin that used to work here, he's at Easton now, you know. So he moved from here, went out. He lived in Salt Lake city. He's like dude. It took me a year. He's like anytime I put weight on my back just running around out there is like different 100%.
Speaker 2:The first day Gabe and I got there, we, uh, we shot our bows, it took us. We, uh, we shot our bows, it took us. And it wasn't a big base camp, it was a six man tent. You know a little pop-up tent. You know canopy, it took us six hours to set that up. Like instant headaches, breathing heavy. We shot our bows. The incline was very minimum, like 10 degrees to walk up 30 yards of incline. I was shaking like breathing heavy, shooting my boat.
Speaker 1:Just to make sure we're dialed in Did you happen to have like track any heart rate or anything while you're there on your watch or whatnot.
Speaker 2:I don't have anything fancy like that to track the heart rate.
Speaker 1:I would just be curious what the difference? Because that amount of stress on the body, you know, trying to recover and sleep through that. If you know what your resting heart rate goes from, here Sleeping was no problem.
Speaker 2:Sleeping was easy as soon as we laid down, I was out, done, um, but just the throughout the day, the day-to-day. It took us, I'd say, a good two solid days to get, really get acclimated. You know, we were stopping every. It felt like every 30 yards. We'd stop for a few minutes just breathing heavy, and we didn't have heavy packs. Our packs were probably 35, 40 pounds max, um, but we'd stop. Kind of just rethink life, like what are we doing out here?
Speaker 1:Like I think that's one of the big things. Man, everybody wants to go out West and I think it's a big uh, a lot of people really fantasize about it. Because I mean, when you think hunting or at least for me, when I think honey, that's the type of hunting I really think about right on the ground, covering terrain, covering distance, spot and stalk, you know, actively hunting, not so much like passively or just waiting. You know that ambush it's. It's obviously two different types of hunting and they both have their place. But when I think hunter, I'm thinking western mountains, I mean you're, you're moving, yeah, you're covering ground.
Speaker 2:um, I want to say, on average, it was about eight to nine miles per day, and then when I say eight to nine, it was about eight to nine miles per day. And then when I say eight to nine miles, it's eight to nine miles up down, traversing, like it's not just straight off the path eight to nine miles, so really I would say that equates to 20 miles and I could be completely out of context with that, but it felt like that.
Speaker 1:Oh, I believe it.
Speaker 2:You know it would beat you down, but I think one of the things we took was a supplement. It was uh like altitude advantage is something basically took five, maybe four or five days prior to getting to that elevation. Um, I feel it helped a lot. I've never been at that altitude for such a long period, but it not once. Just the first day, you know, pop a few Tylenol for the headaches, Um, but it definitely, I feel, helped a lot.
Speaker 1:Really, what is it?
Speaker 2:It's just a supplement over the counter supplement. It's supposed to help with kind of combat altitude sickness. What's it called Altitude advantage?
Speaker 1:Do you have any idea what's in it?
Speaker 2:Altitude advantage mountain ops makes it.
Speaker 1:Oh, oh okay, it's one of the mountain ops supplements, oh okay.
Speaker 2:Uh, okay, uh, that's interesting a buddy of mine had recommended taking it, so huh, I wonder, how that works I don't know if it has something to do with just the molecular like breakdown of the your blood and the transporting oxygen throughout your system and everything I imagine hydration is key in that too.
Speaker 2:For being out there we were probably drinking, I bet, five, six gallons of water a day. Where were you sourcing your water from? From creeks, where are you? We bottle it. We brought, like a lot of you know, gallon jugs, bottles water, but then, on the mountain itself, we'd, you know, get it from the creek with the filtration see that's so cool.
Speaker 1:It was cool, that's legit. Yeah, so you guys did you stay like you? This was was a legitimate off grid hunt, so we're not talking about you. Didn't go home every night to a hotel.
Speaker 2:Our home was base camp. You stayed at the base camp. It was a six man tent which really no bigger than this table it felt like at times, but we had two cots in there and that's where 100% of the time we would go back there. We had planned on doing spike camps, set up one time to do spike camp, just we pulled out so, but every night we were back at base camp. So Wow, Dude.
Speaker 1:So I mean what? What determined where you guys set your base camp up? Was it based off the, the location of where you were able to hunt, or like? Why did you put it the camp where you did?
Speaker 2:when we first went up the mountainside we had preset spots just from east, scouting like hey, this is near like a water source so we can get water. Um, some of the locations were already occupied, so we continue pushing up the mountain. We found one spot. It's going to tuck back off the road a little bit. It showed there was water and that's very misleading in the mountain is you know, you'll see all these creeks on Onyx and they're dried up for the most part.
Speaker 2:Like we went on one day. I think we hit 15 different creeks trying to spike camp and, uh, every Creek was dried up.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's dude, that's bad news.
Speaker 2:And if you don't have water like it's a game over like you gotta have it.
Speaker 1:So how were you guys sourcing your water? Were you, did you have just like a big container? Were you that close to where you could carry it, or was it on your back? How were you getting water to?
Speaker 2:it. We'd have a three liter camelback and then just the filtration system on us where we could refill our camelback and everything.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no issues as far as sickness or anything while you're out there.
Speaker 2:No sickness whatsoever.
Speaker 1:What filtration?
Speaker 2:system. Do you need? I had the platypus. Oh yeah, okay, cool yeah yeah, because they make.
Speaker 1:Uh, we carry some of their hoses and stuff because we do, like the msr dromedary bags, yep, which are great bags, super durable bladders almost like a cadorra.
Speaker 1:Yes, you don't have to worry about smashing it and it busted, so it's a great bladder. But yeah, we use the hoses for them, um to attach to them. So they've got a good filtration system. And and then Joey's got one. What's that called Joey? Be free, it's a. It's super compact that you can use to fill a filter water. It's cool too, man. There's a bunch of good ones out there.
Speaker 2:I think that platypus, it's maybe a leader that you can fill at a time. Yeah, and it's just, you fill it up, squeeze it through the filtration system. Okay yeah, similar concept yeah.
Speaker 1:So that was one of the key things you definitely need when you're out there 100%. Yeah, so that's probably one of the higher up on the priority list. That, and good boots and good boots. That makes sense. So were your boots that you use there? Were they super like a mountaineering boots? Very?
Speaker 2:stiff, it was nevadas, I think. They were like a, the stiffness of like four, I think. So it's the scale go to, I think one to five. Oh, I could be wrong, but they were pretty stiff boots yeah, um was there a lot of break-in period for them not really.
Speaker 2:You know, I did a few rucks prior to just to make sure my ruck was set up as far as height and just the weight distribution, um, but I'll just wear them around the house. I wore them all during turkey season. You know a doing a lot of running and gunning.
Speaker 1:So you have, but you have a lot of experience going into this, so I think that's what people don't understand, right? So you have a lot of experience from your military career. One how to pack a ruck or pack, which is critical. Yeah, right when carrying weight and then a basic understanding of what you need to live out of that ruck or pack Yep, I think that's what some people who don't have that experience like you have, could go into this and end up in a bad situation. Oh, yeah.
Speaker 1:Just because they don't have the experience which and once you're there, I mean, it's not like you can just walk down- the store and get what you need.
Speaker 2:There's no leaving.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I think the best way to explain is you have to be comfortable being uncomfortable, is you?
Speaker 1:have to be comfortable being uncomfortable. You hear it time and time again, physicality wise it's.
Speaker 2:I'm not saying anyone can do it, right, but if you take your time, there's no rush. You're an elk time when you're out there, right, you know solely elk time. If mentally you can push past that comfort zone and that barrier that you're going to get because everyone's going to get it, I don't care who you are, how tough you are, you're going to have a mental barrier and a breakdown.
Speaker 1:If you can, physically and just mentally push past that, I think you'll be successful chasing it. That makes sense, I mean. So one of the things too I think mentally like for like doing anything hard if you just go in and accept that this is probably going to suck a little bit, it makes it a little bit easier to absolutely Excuse me over here dying. Um, so your base camp was at 9,000 feet.
Speaker 2:I think it was 9,000, 9,200 ish, right there.
Speaker 1:That's because, if you guys know us, we're at sea level here or below it in Eastern North Carolina.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That's quite the transition in a short period of time, and we had planned to slowly push into it, try to get acclimated. I think Denver's around 6,000. So we're like hey, we hung out in Denver and most people would probably say you know, do a day or two, we hung out in Denver for a few hours. Um, but you could tell him Denver just at 6,000 feet. It was like, wow, there's different here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we got to the mountain. We got 3,000 to go, yeah. And once we got to 9,000, it was like the air is really different up here, dude, they say so like I was talking to Cody about there and there's a lot of extreme hikers out there, right, he's like. He's like. You notice the real difference. He said over 10,000 feet. I don't know if that's true or not, but he said there's they. He did a couple of hikes and after you hit that 10,000, he's like dude, it's like there's like no air.
