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Courtney Prete
148 Plays1 year ago
Courtney Prete @heroutdoorjpurney_ is an avid outdoorsman and hunter who has set out on a journey to connect and empower women in the outdoors. Courtney is a ray of sunshine in the hunting industry and it was my pleasure to sit down and talk with her.
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Transcript
Introduction and Courtney's Role
00:00:07
Speaker
You are listening to the Tricer Podcast, where we talk all things hunting, gear, and the great outdoors. Before we begin, let's start things out right and put God first. Lord Jesus, I thank you for Tricer, and I ask that you can use this podcast as a way to bring joy to all of our listeners with a Tricer and this podcast at your feet. Amen. All right.
00:00:32
Speaker
I think that's a great way to start the podcast. I'm not even going to start over because that's what you're, you are the first mom, the first woman on the Tricer podcast. I'm so excited to have Courtney Preedy on.
00:00:46
Speaker
Yeah. And I found you Courtney, because I was, when I first started Tricer, I was like, man, I really would like to work with some women in the hunting space. And so I did, I don't know, I just Googled best women in the hunting space. And I found these lists and I started going through these lists. And most of the women in the hunting space looked like they were, um,
00:01:11
Speaker
worked at Hooters and they would kill an animal and then all of a sudden they'd have a full thing of makeup on and it's like their top was like, it's just, what the heck? This does not seem like for someone to
Authenticity and Women's Archery
00:01:21
Speaker
work with. And then I found Courtney Preedy.
00:01:24
Speaker
And Courtney is going on bear hunts, going after moose. She's fishing. She is in the outdoor space. And not only that, she's also growing that space for women and holding archery shoots for women and really creating a real culture of hunting within women in the industry. And I really appreciated that. And I respected that. And I said, Courtney, I want to work with you.
00:01:49
Speaker
And so I've been, we've worked on a few little projects here and there and I just support what you're doing. And I am just so happy to have you on here.
00:01:57
Speaker
I'm excited. Thank you so much for that introduction. It's been a long time coming. I feel like that we get together and get to do a podcast. And I just have to thank you, but also say it's so hard because we want to build these platforms and be able to support hunters no matter if you look like how I hunt or do it differently than
Challenging Hunts and All-Girls Trips
00:02:15
Speaker
me. But I know exactly what you're talking about when it comes to finding some of those really strong, positive female
00:02:22
Speaker
Hunters it can be hard i feel like a lot of us do you get buried down a little bit lower on the totem pole because yeah we're doing it with class intact. Yeah for sure and you're doing like real adventures though correct you're not just going to texas and i don't know what i don't over a feeder like you are like living it yeah.
00:02:42
Speaker
We're living it. Yeah, we definitely do. I've found myself over the last few years on some pretty gnarly hunts that I hate to be the person that's ever, it was the hardest or the worst or the longest, but we definitely put ourselves through some pretty wild experiences. And
00:03:00
Speaker
I've grown so much just I feel like individually as a mom, as a woman, as a hunter by stepping into this more uncomfortable kind of experiences like an all girls trip to Kodiak, right? Like an unguided all girls trip. That's not something that a lot of women do. And it's not even necessarily the thing that I would have initially just said, yeah, I'm going to go say yes to this experience. Scared the hell out of me a little bit, right? But like,
00:03:25
Speaker
You don't get stronger. You don't get better at doing the hard things unless you show up to do those hard things. And not only that, and you're the leader of this stuff. So all these women are expecting you to be comfortable in that, right? And go, Hey, we're going to Kodiak.
00:03:40
Speaker
I was actually a follower on quite a few of these adventures.
Company Offerings and Empowerment
00:03:44
Speaker
We certainly do, though, through our company, Her Outdoor Journey, offer some of these experiences that you're talking about. But I will say I tend to not be the one that operates outside of my wheelhouse. So if I don't know it, I'm not going to teach it. And I'm never going to bring women just totally blinded into a situation that I've never walked through myself. I think that's something that's been really important for me with building these events.
00:04:08
Speaker
Yeah, I need that with you. You're really good at not honestly holding people's hands, but bringing them in entry level, right? You're bringing them in and you're doing these shoots with them and you're just helping them to explore hunting. A lot of people have interest in it, especially I feel. Do you homestead a little bit too? You do, right? A little bit? Did you say homeschool or homestead? Homestead. Homestead.
