By: Bud Alexis
I couldn’t believe how dark it was in the woods, a new moon on this night, and my light went out. I knew there were many wild hogs in this area and I could hear many sounds of crunching leaves all around me.
I had not hunted this area before, and after a little scouting found what I thought was an ideal area to arrow a deer. I made my way into the woods with my not so trusting homemade climbing stand, found the tree I had chosen, climbed and waited. As sometimes luck would have it no deer came my way. I guess that is why they call it hunting and not killing. I decided to wait as long as I could before I came down, in order to take advantage of every bit of light.
It was getting dark fast, so I tried turning on the light and get down. No light! This is not good. I had a general idea which way to go to get out, but there sure was a lot of briers, logs, etc, I would have to traverse in order to get to the road. When I reached the ground, I fumbled around in the dark until I got the tree climbing stand folded up. I could hear the sound of crunching leaves throughout the woods around me. I became a little concerned, no a lot concerned, no I was scared, because I had seen a herd of wild hogs in this area on previous hunts. Trying to keep my cool, I grabbed all that I brought with me and began making my way, hopefully, in the direction of the road. It wasn’t long before I was encountering thick brush, briers, and most everything, but I trudged on.
I had crossed a deep canal on the way in. It was about 8 or 10 feet deep, but because of a lack of rain it was dry. I figured if I reached the canal I would be home free, because the road was just the other side. As I moved forward, I came up against some very thick brush and forced my way through. There was no telling how scratched up my face was from all the briers I had gone through. As I made one last lunge I could feel the thorns scratching across my face, then the sensation of tumbling head over heels into the canal. I didn’t mind the cuts and bruises so bad because I knew I had found the way out. Now I bring a spare.