Speaker 2:I don't know Cause we went up, we pushed up 10,000 a few times. Could you tell the difference? I don't think so. No, Okay, Um, like after day two, I didn't. I didn't feel elevation was a factor. We were pretty well acclimated. And again, we're an elk time. You know, there was a few times where we're running, you know trying to chase whatever it is. You know whether it's a bear or an elk, Um, but after day two or so, we're pretty well acclimated, Um, and I think our training, our preparation prior to really played a huge factor into it.
Speaker 1:You've got a good baseline, though, too, so you're a pretty physically fit individual, just based off one career and choice. Right, you choose to live an active lifestyle. You choose to actively stay in shape. Um, it seems to me and that was one of my things I knew going into this when we were talking originally I'm like Joe's not going to have any issue out there. I mean, and mentally I know, even if it sucks, he's going to be like yeah, we're here, man, this is it. We've got 14 days of this.
Speaker 2:It's a once in a lifetime opportunity for a lot of people, absolutely, you know, let's gut it out a little bit.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there was no doubt in my mind that you were going to do well out there and excel on the mountain man.
Speaker 2:I didn't realize that you guys were going straight to 9,000 feet though that's crazy, I'll set my hunting partner was a really good motivating factor for me too.
Speaker 1:So what was his experience level?
Speaker 2:Zero, I've never been out West either. Um, fairly new to archery hunting, it's my daughter's boyfriend. Actually. How old is he? He's 20.
Speaker 1:Oh, sick so.
Speaker 2:I kind of always had it in the back of my head Like I got to show this young buck up. I'm not going to let him outperform me, I'll die. And you know, there's times that I'd look back and he's not struggling and I'm like I'm struggling inside but I'm not going to show it to him. I got to show him what's up.
Speaker 1:But that's important, man, to have that little bit of grit.
Speaker 2:I mean, that's what guys do I think you have to have a good hunting partner, almost just like a good gym partner. A hundred percent, you don't want to get up in the morning.
Speaker 1:Hey, dude, let's go. We've got to work out, so I have a really good friend group man.
Speaker 1:Like a lot of you guys, man, all excel in your careers and, in my opinion, are what I would consider more so. Your elite individuals that have done home life, uh, career wise um, hobbies have excelled in all of these different aspects of their life and there's a, there's a common ground there, and it's they're surrounded by those same type of individuals, or better Um, and there's a constant pursuit for more um and just improving in all aspects of life. It's not focused in one area right. The home life is squared away. The relationship with the wife and the kids are good. Their career has always been a stellar career, maybe not, not, obviously not easy, but they've excelled and put in the work where it needs to be. And then again, on the hunting side, you know there's no difference. I see these guys. They get into hunting later in life, maybe a bow hunter, but they excel quickly. They understand where they can turn it on and resources that they can reach out to to really expedite the learning curve and the process, and that's where being humble is a huge factor.
Speaker 2:Like embarrass yourself. I have no problem saying look, man, when I was reaching out to my buddies, like I have no idea how to call an elk, Tell me what I'm doing wrong, what I'm doing right and how do I make myself better, Cause it's only going to pay off in the end it's going to make us that much better as humans, and it just has hunters in general.
Speaker 1:And you've got to be able to look out and see further than these little what's right in front of you. Right, we've got to think long-term and that's and it makes it easier, in my opinion. You're like the goal isn't to be good here, it's to be good for you down the road. I'm not trying to perform here in the gym. I'm performing, you know, in the competition or tournament, or on the mountain, here doesn't matter.
Speaker 2:I don't work out to work out. I work out to be fit for the mountain.
Speaker 1:There's a, there's a goal in mind for it, absolutely yeah, I don't care about being good at working out.
Speaker 2:No, I did that. I did that forever. I did that forever, though, man, you're great at working out.
Speaker 1:Raw strength man, that was my thing. But you know, as I've kind of shifted in my, my life and my goals, you know my training has shifted dramatically too. Don't get me wrong. I still love to lift weights, but there's a different motivation for what I do. So it's good. It's good to get the kids involved too.
Speaker 2:So they, they pick it up early.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure. So what made you decide to go and do a DIY hunt versus going the guided route for your first hunt?
Speaker 2:Um, I mean there's a few factors. One was money. If I could be speaking out of text when it comes to cost, but I would say on average about $10,000 per hunter if you were to go to an outfitter. So that was a factor I'd say. My biggest factor is I've been on guided hunts before and I don't enjoy it the way that I enjoy it if I'm hunting on my own. The reward, even though we didn't harvest an elk, you know we got. We got on several good bowls, you know several elk, we had the encounters. It was the benefit and the reward that would pay off if we did harvest one on our own. Like, look, we came in brand new, not knowing what we're doing, and we're able to accomplish this goal. I think it's just so much more rewarding. So that was really the biggest thing for the, the kind of DIY.
Speaker 1:I personally, and my thought process is similar when it comes to stuff like that.
Speaker 1:Um, I like the idea of not being able to push my failure off on anyone else other than myself, right, Whether it was just it just didn't happen or the preparation wasn't on point, I can't, I don't really have a scapegoat. It's like, hey, man, I know now it's a good learning curve, I know now I didn't put in the effort in my training program in the off season to get where I need to be. Or hey, I should have done more e-scouting or more mountain research to acclimate better. And I can take all that and learn, versus putting off and say, well, so-and-so was you know the reason for our failure.
Speaker 2:It's so easy on a day-to-day basis to just pawn your mistakes off on someone else.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah.
Speaker 2:But if you go into that DIY, it's only you, it's all you. Buddy, you have to be able to accept failure and I don't look at our hunt as a failure. I look at it as 100% successful hunt, like I, successful hunt. Um, like I said, we got on several Elks, had a few encounters with. You know some really good bulls, um, so in my book and in Gabe's book as well, uh, we both, you know, come to the conclusion it was a win, 100% of win.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't doubt that man, I mean one to be able to survive out there for 14 days to me is impressive. Yeah, you know cause? I was talking to some guys. They're like man. Everyone says they're going to go out there and stay for a seven day hunt or whatnot, and after 48 hours they're back at a hotel. They're staying the night sleeping in a bed. Most people don't realize how much effort is required just to live. I mean breathe, eat, and now you got something on your back and you're covering all this unfamiliar off, you know, off the beaten path terrain.
Speaker 2:I think it was day four, gabe and I decided, hey, let's head to head to town, we'll do some laundry, we'll get a shower, and you know, we have to get a hotel room to get a shower. So we're sitting there, we got all cleaned up and it's like all right back to the mountain. And it was kind of it was a gut check Cause it's like man, it's so comfortable right now it's Sunday, football's on, we can just relax, and we're in the hotel for maybe two hours. And we went back to the mountain. And you get back to the mountain and again it's that mental battle that you're going to have. It's like man, what are we doing back out here? Right, we were just in comfort, like we were relaxing, you know, just enjoying the day, but then it's that drive that you have to have. And out West is, I will say, out West is not for everyone. It's. It's a different ball game, it's. It's very difficult at times. There were times I wanted to quit.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know I didn't want to be there. I wanted to come home to my family, but my wife was such a motivating factor I would text her, you know, through, like the Garmin, that. I got from you. I'd be like hey man or hey babe Um, I don't know if I'm feeling this right now and she'd be like you better not come home without a monster bowl. I'd be like gotcha. Oh, now check back in tomorrow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was great. So you know. So she was huge, you know she stayed back home. She was taking care of the house, the girls, all of our dogs. While I'm out there just living the best life chasing elk on a mountainside, she was definitely a motivating factor to help me push through.
Speaker 1:That's awesome man, that's good to have. I mean that makes, I mean for whatever you're doing, to know that you have that stability and that partner at home that's willing to support you, and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:I mean I think that's pretty critical too, I mean for you to excel in any aspect you know, career wise, or your hobbies, or whatnot. It's important, man, you guys can you know back each other when times are tough, yeah, so what was the terrain like where you were at? You were in Colorado. I don't think I mentioned that you were in Colorado, um 9,000 feet. What was the terrain like? Is it, you know? Is it very open? Is it very thick?
Speaker 2:dense forest, um, and then it would open up to Aspens and for the most part, I think maybe your furthest shot you're going to pull off in the area we were hunting was maybe 50 yards, which is crazy to think, because everyone's like I'm going out West, I'm, I need to be able to shoot 157 yards. We'd practice out to a hundred yards, but we weren't going to take a game at anything right.
Speaker 2:There was a bear, you know an elk, at a hundred yards but we would practice that distance. But getting out there it was a lot of straight up and down, you know, traversing the mountainside.