00:04:25
Speaker
I know I don't really. I would love to get more into it, but that's a very green area for me. Okay. But since COVID, like I feel like a lot of people want to get involved and want to learn about it so they have no idea where to start, especially women in the space. And I feel like you've really offered a tool to do that. What are some of the events you guys do?
00:04:44
Speaker
Yeah, specifically to that, I think self-reliance is so important and something that we've all seen become a little bit more real life scenario. Like I need to be able to have options to put food on the table for my family when I can't find it at the supermarket.
Retention and Upcoming Hunts
00:05:00
Speaker
I need to be able to figure out how to purify water or live when the power goes out. So I think that those things are just, we're seeing a little bit more evidence that is really important skills to have.
00:05:11
Speaker
And I certainly want to be able to empower my community, the women who follow online that come to these events. So we always try to really instill a baseline of building confidence and those self-reliance skills. This year, we're doing some pretty fun things. I started doing the events 2017, 2018.
00:05:29
Speaker
And it started out as just archery fundamentals course, which was super fantastic. We would do it over a long weekend. Everybody get together, camp out. There was no stupid questions. You could come in and you could know a little or a lot about your bow. You could be well versed with it or not shoot it very often. And there was a place for everybody to feel included and comfortable.
00:05:50
Speaker
And over the last few years, we started doing a few more adventures. So like kind of destination style retreats. So last year we did Alaska and it was a seven day just fishing frenzy. We had so much fun. I hate to say it a little bit bougie, but it was like a nice place. You're coming back with really comfortable, luxurious lodging, but you're going out and you're getting after it during the day. So it was a kind of a fun medium. And this year we actually expanded to offering guided hunts as well.
00:06:19
Speaker
And really, for me, I love exposing new women and families to the outdoors. But there's this piece with retention that becomes so important because we want to bring newcomers into the hunting realm. But if we're not helping them be more successful or if we're not helping them apply the skills that they learn in a camp or course in the field, keeping them interested in the hunting long term is a little bit more difficult.
00:06:47
Speaker
So this year, new for 2024, we're doing guided hunts as
Comfort for New Hunters
00:06:51
Speaker
well. We've got one going in Australia and then one in Hawaii and some more adventure camps this year that are just going to be really fun for getting people connected with like-minded individuals and out just doing some of those like bucket list kind of events. That's awesome. I actually just had a phone call
00:07:10
Speaker
on the way home for this meeting about going to Hawaii hunting axis deer. So I was talking to Nate from Kestrel and hopefully going to go with Nate from Olin and go hunt axis deer in Hawaii. It's on my bucket list. That's really cool. You talked about retention and that's one thing I've dealt with hunters and I don't know if it's.
00:07:26
Speaker
more so with women or not, that you could probably speak to that. I have a lot of friends who want to kill an animal. Take me hunting. And I'm always like, get a hunting license, start scouting. And then like, then you lose them. Like, they don't want to do it. They want to have their, you know what I mean? Like, their idea of taking me hunting is take me to your spot, put me in a spot, and the deer comes in, I'll shoot you the year you've been scouting all year. And
00:07:46
Speaker
Yay for me and I'll go home and not do it again. Or they'll never go engage past that. And you know that with hunting, right? There's like different levels of it. How do you feel like the retention is with women once they start doing your classes? Are they actually getting out and scouting on their own? Or do you like going and doing it outside of that? Does that help for that?
00:08:04
Speaker
Absolutely. Oh my gosh. Absolutely. It helps so much. And every woman that comes, we've partnered with Onyx maps for years. And so they all get Onyx. They all get a crash course and how to use it. And again, these things go to like self-reliance, but also like safety, right? Like we want women not only to just be going out and getting after it and like going to hunt and going to do these things outside, we want them to do it safely and empowered. And so I think you teach them
00:08:32
Speaker
the ability to look at your maps and navigate and find your routes and use your pins and all of those things I think really help so much because at the end of the day, again, we don't want to just push people out the door. We want them to go out comfortable. I have men often reach out to me and they'll say, I love that you're a hunter. I don't see many females. This is great. I want to get my wife or my girlfriend out. I want to get her involved. What is your advice? And number one advice every single time is make it a comfortable experience for her.
