For only a few months have I been working with my new company, but it was already time for a vacation. Ha, thats just a little melodramatic. But I did already have a vacation planned for the last week of archery in Colorado. The outdoorsy get away would set me back all of my 2012 vacation days but it would prove worth it.

The base for this trip took place in the campgrounds of Arapaho National Forest. A week away from cell phone service, 3G and any other technological burden of today’s society. While the campground doesn’t look like much, by the end of the week it started to feel like home. The only problem was that I am a Floridian, and it gets pretty damned cold in Colorado in September.

After getting camp set up, we decided to take it easy for the day and hit up the grocery as well as eating out for dinner. My partner in crime was more fascinated with the state of Colorado than me, and was even hoping to move there soon. As such, he had visited the state a month previously and raved about this great pizza place.

Now I’m sure you’ve heard of Chicago style pizza and New York style pizza, but Beau Jo’s of Idaho Springs, Colorado is known for serving its famous Colorado style pizza. The secret ingredient  honey. I will let the pictures speak for themselves.

After resting up the first night, we slept in a little and got ready for fun packed day of mountain climbing and elk hunting. My bag weighed too much for mountain climbing, I was wearing too many layers of clothes, and didn’t have a good strap for my bow. We walked over 10 miles and climbed probably 2000 feet in elevation. Needless to say, I slept like a baby that night.

The second day, we used our brains to find the elk honey hole. We used the State of Colorado’s Fish and Wildlife Department’s elk migration pattern charts, a Jeep Wrangler and a GPS system to get us where we needed to be.

We pulled off the road, climbed up the mountain and set up shop. And as with most of my hunting endeavors, the place ended up being a dud. We were confident this was the honey hole though, so we stuck with the same location all week. No dice.

As we drove back at dusk each night, we kept passing the same group of Moose in the road. Moose are a creature of habit and do not give a shit about nothing. These Moose would walk in front of the jeep for several hundred yards with no haste or concern whatsoever. They only cared about getting where they wanted to be. These creatures demolish whatever might be in their path to get to where they want to be. The takeaway lesson from this is that if you see a path of fallen trees, you’ll know a moose didn’t want to walk around that tree. So I got bold, and snapped a picture with one.

As we tried to sleep in our camper each night, the sounds of an annoying beaver kept us awake. I didn’t think beaver’s were nocturnal. They might not be. I don’t really care to look it up. I just know they are annoying. I didn’t respect the beaver until daybreak. When the light was fully up, I could see the engineering work of an intelligent creature.

It was after having a beer, the epiphany then came to me. I finally understood why it was Rocky and Bullwinkle. Why would there be a cartoon about a moose and beaver? Its because they are tag team champions of nature. They are the legion of doom. The moose demolished trees over a body of water, and then the beaver comes in for a finishing doomsday device masterpiece.

OK, enough wrestling jibber jabber for you haters out there. Back to the hunting. So I did finally see a female elk at about 50 yards. So I drew my bow, and released… Gut shot. She took off running. I finally found her bleeding out at the bottom of the hill, but as I approached she took off sprinting into the never never land of Colorado’s equivalent Mirkwood.

I did feel bad about killing the creature for a few hours. Mainly because I felt the death was meaningless. My hunting partner assured me that either a bear or a coyote would be much appreciative that night so I began to let it go.

I actually flew into the Kansas City airport for this trip as my friend didn’t want to drive the entire journey from Kentucky alone. I wish I would have realized how boring the drive from Denver to Kansas City was beforehand because I never would have agreed to such terms. But on the return trek, we stopped at one of the only exits in the entire state. The signs labeled the exit “The Oasis”.  As we pulled in for gas we were sure if we were actually seeing mirages at the Kansas Oasis or not. But after rubbing our eyes as if there were sand in them, it was clear as day. Palm trees in Kansas. I knew my journey was complete.