Speaker 1:You know what makes is important there making sure your axes are set correctly on your bow, 100% your axes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like your third axis has to be set. Gotta be man and it's you don't. You can't do it here. You know you can climb up on a tree or whatever, but when you're at that elevation and you're shooting almost straight down it's, it's completely different. Yeah, um, but it was very. It was tough train. It was loose, you know rocks. There was times where I was telling Joey, um, gabe was behind me and when you're going up a you know an incline, that's, I feel almost straight up. All I'm thinking about is getting to the top, like, as selfish as that sounds, like poor gaze behind me, like all I care about is not dying, catching my breath. And we got to the top of the mountain. Gabe's like man, I almost died. I was like when, what do you mean? You almost died. He's like there was a big boulder came rolling down behind you and it skirted to my right side or left side, whatever it was, and I would have never known because all I cared about was getting to the top.
Speaker 1:Oh God, you get to the top. Look down Dude, this dude's slacking man. Meanwhile he just got flattened by a boulder.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but that was one of our big things is, you know, we stayed together. You know, even if I was struggling or if he was struggling, we stayed together because you can only move as fast as the slowest guy and I say slowest guy in kindest terms Right, if you get ahead 100, 200 yards, you can get separated really easily and it's a big country. There was a not to call Gabe out, but I got to call him out. There was one evening he got a little turned around. We separated for the first time this evening to work different bulls and uh, I said, hey, this is where I'm at, just come to me, you know, go to the Creek, start, hit the trail and walk, you know, to the East. And he said, all right, well, I think I'm lost. I was like, oh, that's not good. So I packed up and I went to the creek where he was supposed to hit that trailhead. And I get to the creek, I said, where are you at?
Speaker 1:He's like I have no idea.
Speaker 2:So he was able to send his location through the Garmin and he was 300, 400 yards off the trailhead, like up the mountain. So I said I'm going to bugle like five times just come to my bugle. So it just goes to show like how easy it is to get separated, even with you know gps's and your onyx and everything like it's.
Speaker 1:It's big country there's a lot to consider out there, man, because the potential for something to go wrong could go wrong very, very fast. Yeah, and being level-headed, I think is, is probably another massive thing to consider. You know, when things go wrong, it's the first as soon as you panic, man, it ain't getting no better. Now you got to be able to think on your feet. And the other thing too, man, cause it is. It's so easy, especially in the dark, to get turned around and get lost Once it's dark.
Speaker 2:it's a completely different ball game, dude.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I mean, I do it here all the time I'm familiar with the woods, I'm like dude, what is going on?
Speaker 2:You know you're good. It's like you look at your honors like Whoa.
Speaker 1:I'm not even close. I was off the trail where I was walking out. How did that happen? Yep, I mean and that's the other thing man is, I think, when you're setting up to go out somewhere like this, making sure you understand how to read a map, you know and and read terrain and stuff like that. There's just so many factors to consider whenever you're out there. I mean, just as a hunter in general, right, Just your woodsmanship skills. It's a great way to develop them, but the last thing you want to do is develop them while you're out on a mountain.
Speaker 2:It's not the spot where you want to figure out how to be a woodsman.
Speaker 1:Right, oh man, that's crazy. So whenever, and generally to, whenever we're going back to, we're talking about the terrain, like whenever I think terrain out there. For me, most spot is generally pretty open, is my thought, but the more and more people I've talked to about it, they're like man, no, you don't have it's. There's a lot of spots, it's pretty tight. You're talking 50-yard shots and that's the dark timber.
Speaker 2:We did our best to stay out of the dark timber.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:Because once you get tangled up in the dark timber, it's matchstick just logs on top of logs. All the downfalls. It was day one. We got caught up in some downfall we're working a bull and it turned out to be two other hunters. So downfall we're working a bull and it turned out to be two other hunters. So I know, reaching out to my buddies, and having critiqued my, my calling ability, it kind of worked because we were able to call in some other hunters so we didn't sound too terrible yeah, so we tricked some other people to think that we're elk, but it was matchstick, just timbers like downfall.
Speaker 2:It was nasty and it's super dangerous. You know, because sometimes we're walking on top of them and one slight slip like you're falling down. You know you can impale yourself with, you know, a limb, whatever it is Right, and then to be extracted from there. It's not going to happen. You know, in a matter of minutes, hours, like it's going to take a while. You know, in some of that country that we're in to get out of there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you go in there and roll an ankle or break an ankle or something, man that's we were fortunate.
Speaker 2:We had no injuries whatsoever. No injuries, no sickness. You know, our health was good, um, and we work really well as a team.
Speaker 1:So I think that is more important than anything is being able to communicate with the people you're with and let them know one how you're feeling, and and being able to, to, to work off of each other Well to keep morale high 100%.
Speaker 2:You have to be honest with yourself and you have to be honest with your hunting partner. You know there, there's times Gabe and I would have conversations like hey man, like just not feeling it right now. And one of us. You know we'd pick each other up like hey, let's keep going, or hey, let's just take a break.
Speaker 2:You know we'll just sit up, sit here for three, four hours. Again, you're an elk time, Like there's no rush. Once you start rushing out there, I feel that's when you're getting into trouble Break yourself off right away, and then recovery is like almost impossible when you're in something like that.
Speaker 2:I will say I don't know what it was, if it had something to do with the mountain ops, the altitude advantage stuff. I had zero muscle fatigue for as many miles that we're putting on and Gabe was the same way like zero muscle fatigue the entire duration that we were there. It was very strange. I wasn't expecting that. I don't know if it was the preparation, you know, going out there, you know what we were doing. We did a lot of circuit high intensity stuff, but with zero muscle fatigue, which was kind of interesting. That is wild yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean, and, like I said, I think nutrition and, honestly, probably more hydration are key when being out there. And that's why I was kind of asking you too about if you monitor your heart rate and stuff, because I was reading on an article or something about somebody who their goal was, you know, a target heart rate zone, so like a zone two heart heart rate, while actively moving, so that you're not pushing into, you know, that zone three, four or five to where you it's detrimental and you fatigue a lot faster and it's harder to recover from that. Um, you know, being in that zone two trend, you can typically go for a long time and that's an average heart rate of like for some people I I don't know 120 to 135 beats per minute.
Speaker 2:You know, maintaining that, you can maintain that heart rate for a long period of time, I'd say my average heart rate while sleeping was probably around one 20. Isn't?
Speaker 2:that crazy on a mountain Like when we're chasing elk and moving it. It was, it was, it was elevated. I didn't monitor. I'm a pretty simple guy when it comes to that stuff. I just I kind of get into the zone and I just keep pushing Um. But uh, to have a an average of one 20 heart rate on the mountain for me, I think, would have been difficult.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think, and I think zone two for a lot of like fit into beat. They use the um, the, I can't remember it's. You take your, your age, and you subtract it from two, 20, and that's your max heart rate, and then zone two is like I don't know, 60 to 75% about that, I'm probably wrong. So whoever is out there, somebody will tear it up.
Speaker 1:They'll tear it up, but it's like like, let's call it like your, your zone two max heart rate is like one, 44 or whatever, based off your age. Yeah, I mean, cause I do a lot of zone two training in my heart rate typically stays. Yeah, I mean, because I do a lot of zone two training and my heart rate typically stays. I try to keep it between like 140 145. Okay, um, to build that foundation. Yeah, um, so that especially whenever I was doing like triathlon, half iron man stuff, that would a majority of my my training was that and I noticed it helped build my overall fitness. But it's a long-term game yeah absolutely.
Speaker 1:It takes a lot of time, but you guys were at again going back 9,000, 9,000 feet. So when you were chasing elk and you were getting on elk, how did you guys key in onto the areas that they were? I mean, was it constantly going uphill to get to them or were you coming downhill to them?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so day one we went down the mountain. So we, I think we're averaging around like 8 000 feet and we slowly, you know, worked up back to 9 000 um, and really it's a. It's a chasing game. You have to figure out where the elk are because you gotta think an elk takes one step. It's like four feet were they?
Speaker 1:were they bugling so you could get on them? Or was it like?
Speaker 2:the first day we had a few bugles and I'd say for the first six days after they were pretty active. They're running around, they're bugling, but more so active in the morning, active in the evening.
Speaker 2:So we try to find them in the evening so we could set up for the next morning. You know whether it's a we had like an OP that would go up in glass. We'd, you know, rip out a few bugles. They'd talk back and forth to us and from there just doing a terrain study, trying to figure out. Okay, hey, this is listening off of sound where they're bugling. They're moving Northeast up the mountainside through this Valley. Let's try to intercept them. So you know, we brought some e-bikes out there. Um, one of the e-bikes broke so I ended up having to walk with my e-bike for like six miles Um so leave it on the mountain I wanted to so badly.
Speaker 2:It was terrible. But so just trying to figure out where they're at, what they're doing. And we're there. It was mid September ish, so they weren't fully into the rut like real heavy, but I mean they were talking back and forth. There were some evenings where we'd stay, you know, deep in the timber and they were just ripping bugles. I mean it sounded like dump trucks driving through the forest just knocking trees down. Um, we have some audio recordings. It's. It doesn't do justice for what we actually, you know, we're able to witness in here. Um, but just trying to figure out, if you know, it's a little warmer. Hey, we found all these wallows, let's go sit this wallow. Um, and that was.