00:09:02
Speaker
If you go out and it's late season and it's winter and it's cold or it's rainy or you're not prepared for the things you're gonna get yourself into, there's a really good chance that there will be a distaste for that experience and that exposure.
00:09:17
Speaker
And so whoever it is whether it's your kids or your coworker or your partner like just keep that thing comfortable make sure it's a good experience but yeah i think just giving them these tools i can't tell you how many times in the last few
Encouragement and Patience
00:09:32
Speaker
years i've we've wrapped up our events for the year and now we're in hunting season and i get this text message.
00:09:39
Speaker
Courtney, you'll never believe what just happened. And the next one, the picture of her holding her bull or things like I had a few women come to camp, an archery camp a couple of years ago, and they all came from the same town but didn't know each other.
00:09:54
Speaker
And so at that camp they got connected and now those women are out like backpacking together. They're taking their families fishing together. Like they're getting to grow and feel supported in that outdoor space. And so it just, I can't say enough good things about the camps. Really easy for me to do because they're my events, but
00:10:13
Speaker
just honestly getting to watch the byproduct of these camps and the community and connection that these women form is like, that is honestly the biggest reward for me out of the whole thing.
00:10:26
Speaker
That is awesome. And I like the way that you see, if you talk about like support and doing that, cause like I was talking with Lampers today and Brad Hunt, I'm going to go to their Western Hunting Summit and they are both making fun of my trigger punch. Like they're not supportive of me. They're making fun of me. And I feel like with men, like we could be that way, especially like I don't have the patience. Like I took my wife, she doesn't, my wife doesn't hunt. She's just, it's not her thing. She's raised, she has, we have five kids. She's raised four boys who are all going to hunt. My daughter doesn't want to hunt, but, um,
00:10:56
Speaker
I sometimes we as men aren't the most patient with our wives or with women when it comes to that stuff and we were dragging along and I've learned that piggyback often with not so much with women with my kids like with my boys my older boys I rush them into shotguns.
00:11:12
Speaker
I rushed them into center file rifles and they both became so trigger shy. Like we're still dealing with it at 17 years old and be like, oh, don't be a wuss, just do it. Instead of walking them into it and being patient, I was doing that. And then I've had some experiences where I've, it is good for them to be uncomfortable sometimes, but like where I've drug them further than I should have. Where I learned now is I've gotten older and had five kids, like my 10 year old, he just drew a turkey tag.
00:11:36
Speaker
Yesterday was the first time he ever shot center fire rifle, but he shot in a 22 a million times and he shot in his BB gun a million times, right? So we went out and shot shotguns and center fire rifles yesterday, 300 blackouts, and he shot perfectly. It was unbelievable. No trigger, no flinch, no nothing, and it was great because I didn't rush him into it and I wasn't like, don't be a wuss, pick up that gun. I don't think women received that well, right? And when you said, oh, it's bougie,
00:12:06
Speaker
I like bougie too. Sometimes it's okay to be a little bougie on these hunts and do stuff. There's this weird, especially with social media and some of these guys out there, they're just going so deep. This weird idea that you have to be on this miserable hunt to enjoy yourself. And man, I just went to Mexico with my father-in-law who's 75.
00:12:23
Speaker
We sounded in a ground blind together and we had the best time in the world just hanging out. You don't always have to have this miserable thing. So taking your wife or your daughter or even your kids on a dove hut or a rabbit hut to start instead of a raining late season deer hunt might be a better avenue to get them into it.
Community Support and Inclusivity
00:12:44
Speaker
a thousand percent. Yeah, I could not agree more with that. And you're right too. When you talk about that on social media, there's always this portrayal that it was the hardest, longest, worst, and you're right. It doesn't always have to be that way. And I don't know if it's like that you get a little extra credit if it's real hard or you almost died or whatever, but, um, no pack is less than a hundred pounds.
00:13:08
Speaker
Exactly, exactly. But yeah, it doesn't have to always be that way. I learned that for myself, actually, year before last on that first Kodiak trip that we did. And I'm like, Kodiak, okay, give me the details on a scale. We're going to come back and we'll have a cabin, which will be warm at night. And I'm like, in, like, I'm in. Like, yeah, let's go. This sounds great. Warm at night. That sounds amazing. So it is fun when you get to do some of those real cool experiences, but you get to do it a little bit more comfortably, for sure.
00:13:36
Speaker
Yeah, definitely. You keep referring to yourself as a hunter, not a huntress. Why is that?
