Twenty Hours and $152 per Pound

These are the famous hunting cousins, Gary and Larry, in search of chukars in the hills above the Deschutes. Although this blog is all about chukars, you will not see any actual chukars in this post.



After leaving home at 4 a.m., we drove to The Dalles, then south through Dufur and Maupin to the Deschutes River. We left the car by the river, took the canoe across, and hiked up here.



Chukars like rocky spots. I kept to the top where the going is nice and flat while Larry and Gary worked the sides of the canyon.



Despite Larry's attempts to convince me otherwise, I'm not a fan of guns.



After hours of trudging along in the cold, wind, and a bit of rain, Gary had four dead chukars while poor Larry had none. Gary hauled his dead birds around in his backpack, and I never saw them. This is why you won't get a picture of a chukar in this chukar-themed post. As it got later, the rain began to freeze. Everything was slippery as hell. I played the grandma card and elected to slide down the last (and steepest) part. In my defense, I must mention that this is much steeper than it looks and there is ice on the grass. Larry and Gary side-stepped down the hill like a couple of tough guys, but I beat them to the bottom. I would also like to point out that I bought this very nice Marmot raincoat at Sierra Trading Post in Cody, WY. The only thing wrong with it is the color. Larry says this is why he didn't get any birds: my coat scared them away.





It was almost dark by the time we got back to the canoe, and the rain had begun to freeze. Larry ferried me across the river and called for Wilbur the wonder hunting dog (as in "I wonder why we brought him?") to swim over like he's done a million times before. After various attempts to get him to come, Gary and Larry went back across the river in the dark, freezing rain, hog tied Wilbur and strapped him into the canoe.



More fun to come! Larry and Gary loaded the canoe in the freezing rain.



We drove almost to The Dalles before putting on the chains. The road was a sheet of ice.



When we got to The Dalles, we discovered that I-84 had been closed most of the day but had recently reopened. It was 1:00 a.m. before Larry and I made it back home.



Generous Gary gave Luckless Larry a couple of his birds, and Larry made this peanut coconut chukar dish where all the peanuts and coconut fell off the meat and burned in the bottom of the pan.



We enjoyed a hearty meal while tallying the trip expenses: $65 gas; $20 vehicle wear and tear; $25 breakfast in The Dalles; $65 hunting license; $10 boat permit to cross the river; $5 shotgun shells. Larry figures the meat in our chukar dinner cost about $152/pound.