Speaker 2:It was a huge learning curve because it's nothing like whitetail hunting. Yeah, you know, the first few days, like I'm telling Gabe hey, we gotta be quiet, we got to kind of stalk through here. I'd hit up my buddy who's from that area. I said, hey, man, that's what we're doing. He's like dude, you don't have to be quiet. Like you can be loud and that's elk are loud when they move through the woods. Like it's not sneaking whatsoever, like you can hear elk from a few hundred yards away coming, you know busting through stuff. So it was a huge learning curve trying to figure out going from whitetail hunting to elk hunting. You know it's covering a lot of ground. You know if the elk were here today it doesn't necessarily mean like they're going to be there tomorrow. You know finding a bunch of rubs. It's not like a whitetail. You know rub line, like they're just rubbing a rub. You know whether it's in their like little area prior to the rut kicking off. They're just kind of. You know their testosterone is building up. They're rubbing trees, raking trees.
Speaker 2:You know know, doing whatever it doesn't necessarily mean they're going to hang out there like right, you know elk are in that area but they're not going to come back like you're.
Speaker 1:You know, stereotypical whitetail kind of his territory so at this time of year, what are the? What were the elk? Are they hanging around like specific food sources, or are they? Is it water because it's earlier in the season, like how we're like? What are they doing this time of year?
Speaker 2:there. I wish I knew exactly what they're doing. We probably would have been more successful in that piece of it Right Um early mornings, like so they're really active early mornings and they're all moving up the mountain and they're in big herds, I'd say I wouldn't say big herds, I don't think they.
Speaker 2:They didn't start like developing their harems quite yet. There were maybe five or six, but they weren't like big, big herds that we were getting on and it could have just been the unit we were in. But morning times are always moving up the mountain. So, understanding the thermals of the mountain, you know, come eight, 39 o'clock, your thermals are shifting Right. Instead of going down the mountain, now they're going up the mountain. So positioning yourself, you know where you're, not in that direct line of the thermals so they can sense you. And then in the evening they're coming down the mountain. So trying to figure out where you can set up to intercept them and then really just trying to piss a bull off. You know whether it's, you know, just being super aggressive with your you know your bugles, or if it's you know being quiet.
Speaker 2:You're raking trees. You're trying to get in front of them. It's really. It's a. It's a game of chess. I don't know how to play chess Right, I'm more of a checkers guy, but it's a game of chess, trying to figure out how to be smarter and you know, outmaneuver the elk and get in front of them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, that makes sense. So what was the weather like when you were there, cause 14 days, I'm sure shifted quite a bit.
Speaker 2:In the daytime is around like seventies evening, no drop down. I think. The last night it was 16 degrees. Oh man, it was a huge drop. It was a huge drop. And the thing that was difficult is you know you'd sweat throughout the day, get back to base camp and your stuff's not going to dry overnight. So having enough clothes, you know, your backup clothes, whatever you want to call it for the next day, so you can put your wet stuff out during the day so it can dry. So having a good quality gear, a lot of like merino wool stuff, kuyu sitka, you know crispy. I think they make really good gear. That was you have to pay upfront for it, but it's 100% worth it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think. I think anybody that's really done any kind of hunting understands that, though Like it's an investment right. So the equipment you get from the bow you buy um to the, the undergarments, uh, it's. It's a long-term investment and with that comes quality and longevity of gear as well, so that gear is designed to last, uh, hold up. And it's like you're out there hunting with the hoyt, uh carbon bow, right, yeah, so hoyt, known as one of the most durable bows on the market. What do you have an rx7?
Speaker 2:yeah, rx7 and it got beat up yeah, man.
Speaker 1:Um, but you know you can count on that, that bow, that bill, to hold up with what you're doing, unless you like, fall down the mountain.
Speaker 2:There were times when we did yeah, well, you know, we ran one over with a truck and that's the Hoyt plug, right there.
Speaker 1:Right, so great bows man, but yeah, the it comes back to and I even, whenever I just go out of state to like Kentucky, right, I like having the confidence in my equipment. That is not going to be the reason I fail on my hunt or whatever I'm doing, cause the last thing you want is equipment failure versus, you know, you just screwing it up a hundred percent.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm not saying you can get by cheaper. You know stuff lower quality, um, but it's the way we looked at it, gabe and I. Is why not make that initial large investment for a hunt of a lifetime?
Speaker 1:Like you said.
Speaker 2:I don't want to go out there and fail because my equipment failed me.
Speaker 1:You know, I want to fail because I failed my equipment, my, my site doesn't have a third access level on it, something like that. Yeah, I'm. I'm on board with that, a hundred percent man, especially if it's something I'm seriously into and I'm going to invest. Cause you guys drove out there, we did. It was how many hour drive? I think it was 28, 28 or 29 hours. 28 hours away from home on the road, 14 days in the back country, another 28 hours to drive back. I mean, that's a long time away and an unfamiliar territory country with. You don't know if you have a bow shop that you can just roll up to and get your bow fixed.
Speaker 2:It was let's just hope nothing breaks and if it does, we had each other's bow for backups where I could shoot. You know Gabe could shoot mine type you know set up, but there's nothing out there as far as you can bring that the minimal things you know to fix whatever it is that you know set up, but, um, there's nothing out there as far as you can bring that the minimal things you know to fix, whatever it is that you know issue you have, but I'm not. I'm not a huge bow guy. You know you guys doing my bow work.
Speaker 2:So, I kind of just rely on you guys to set everything up perfectly, and I go with that.
Speaker 1:Let it work. Yeah, man, I hear you. So as far as looking at it now, I mean, what were like the biggest hurdles that you had while you guys were there, that you had to adapt to that you, that were maybe kind of unexpected. Was there anything that really comes to mind?
Speaker 2:Uh, I'd say food was one.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I went out and this was like a few weeks prior, sitting down with my wife and she's really big into fitness and nutrition. So she's like, babe, like you need 3,500 calories minimum, maybe 4,000 a day, and I was like, yeah, I agree. So I'm like going out buying all these different you know snacks, we're done. You know we had, uh, what are the meals that you got here? Peak refuel, peak refuels, you know, with the peak refuel meals. Um, but getting out there, I bet I ate half of my meals. As far as I'd have a bag set up Like this, one was set up for 3,500 calories I'd set one up for 4,000 for like a spike camp type thing, and I'd come back to camp with maybe like a thousand calories left in that bag after a day hunting. So I didn't eat as much as I thought I would.
Speaker 1:It's due to cause you won, you weren't hungry or you just didn't have the time or you didn't eat as much as I thought I would have Due to, because one you weren't hungry, or you just didn't have the time, or you didn't make the time.
Speaker 2:I wasn't hungry. I almost had to force myself to eat and I knew it was important because you need that caloric intake to keep moving. But I wasn't hungry. I drank a lot of water, but as far as the food intake, it was a lot different than what I expected. So for future wise, I probably could cut, you know, some weight down, not packing as heavy when it comes to the food, did you?
Speaker 1:do any? I mean, you say you do the peak refuel meal meals. Did you do any like, um, like what was your other like substance that you were eating? Was it like just like nuts and a lot, a lot of like nuts?
Speaker 2:berries? Um, there are some, uh, what is it called?
Speaker 1:It's like the little peanut butter packets.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Um the sandwiches, no, it was like the actual. I can't think it's got like a, it was like a hazelnut peanut butter.
Speaker 1:Oh, I know what you're talking about.
Speaker 2:Okay, so just calorie dense, just really calorie dense, and trying to find meals high in protein.
Speaker 1:High protein high fat.
Speaker 2:And then you got to have your lickies and chewies. You know just to kind of, you know a little, pick me up when you're feeling a little down. We had these little. What were they? Like apple pie little, like little debbies. Okay, yeah, if I can make one recommendation to any elk hunter going out, get those little apple pie, little debbies.
Speaker 1:man, dude, they make one recommendation to any elk hunter going out, get those little apple pie little debbies. They were money like when you're feeling down man or or, and then you get a little bit of something that that can really boost morale and yeah, you know improve the hunt. Like oh man, I'm back in the game, let's go yeah oh, that's funny, man. So food was a a massive one. Um, is anything else that really?
Speaker 2:uh, for as far as electrolyte replacement, I'd get the, the PDA light, I think it was like the 33% more electrolytes, like the enhanced one. Um, every time I would drink out of my Nalgene I'd had, you know, throw one of those in there. So really trying to increase my, just the, the electrolytes that I'm taking in Cause I mean, you're burning them at the cyclic rate.
Speaker 1:So what about? Um? So there's another good one besides those it's called element LMNT. They make a really great hydration packet. Okay, Um, so I I like those personally. Um, it's just high sodium, high magnesium, high potassium and that's huge.