00:13:41
Speaker
Oh gosh, did we really just go there? It's so funny because I don't really have an opinion on the whole thing. I feel like there's definitely a negative connotation to Huntress and only because what you typically see tied to that. And that's as far as I'm going to go with that because I could put a very general statement out that won't be true in all cases. So I support people if they want to use the term Huntress and that works for them. That's great. It's not something where I feel like I need to be gender specific when I'm talking about myself as a hunter.
00:14:11
Speaker
Yeah, I wasn't trying to trigger you on that. I'm sorry. I just, I think it's neat that you are out there doing it. And I consider you an equal in the industry and how you do it, like how you're talking about it. Like it's not like you're not trying to separate the two. You're a hunter and like, we're all doing the same thing. That's what, that's where I was going with that is like, I feel like you, when I see Courtney doing stuff, it's not like Courtney's a woman hunter. Courtney is a hunter. And I really appreciate that about you.
00:14:35
Speaker
Yeah, no, I appreciate that. And honestly, it's not triggering for me. I just, I think the hardest thing right now is there's so much like animosity within our own community, within our own hunting community.
Masculinity and Leadership
00:14:50
Speaker
And some of the shoe fits and they should wear it, but at the same rate, like I'm not here to judge anybody else's part as long as we're hunting ethically and trying to do our best to support this love of ours and have sustainable conservation to where we can continue to do this. You can do it with makeup or no makeup. You can identify however you want, whatever floats your boat.
00:15:11
Speaker
For me, it just isn't important. And I try to think about that distinction too. For example, I was, Jana Waller just came on our podcast the other day and I wanted to talk about her because I think she's such a powerful woman. That's the truth. I think she's such a powerful, influential female hunter.
00:15:31
Speaker
I try to remove myself from classifying her in that way because I think she's wonderful whether she's a female or not a female. I think she's doing cool things in the outdoor space. And so definitely something that I try to be pretty mindful of, especially with owning a women owned and based business. Yeah, I think you're crushing it. That's what especially in the hunting space.
00:15:52
Speaker
So what about you are also a mom and a wife and you are out there raising up two boys or three boys? Two boys. Two boys. And I want to touch on that from your perspective of men in the state of men in our country, the state of men are men lacking in manliness. Is manliness a bad thing? Is masculinity a bad thing from your perspective?
00:16:17
Speaker
It is not a bad thing. I was raised, I don't even know what you want to call it to be honest, like old school traditional, right? There definitely was this leadership that came from my dad and the family. I was also, and am raised and I'm Christian. And so I feel like there's definitely a little bit more of an emphasis for the men to lead. And that's just something that I believe in. And I don't see that necessarily in our society anymore. And I have a funny story about this. I think men and women are getting,
00:16:47
Speaker
a little bit deviated in the way that we uphold our normal traditions and our gender roles, if that makes any sense. We were out to dinner. I just went on a women's retreat, a wildlife photography retreat, had
Gender Roles and Parenting
00:17:00
Speaker
your tripods there. They were amazing. Can't say enough good things about them. It was so fun.
00:17:03
Speaker
And on this trip, we had a guy come and join us and he's a young man. He served for a time as a Marine. He's a videographer, super cool guy. He's 25, a younger kid. I consider a younger kid. And we're out to dinner and everybody had ordered dinner and I had ordered, I'm on the stupid restrictive diet right now, a gluten-free, dairy-free burger.
00:17:27
Speaker
And they come to drop everything off at the table and they put it down in front of me and my girlfriend sit right next to me and she goes, oh, is that the gluten free? And he goes, no, it's not gluten free. She didn't order gluten free. And I looked around at the table and I'm like, I swear I did. And everybody's, yeah, no, you clearly did. And the guy goes, you didn't order a gluten free burger. If you did, I would have told you it's not gluten free.
00:17:50
Speaker
and got really like upset with me to the point where, and I'm not usually, I don't like confrontation, but I'm not super reserved. I tend to handle a situation like that. And I just didn't even know what to say. He's raised his voice and was like telling me I didn't order this burger. And I'm like, whoa, like this is crazy. And so.