Speaker 2:Yes, yeah.
Speaker 1:Massive. Um dude, what was the other question I was going to ask you? Oh so, one of my major concerns with like going out and you have a ton of experience this is the medical side of things. Did you have any prepped like med?
Speaker 2:kits we did, um, so I care, I call it like a blowout kit. So I had a few tourniquets in there, um, some sutures in case on Yanni emergency with that, some super glue stuff. Um, I actually had a few prescriptions to treat combat altitude sickness. Um, we didn't have to take it, fortunately. Um, so that was good there. But just trying to think like the immediate, like first aid, what would we need if something bad were to happen? Like it wasn't a big kid, it was, you know, a small little, almost a fanny pack full of things. You know, I had some Benadryl, motrin, tylenol, things that you know you can use preventively, like right away type thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, one of my things too is like for rashes, so like Benadryl one any um and obviously some some pain reliever stuff, but also for like stomach issues.
Speaker 2:So we had a bunch of tomes. I carried some tomes on us, some like gas sex stuff, um cause I that's. What I was worried about was abdominal issues like GI issues.
Speaker 1:That is my number one thing, cause that'll turn things South quick, because you go from your standard diet right Like you eat a pretty you have. For me, I have a pretty regimented diet that I find when it's just the way I eat, um, and then you go to like ultra processed peak refuel meals and stuff like that You're. You know you're asking for intestinal discomfort.
Speaker 2:I luckily. Fortunately I didn't get constipated.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So it was as far as GI issues. I didn't really experience any. Gi issues. You're urinating a lot more because you know you're at altitude, so, and then you're also. You know you increase the water intake, so but that's an easy fix there. Yeah, that's smart.
Speaker 1:I think people got to consider that too, like medical wise, and we're not talking like chest seals and stuff like that. We're talking about like the stuff that you could use on a daily basis. You know your, your everyday stuff. I think people kind of tend to overlook some of that. From some of the medical kits that I've seen people put together like, oh, I got all the tourniquets and you know I could do this, this, this and this. I'm like man, what happens if you get a bellyache?
Speaker 1:Exactly, you know or you get athlete's foot or something for being in a boot, and that's huge.
Speaker 2:Take care of your feet, take care of your feet if your feet go south like that's it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm on board man. Good socks, dude. Yeah. So marina wool I don't care what anybody says base layer, that is the go-to 100 smart wool darn tough. You named a couple brands. Yeah, there's some really great ones out there. It's an investment, but but it is. It doesn't stink.
Speaker 2:That's it was. I was blown away. It's amazing. I kind of tested it during turkey season. I wore the same pair of crispy socks five days in a row. I was like there's no way you don't get that funk that builds up in them at all. There's no smell whatsoever, like your feet are comfortable. They they feel wet kind of, but they're not wet it's. It's very hard to explain unless you actually wear them and try them out. Like I am hands down a believer of Marina wool A hundred percent, man it's so.
Speaker 1:It got me a year or two ago, cause I've always wore like synthetic stuff. Synthetic stuff stinks man.
Speaker 2:Instantly, within the first day it's done, just get rid of it. Can't wear it again.
Speaker 1:But I spent like five days or six days I camped out in Kentucky by myself and just hunted a whole week alone.
Speaker 2:Um, and I had Marina wool I could wear the same thing every day and it feels clean when you put it on, it feels clean and it I don't.
Speaker 1:It keeps you warm. It'll keep you cool if you're hot. I mean it's it's wild how it works, but it works well. If there's one thing I could recommend, anybody invest in absolutely that over anything.
Speaker 2:I had a buddy say hey man, I brought two pairs of socks and two pairs of underwear for a 10 day hunt. I was like no way, I brought seven socks, seven underwear and I think I used two pairs. You don't have to change it.
Speaker 1:It's unbelievable man.
Speaker 2:I was blown away at the fact that I'm like this has got to smell bad. It doesn't.
Speaker 1:It's incredible, yeah, incorporate in your everyday life, man.
Speaker 2:There you go. Way less laundry yeah.
Speaker 1:All right, so as far as. So the next thing I've kind of got is the most important pieces of gear like that you've considered, that you maybe didn't think about or you knew going in like this is going to be vital to what we're doing in order for us to sustain ourselves out here Is there a couple pieces of gear kit that you aside from your bow, obviously.
Speaker 2:The boots are big. Yeah, like I said, we talked about the crispy boots, and I'm not saying crispy, but just a good mountaineering boot, something that gives you ankle stability, something that you can wear for 15 hours a day and your feet are good. Um, a ruck is very important. I brought two different rucks. I had a kuyu 6000 and then a sitka, I think 2800, and I used my 2800 the smaller of the rucks for the majority of the hunt.
Speaker 1:It was 2,800 cubic inch.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And you said the other one was 6,000. Oh wow, so huge different time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the 6,000 was mainly primary, like for my, my spike camps, if we're going to go out, and I think that was averaging about 45 to 50 pounds. When it was loaded out for a few days with the Sitka pack it was, I'd have water, I'd have, you know, one day's meal in there, you know some warming layers and that was really it.
Speaker 1:so we packed pretty light and would you carry that pack with you every time you went out?
Speaker 2:every single time okay, like, and I I would make sure to not put my pack down like, hey, I'm gonna set my pack down and go check something out. I think no, like there's. You hear too many stories of guys setting their pack down hey, I'm going to go, you know, work this bowl or go check this out, and then they lose their pack. So, like you have to live with your pack on.
Speaker 1:That's a good point.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's a lot of guys that you hear stories man.
Speaker 2:Like hey, you'll see my social media, I've lost my pack. It had like $10,000 worth of, you know, optics and all my gear in there. So always keeping your pack on and you get used to it, it becomes part of your body really. So having a good pack warming layers was big, you know. And having warming layers that are easily accessible, like to strip off, like I had three 30 Moreno wool like three quarters zip, where I could just, you know, drop my trials and just unzip them. I don't have to take my boots off, throw them in my pack. Having like a nice puffer jacket and this we weren't there like extreme cold, but it was in the teens, you know sometimes. So as far as other gear, I mean I you could do everything with with that?
Speaker 1:Yeah, did you have. I mean with your approach, with it was and with everything you put on you or took with you, was it to serve multiple purposes? Like if it didn't solve multiple purposes, I'm not taking this. Or were you trying to like? I want to be comfortable, so I'll carry a little bit extra.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, we both had jet balls. I carried a jet ball, we didn't. You don't need two jet balls hunting a team.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Um, but I, I definitely I would pack a little extra just so I'm comfortable. It's worth it. I'm not gonna, you know, deplete myself of something just to save a few extra pounds or ounces. Um, and knowing that we're coming back to base camp every evening, it wasn't so much of a thought like, hey, we've really got to cut weight because we're going 15 miles back, we're not gonna be back for a few days. Um, so I wasn't really focused on on my pack weight. Honestly, the first night we set up we were kind of unsure of what to bring because we really, you know, our first night out, first day out, we're like, ah, I don't know if we're gonna need this. So we brought a little extra, we brought two meals instead of the one, Um, so a lot of trial and error and figuring out what best works for you. That makes sense.
Speaker 1:I mean, I, I would probably personally err on the side of caution when it comes to. I'd rather have be safe than sorry when it comes to something like that, just not knowing what I didn't know. And I'm out there and you know, and it turns out I'm, you know I'm off, you know that little secondary camp or spike camp or whatever and I don't have enough food or water. You know that could be potentially catastrophic.
Speaker 2:And you find your. Your creeks are all over on your map and every single one you find is dried up. So that was the last day where we're like, oh man, we were going to set up spike camp and we pushed about 10, 15 miles back and it's just every creek that we'd come to was dried up. So we ended up pushing back to base camp that evening. Jeez, it can be scary at times too.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You hear some strange noises at night. Did you guys run into any mountain lines or anything? No, mountain lines. We had a, a, a big bear, I'd say. The black bear was maybe like 300 on the first day. He's about 80 yards. Um, gabe saw him first and then we started chasing after him cause we had a bear tag we're unable to get on them. And then it was day three or four, there was a cow carcass that a cinnamon bear was on and we're able to kind of maneuver on that bear. Gabe was able to get within like 30 yards and one more step of this bear would have stepped out. He would have been able to get, you know, kill the bear. But, um, no mountain lions.
Speaker 1:Really there's more bear in this area eastern north carolina, than there are in the mountains in colorado yeah, I mean people come here from all over to hunt bear in Eastern North Carolina, especially like Hyde County, like that's like the Mecca for black bear.
Speaker 2:Like last night I was hunting, I had two big black bear come into my stand. That'll frustrate you, yeah.
Speaker 1:Me and Gavin were out and we were hunting a couple of weeks ago my son and you know we had a big black bear come right up to us. I was like, well, that was cool, gap. He was like, oh, that's awesome.
Speaker 2:November 11th, he won't be there. Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1:That's right. Yeah, that's funny man. So I think one of the other key takeaways that people might not consider is you can have all this cool fancy gear, right, you can have anything and everything you ever wanted, but it is not to make you the hunter that you think it might. I think people get carried away with that and you know we're we're a shop, right. My job, my whole life, depends on selling gear and selling quality gear. But before that, we'll sell people the hey, you might not need that. You might. You probably need to be efficient with what you have, or you know, this does make sense for you, because the last thing people need to do is go and buy all this stuff and then not know how to use it how to implement it.
Speaker 1:Um which I think you see more and more people like to buy fancy stuff and they can have everything and it turns out the gear doesn't make you a hunter. Gear does not make you a hunter.
Speaker 2:Um, you said you can have the fanciest, the best top of the line equipment. Make you a hundred. Um, you said you can have the fanciest, the best top of the line equipment. It's what you put into the hunt and what you invest into it to uh, you know, whatever your definition is of successfulness is what it will come out to be. Um, you could go out there with the baseline stuff and still be successful.
Speaker 1:Dude's been doing it forever, man, absolutely. They've been killing and being, you know, like you say, ultimately successful with the bare minimum. Yeah, uh, I would recommend a tuned bow, though.
Speaker 2:A hundred percent. I went through a broadhead battle, Did you um, trying to find a fixed blade that shot really well.
Speaker 1:Did you have to shoot fixed blade out there you can shoot mechanical, but just again again. Well, I I know your struggle because you shoot such a high poundage bow yeah because how fast is the bow shooting?
Speaker 2:I think it's right like 287. Oh, that's not bad, so it's not terrible, it's not.
Speaker 1:Some of these guys are shooting bows that are so fast that they shoot so fast. It's hard to tune with a fixed blade.
Speaker 2:Oh no, yeah, mine, it's, that's I'd say it's a, that's a sweet, a good speed, yeah, but just figuring out, and from zero to 50, I get a lot of heads that fly true, but there is always, you know, I'd go to 80, and I'd get a little deviation and I just want to perfect that. And again, that's just coming down to the pre-gaming of it. Like, I want perfection because I don't want to blame anything on my equipment. Would I have taken a shot at 80? Probably not, because I wouldn't have that opportunity. But if it presented itself and I felt confident the elements were there, I would have tried to execute that shot. So, trying to figure out what blade flew the best for me and it was actually, it was a grim Reaper the micro hates for blade.
Speaker 1:Oh nice.
Speaker 2:So, and unfortunately I didn't get to use it yet, but we'll see how it does on a whitetail around here. Yeah, if it would ever cool down here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, still mosquitoes out there eating us up. Yeah, I think, going back to it, man, I think more people can do with what they've got, do more with what they've got than what they realize Absolutely. And if that comes down to taking care of your equipment and stuff, making sure your bow's tuned and set up correctly, but for there, yeah, and investing in a few key pieces and then putting more emphasis in maybe time, money and energy and learning you know, your woodsmanship skills, we harp on it on time, right?
Speaker 1:Everyone says it but, I mean it's, it's literally the key to being successful 100%, there's nothing else is going to do it. Um, yeah, I think it's important you talk to any guys that are successful and that's their focus, man, after you get into it. And, yes, you will continue to upgrade things that you need or that might make things a little bit easier, but you don't got to spend an arm and a leg to get into this there was a lot of gear that we purchased that we didn't need.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was what's that? Solar panel, the dark energy.
Speaker 1:Dark energy.
Speaker 2:I got one of those. Didn't end up needing it, so how'd you charge your stuff? I just had a dark energy like solar pack.
Speaker 1:The battery pack.
Speaker 2:Dude, those things are awesome, it was great, and we brought a generator. So we had a small generator at base camp so we'd get back. You know charger, you know garments charge the phones and everything. Now, if you're in a spike camp it might be more beneficial to have something like that, but I found you don't need all the high speed stuff and again, it's just extra weight. Ounces or pounds and pounds are paying when it comes to whatever it is you're doing out West. So there's a lot of things that we easily could have got away with not having out there. Right, that makes sense.
Speaker 1:But if you need stuff, go to Extreme Outfitters Absolutely.
Speaker 2:We're here for you.
Speaker 1:I probably I get told more times and not like you're a terrible salesman, I'm like man, I'm trying to listen, I'm building trust here, Like I'm not going to sell you what you don't need and you don't let's, let's be real man. You don't need it, you don't work with what you got, absolutely. Throw a little bit of paint on that thing and let it ride, man.
Speaker 2:It'd be all right. I mean, I shot my RX one, I think, for four or five years and never once. I come in here and you'd pressure me. You need to upgrade that, but I never will, man.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think it's important, man, not because if you want to buy it, dude, by all means I'm here, let's do it. But you know, not everyone wants to spend all that money on something when they don't need it. Like you know, I'm a casual hunter, bro, you don't need to spend, you know, 2,500 bucks, get good at what the gear that you have be proficient with it, yep.
Speaker 1:Spend your money on a hunt. Exactly, that's sick, that's dude. Hopefully one day I can get this place where I can get away man and go for a couple of weeks dude, I'm looking forward to it. You know, fingers crossed sooner than later.
Speaker 2:Start putting in for your points for other States too.
Speaker 1:No doubt I got to do something. I'll get them, and then it'd be my time.
Speaker 2:They're like ah no we can't go short staffed again. Uh, so what gear? Is there any gear that you didn't have, that you wish you would have had? Anything that comes to mind that I wish I would have brought my camera? Oh yeah, um, but I was so focused on just being good at what we're trying to do that you weren't doing it for the, you weren't doing it for the gram.
Speaker 1:No, I don't have it for the social media. I don't have any social media. That's your problem, that's why you weren't successful.
Speaker 2:I just I wish, cause there was moments that I could have captured with the camera.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, I was 20 yards from a five point. It was a monster bull and he's just ripping bugles and I'm talking back and forth with him and if I could have captured things like that, you know, I think I would have made it I'm not saying that much better, but the memories would have lasted a little bit longer, Just having that to kind of look back on and looking at mistakes that we made too. So maybe a good camera, I just I didn't want to. I brought it, I just didn't bring it out in the mountain with us. As far as other gear, I really can't think of anything off the top of my head. That's good man. That's a solid.
Speaker 2:I was concerned with the Garmin. At first, like gabe and I, were having issues sending and receiving messages, but after like two days, I don't know if it kind of so when satellites rearranged were you having trouble because we communicated quite a bit on the mountain um were you having?
Speaker 1:was it when you were in the canopy that you were having issues?
Speaker 2:It was any time that we were under. Basically, if we'd get up to our OP, which was at about 10,000 feet, we could use our actual cell phone. Any other time you had to use your Garmin through your cell phone and sometimes it would take hours for a message to deliver or for messages to come through. So it wasn't so much the canopy, I think, it was just more of like I don't know how cell towers work, but it's more line of sight in that area. Okay, so having that was a.
Speaker 2:It was good and bad. Right, it was good because we were completely almost disconnected from everything and we're able to really focus on the hunt and just being on the mountain. Bad in the case of, if something were to happen, gabe, he has his own business, so he was trying to you know, oh yeah, communicate with you know his business back home. You know he was looking into other businesses. You know future buys and stuff, so that was difficult. So we'd you know there'd be times where we plan, hey, let's go up to op so you can send out these emails, take care of you know work right so that's not a distraction, know for the rest of the day, type thing that's solid.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I think too. Going back to the camera things a double-edged sword, right? Um, because maybe if you had that camera while you were with you, you could have screwed up your encounter, or stuff like that. Because I look at it, people are like, oh, you know you should record hunts and I'm like, oh, that'd be great If I hunted more. Yeah, maybe you know I had more opportunity. That would be awesome and you know it's, it's on my mind. I'd love to. It's a project I'd like to stand up with. I get a bunch of guys together and we do these filmed hunts. I think it would be a great, another aspect to what we do with our social media stuff. But at the same time I look at it, I'm like, man, I'll be honest, when I go out in the woods I spend so much time working and on a computer and writing and all these things. It's like the best disconnect. So if I know, if I had a camera. It's just one more thing I got to think about. It's difficult.
Speaker 2:It is very difficult. This past turkey season I carried a camera the entire turkey season.
Speaker 1:I probably have hours of footage, but I don't know how to edit footage, so I don't have the editing software.
Speaker 2:So I have all this footage and it's great footage, but then it's taking that time to sit down, you know, to edit through everything and I'd rather be in the out in the woods hunting yeah you know, getting other individuals my wife, my girls, whatever buddies on you know, birds or animals. So, having the patience, and I'm not there when it comes to the filming thing, yeah, um, it's definitely a whole.
Speaker 1:Adds another whole, nother dynamic to what you're doing out there.
Speaker 2:And it's. It's not a big camera, but it's an additional piece of gear up in the tree, whether you're on your like a little apparatus arm or something like. It's more of a signature for you know to pick up movement.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, absolutely, I'm with, I'm on board with that. So favorite part of the trip is there anything that sticks out in mind? That was like man, this, this point right here made it all worth it.
Speaker 2:I'd say the my favorite part of the trip was I've wanted to do this for the past 20 years. Yeah, I think I've always wanted to do it. Um, my good buddy kip. He's always very encouraging when it comes going out west. He goes out every year. You know he's been begging me to go. I just with work and everything I wasn't able to. So just going out there and experiencing that type of hunting was a game changer. Yeah, like it's just.
Speaker 2:It's a different world there like you're so disconnected from everything back home, just all of the nonsense that's going on. So to be out there in the wilderness in the peacefulness of it and spending time with Gabe was pretty cool. Just that companionship, the camaraderie that we had.
Speaker 1:I think that builds. I mean cause, that's a special bond right that you don't get to to necessarily build just in everyday life. I mean because there's so many challenges and things that you have to work around and overcome and, you know, use critical thinking skills and work as a team or a unit in order to achieve a goal. I think that really builds on that and I think it really can one further evolve or build a relationship or tear it down.
Speaker 2:It definitely could yeah.
Speaker 1:So I've watched a handful of relationships crash and burn due to being on the mountain and Western hunting.
Speaker 2:Um.
Speaker 1:I've seen a handful of them. You know it's two different mentalities go out and if they're not on the same page it does not end well, because one dude's like let's get it.
Speaker 1:And this dude's, like you know, more casual and it doesn't mesh well and it's understandable. But I think it's understanding the individual that you're going with their capability and their mindset, going into it and realizing and being real and honest with yourself. Yeah, Am I the right guy to go with this individual? Uh, or you know, maybe I need to change something in my training protocol or whatnot in order to get to that level.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Um, I think I could really see that as being a um and I have seen it as being a massive issue, uh, with a handful of of individuals over the, honestly, the past couple of years, which the first time I heard about it I was like oh man, how can that happen? And then I really sat down and thought about it and like, well, I understand both perspectives. I get it, man it's it's just two different mentalities and they just didn't mesh well, because everyone's built different.
Speaker 1:Everyone's built different, my friend. Everyone's built different. What's your least favorite part of the trip? Is there anything that where you were just like dude, this was a bummer.
Speaker 2:I'd say the drive.
Speaker 2:Oh, dude, yeah the drive going there wasn't bad. We stopped halfway, we made like 20 hours and we got a hotel. The drive home we drove straight through. We were ready to get home. It wasn't terrible. But if I had to pick out what was the worst part, it was probably the drive it was. It was tough at times, like the last three, four days. The woods went silent, so going from super active chasing bulls to not having anything around it was a little frustrating. But I said the drive was probably the worst part. Yeah, I could see that man 28 hours on the road. Yeah, but I said the drive was probably the worst part.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I could see that man 28 hours on the road. Yeah, and that's fine. I can't sleep in a truck.
Speaker 2:I can sleep maybe an hour and that's it. Yeah, I just can't get comfortable. I fell asleep one time driving.
Speaker 1:Don't go to Colorado. Didn't end well as a kid though, man. But yeah, dude, yeah, driving man. That's probably my least favorite thing to do in general now, cause I commute so much as it is. Um, you know, but you know, going there it's like oh man you know, but coming back you're like, yeah, but we would stop every two, three hours, four hours, whatever it was.
Speaker 2:If, if one of us was getting tired, right, I would switch, or you know, know it was. It was no rush to get there and it was. I say it wasn't a rush to get home. We drove straight through, but it wasn't a rush to get home. If we got tired, we'd stop, do whatever stretch, um, and then you, I don't know, I there really wasn't. I can't pick too many negative things out of the hut, I think that, honestly, I think that has to do with mentality and perspective.
Speaker 1:I'd agree, Right. So I see, I say that about everything, man. I mean obviously bad things happen or there's there's. There's pros and cons to everything, but I think it's the way you perceive them and you look at them and you approach them. Your mind is probably a little bit different than how maybe some people think about things. You know how you can see it. You see it as more of an opportunity, you know, a learning opportunity or something like that.
Speaker 2:Well, I got one thing the people in Colorado, like the residents in Colorado, if you watch this video, just wave. That's all you got to do. Just throw it away Like they would not wave at me whatsoever.
Speaker 1:That's good old Southern hospitality.
Speaker 2:I'm a super friendly guy and I'd wave and they just keep driving, wouldn't even look at us. It's like come on, man, like we're all here to do one thing. It's down elk. Yeah, but they were, uh, they were pretty disgruntled.
Speaker 1:I felt disgruntled. I felt that we're on well. I heard this year was a very tough year because it's the last year over the counter for bow hunters right, yeah, for archery tags. So I heard the hunting was really tough this year, uh, due to the amount of people that were there, the amount of guides that were running at that particular time. I heard this year it was. It was very difficult and I'm wondering if there maybe there was an influx of people. You, you know.
Speaker 2:I really I have nothing to base it off of. I'll say I think Gabe and I ran into on the mountain itself not like you know, up the road going to base camp on the mountain itself, in the woods we ran into maybe six or seven people. And the people we ran into in the woods super friendly, you know we'd sit down, have conversations with them. You know talk elk like hey. You know one guy he was, he was from Wisconsin. Actually he's like hey man, like where's your spot? I don't want to go there. I was like look man like this mountain lies.
Speaker 1:Where's your spot? I'm going to sit there.
Speaker 2:I honestly I think he was a. This mountain's huge. There's plenty of elk out here for everyone. Like you can hunt with us. I really don't care. Like I encourage other people to you know, do what we're doing. So there's no secrets. I wouldn't tell them like hey, I just worked a five-point.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:But I'm not going to be like, hey, don't go over here because it's my spot, right. So I there was a bunch of pressure in the unit that we were at, and it was during muzzleloader as well. It came in I think three or four days after we were archery hunting.
Speaker 1:So there was muzzle hunter while you guys were out there, there wasn't Muzzleloader.
Speaker 2:Excuse me, and that was the strange thing, is Did you have to wear orange. No Muzzleloader. If you have a muzzleloader, if you're using that weapon, you wear orange If you're archery hunting, you're not required to wear orange, you get smoked.
Speaker 2:We wore orange, did you? We cut up an orange vest and we put it on our rucks. Not a bad idea. I was a little confused with that. And it's all iron sights. It's primitive hunting with the muzzleloader, so it's not a scope. So there was a few times we were sitting up on the OP or on a different you know mountainside and you're seeing all this orange running around, which is fine, doesn't bother me, none, but it it did make me a little nervous to, uh, to be out there with guys who are muzzled or hunting and you're not required to wear orange. So it's kind of a safety thing and I was a little nervous with that yeah, I can see that.
Speaker 1:I mean, look at eastern north carolina, dude. We got flat terrain and dudes are shooting 30-06s and 308s and 300 wind mags across flat fields into the woods yeah so yeah, it's sketchy no matter where you go, but it's funny.
Speaker 1:I was just talked to some people that were colorado residents that came out here to wilmington a week or two ago. They watch a lot of our youtube stuff. It was really cool to talk to them and I kind of talked to them about you know, the the hunting this year. They were like, yeah, as a resident we saw it was tough hunting due to the last year of the tags, but I see for them they're probably like this is awesome, you know, because we've got less, you know outside residents coming in and you know running around on our mountain.
Speaker 2:I don't know much about it. He was super cool, awesome guy, Like the financial piece of it for the state of Colorado. But I do know in the specific unit we were hunting, I mean just the non-resident tags where they brought in over a million dollars just off non-residents. So the financial kind of burden that they may put themselves in not having over the counter, like how they're going to subsidize that with something else.
Speaker 1:Well, they do some. They do some weird stuff anyways, right, With their mountain lion hunting and lack of management.
Speaker 2:I think. I'm not sure if Colorado allows it anymore.
Speaker 1:I think they're the one of the ones that are banning it.
Speaker 2:Right, so going through the process of if I'm wrong.
Speaker 1:I apologize, but I think there's some, some questionable things that we see, like a lot of, as hunters. Yeah, that is being done in colorado and some of these other states by anti-hunters, or the influence of anti-hunters.
Speaker 1:Uh, I may be way off, but so correct me if I'm wrong in the comments uh, but I think that's one of the things about colorado with the uh, the political side of things and the amount of people moving to colorado, the influence on the hunting scene, I think the dynamic is maybe changing or has changed a little bit. Yeah, I don't know, maybe I'm just an idiot, that's what I? I've heard the same, okay, yeah um, from there, you know, favorite, least favorite part of the trip. Is there anything that you, anything you would have done differently, or approach this hunt differently, knowing what you know now?
Speaker 2:I think I would have really if I could have dove in any deeper, trying to understand elk because again, it was not knowing what I'm doing, brand new to it and I'm no means like a great caller. Understanding the different tones when an elk's bugling, you know it's not just throw out a bugle, you know rip one out and he was going to rip one back. Like what is the emotion behind that call? You know whether it's a long drawn out bugle, is it a short bugle with some chuckles. Like better understanding the emotional context of a call I think would have helped me a lot more. And then just understanding how elk react to certain things. You know whether it's hey, I'm a cow call right now instead of bugle, like just having a being out there, and that's for me with any type of calling.
Speaker 2:You know turkey hunting I'm a big caller with turkey hunting understanding what that bird's saying to me. So understanding what that elk is saying, because there were times where I would call and we're talking back and forth, you know ripping bugles back and forth I'm not sure really what that elk is trying to say and then what am I saying back to him. So, working on my calling, having a better understanding of that, and there's so many things on YouTube, so many different podcasts that you can listen to, and there's like Remy Warren is a great one Just guys that really break it down Like, hey, this is what this means, this is what you'd want to do in this situation, and I think that comes down to experience and just being out there, boots on the ground and working that mountain that makes sense.
Speaker 1:That's what I was going to say. I said there's there's no better way for you to learn than to actually get out there and get after it.
Speaker 2:Go do it 100.
Speaker 1:I mean, that's I've. I've always kind of believed in that approach. You can only learn or take in so much information without actually being on the ground and trying to apply it and screwing it up and realizing what you did wrong, yeah, and then kind of coming back reevaluating and growing as an individual or hunter, yep.
Speaker 2:I mean, on the first day we're ripping some bugles, and then we heard this what I thought was a human Cause I was like there's no way, that was a bull. It does not sound like a bull, like that was a human. So like so, gabe and I I were hey, let's just keep pushing. And it was a bull, we jumped a bull.
Speaker 1:I mean, that's like you ever heard a goat. Yeah, a goat does not. That sounds like a person trying to be a goat. Yeah, it was strange.
Speaker 2:And just again, with the experience and the, just having the knowledge of you know the different sounds that they're making, I think would make us that much more successful. Right, you know, at that time comes that we do have the opportunity to harvest one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and we had opportunities, you know, shoot some cows. Um, at the moment I just I wanted to really work for on getting a bull, and it's not because I'm greedy, I just I didn't want to shoot a cow. Um, I had pulled back on a couple of them, I just I wanted a bull and that was my goal. So was it one tag as? One bull or cow it was either sex, so I could have shot a cow, I just and you guys both had those tags.
Speaker 1:We did oh, dude, I would have been, I would take the sacrifice, dude.
Speaker 2:But I mean looking back at it, I don't even, I don't regret the decision right. You know, the day after, a few days after, I was like man maybe I should have shot that cow, but I am 100 satisfied with what we did on that mountain and coming home eating what people say tag soup, I'm okay with that.
Speaker 1:Just it was a successful hunt in my eyes and I think it is engaged as well well, the fact that you guys got on them first year, out there, unknown, uncharted, never been on a mountain man, I I would say, is a win in my book, absolutely um. But I would have been the dude that that shot that cow for you. Don't worry, we'll split it.
Speaker 2:We try. I gave was on the op. He was on top of the mountain I said hey, man, that cow's working back up to you, work back to the op, to the east a little bit, and I was watching her go up and then all of a sudden, for whatever reason, she just made a hard right and went right in front of where he was standing. But he was already pushed down to the East at the OP.
Speaker 1:So but it was, it was successful. Yeah, that's awesome, man, that's definitely, I think, one of those things I mean you'll always remember. I mean, dude, just tons and tons of great memories, and I think maybe not having the camera, like we talked about there, may have even been better. You know, just for you, cause you're so much more in the moment, it's very easy to get distracted. Um. So, final question I've got for you, um, I think this is a really good one advice for future first time, uh, elk hunters that are hunting out West, doing it DIY style We've talked about this a little bit, you know um, what advice would you give to somebody that's looking to go out West for as a first time and doing it on their own?
Speaker 2:I would say reference YouTube. But don't reference YouTube so adamantly that you're going to base your hunt off of what you see on YouTube. I think YouTube really shows some great footage, but I don't think they show 100% real footage. Like they don't show how much it sucks. You know, when you're climbing up a mountainside, you know you can barely breathe, you can barely move, um. So reference YouTube and then be extremely humble when it comes to asking other individuals who have gone out West.
Speaker 2:Don't be afraid to say hey, I don't know, help me with this, what can I do here? You know, try different equipment prior to going out. Whatever it is your gear you want to go with and really focus on. You have to be dedicated to the mountain. Like you can't go out there and half If you have asset, it's going to be. In my opinion, it's going to lead for a miserable hunt. Like you have to commit to the hunt like hunt it Like it's your last hunt you're ever going to do and I think you'll enjoy the hunt and I think that starts before you get to the mountain. It 100% does, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, dude, that's, that's awesome man. It's great story. I'm glad we got to sit down and discuss it because I've really been looking forward to it. I know you've been busy, um, and I mean, like I said, we we talked a little bit while you were on the mountain and a little bit after you got back, um, and I mean just awesome man, I I'm I'm a little jealous that you got to go out and my cousin has been, he's been messing, he's like man, we've got to go take a trip. I'm like I can't even get out of here to go see you in Kentucky. How are we going to go out West for a week or two weeks? So yeah, that's that's. You know, the plans for the future we'll see, but it's definitely something I want to experience at least one time.
Speaker 2:I think you say one time like I'm hooked yeah. We were there for the 14 days or 15 days, whatever it exactly was. Um, I haven't. I've been in the woods once this year so far, since we've been back Like it was. I can say I got my fix on the mountain. Really Like I will go back every year, whether it's a different state Wyoming, montana, colorado, whatever state it is like it has become a new passion.
Speaker 1:Do you think you enjoyed that style of hunting more than whitetail? Absolutely Really.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. I feel it's a more of a fair chase.
Speaker 1:Eastern whitetail, I should say.
Speaker 2:A fair chase Like you're, you have to outsmart this massive animal in his territory where whitetail it's I've. I'm not saying I'm an amazing whitetail hunter, but I feel whitetail it's I've. I'm not saying I'm an amazing whitetail hunter, right, but I feel whitetail are very predictable when it comes to just hunting them. You know you can pattern them a lot easier than elk. I mean once an elk. If an elk busts you like they're gone.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're not on the mountainside anymore, they'll go 10 miles away so, being a woodsman, having that, you know, that skill and that ability to actually hunt in their environment, I think it's huge and awesome.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'll say it again man, that's what I think when I think hunter and I've got some, and we've got some really great friends that are really really great hunters, um here, and you know. But that Western style hunting is just different man. It's a I think it's a different um, I don't want to say different breed of individual, but it's just a completely different style of hunting. Uh, that really incorporates to me more. So what I enjoy with my, the physical fitness side of things, the, the, the strategy, obviously whitetail takes strategy, but it's a lot more moving, involved a lot more moving pieces and covering a lot more ground.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. I mean, you test yourself every second of the day. Yeah, I believe that man.
Speaker 1:Like I said, I'm jealous. I'm looking forward to doing it one day, but anything else you got going on coming up the rest of this year future.
Speaker 2:No, just uh been uh trying to get my wife on a really nice deer that we've been after.
Speaker 1:Um. Once bear season opens up, try to get a bear are you hunting all year with a?
Speaker 2:bow or will you pick up a rifle? No, I won't bring a rifle, just just bow for me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the same way, man yeah, I think, uh, the bow man. Once you get behind a bow dude, it's like it's addicting man. Yeah, um, I really, really, really want to and I need to talk to joe long. I really want to venture more in the traditional side of things, just because it's it's intrigues me. I just haven't spent the time behind it, um, messing with it, but that's one of the other things I want to try, as well as doing more of the traditional side. I mean, I struggle enough here hunting with my compound.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I do, I don't get me. I don't get me wrong, me wrong. I love mine. Man, I love shooting a compound bow. But it's something else I just want to pick up and try. Yeah, just that full circle of like, more of that primitive, traditional style. So we'll see maybe if, if I get to get in the woods as much as I want to dude, we need the weather to cool down here. It's yeah, it's november almost and it's like 80 degrees and they're still mosquitoes.
Speaker 2:They have started chasing, though, so that's a plus.
Speaker 1:That's what everybody's saying man, they're starting to chase, they're moving, we'll see. Well, joe, as always, I appreciate you coming on the show.
Speaker 1:This was episode 13. It was a great talk, man recapping that hunt in Colorado, first elk hunt in my eyes. Success, absolutely Good deal, 100% success, good deal, man. Well, as always, we appreciate you guys tuning in. Keep up with us. We're trying to put these out as much as we can. We've got a lot of really great guests. There's a lot of great information, a lot of great experience. Again, we appreciate you guys watching. We'll see you guys in the next episode of the show.