00:18:05
Speaker
After the dinner and unsuspecting, this kid, Jerry, he's 25, he actually went and he talked to the manager afterwards. And he was like, this is not how you talk to women. That was so uncalled for and so not right. And a man should never raise his voice. This situation did not call for that. You need to talk
00:18:25
Speaker
to your server about the situation. And I, I just was so taken by his willingness to stand up and be a leader and handle that situation. Not that we couldn't, but it was just nice to see that. And it's funny that you bring that up because I reached out to him the day after and I was like, Hey, I just want to say thank you for standing up for us.
00:18:44
Speaker
And it's not something that I see very often anymore. It's not something that I've had as an example for me, like outside of my dad growing up, always had my back. But yes, you don't see that kind of strong masculinity anymore. And I don't know if it's because you have a whole bunch of women and a whole bunch of people trying to tear that masculinity down by saying that it's used disproportionately. But I do agree that
00:19:10
Speaker
This is really, it's got to change. I feel like it really needs to change because you don't see men opening the door for women anymore, which you should do, but you don't see this kind of generosity. And I think though that it really does go both male and female. We all need to do a better job, be more kind, be more considerate of other people. It's not that hard to do, but it is for some, apparently. I'm a Christian as well. And what we would teach like at our church is that we are
00:19:40
Speaker
equal yet different. So in my marriage, my wife and I are equal, but we have different traits. They're off the hunting topic right now, but like my wife is like, here's an example. I have four boys. My four year old, Dylan, we adopted him. He is a, he is, he rides, he gets on a dirt bike, he rides a skateboard. So we were at the desert and Dylan followed a giant 450 quad on his 50 quad.
00:20:05
Speaker
and jumped it off of a five foot cliff, literally a cliff. Imagine a retaining wall. And he went end over end, and the quad went on top of him, and I was in front of my dirt bike, and I wasn't there. So my wife gets out of this Jeep, and she is flipping out, and she is crying. So now Dylan's crying, because Lauren's crying, right? Which is good, because she's a mom, she's nurturing. She picks him up, puts him in the car, and they're in the car, and they're leaving. And they get to me finally, and what's wrong?
00:20:32
Speaker
He crashed his quad. Oh my gosh. Now Dylan's crying. He doesn't even know why he's crying. He's crying because mom's crying. And I said, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Hop out Dylan. So we get Dylan out. I'm like, Dylan, okay, squeeze my hand. Move your feet. Okay, bring him back to the bike. No, no, no, no, no, no. Bring him back to the bike. He's gonna get back on the horse and ride it. So we bring him back and put it on, right? But we need, that's an extreme example, but in our marriage, we need both sides of that. Like we need,
00:20:57
Speaker
her to have that nurturing side, and we need me to have that tough side, right? And we need to, and a lot of the problems with today's society is that the man isn't having that tough side, so the mom's having to do both roles, and that's not what she was created to do, or the man's having to do both roles, right? There's this, and you're seeing it right now, and people are revolting against it, I don't want to go too much into like gender politics or anything, but it doesn't naturally, if it doesn't naturally come, like people are, that's not right,
00:21:24
Speaker
And they're still having to go along with it, but naturally it doesn't feel right. So we're doing something that doesn't even feel right to us because we weren't created to be that way.
Raising Boys and Outdoor Adventures
00:21:33
Speaker
And we're forcing women to do things they weren't meant to do or aren't created to do and taking out the role they're supposed to do, right?
00:21:41
Speaker
And by no means am I saying that women should just be in the kitchen. That's not what I'm saying at all. Like my wife is a freaking powerful woman. My wife, I could not do anything without my wife. She's going to Kenya next month with my 15 year old. She's gonna go preach and do stuff. I mean, my wife is a rock star. If my wife died,
00:21:58
Speaker
My children would look like homeless people. It's my worst nightmare. I die. She's going to have 10 guys at the funeral Oscar to marry her. She's a stud. But there's definitely, and she sees that and we work really well together in that. We have a great marriage. We've been married for 17, almost 18 years this year. We've been together since 2003. So our 20 year reunion is coming up this year. So 21 years together, 20 years from high school. Before we go with that.
00:22:21
Speaker
But we work together well, right? And I'm not trying to step on her role. She's not trying to step on mine. And it's important to have that. So with that, how do you address that with your boys? I see you getting in the field. I see you bringing about hunting, fishing. Talk about that. Talk about bringing up boys. You've read that book?
00:22:40
Speaker
Raisin boys is pretty stinking awesome. I joke often that I wouldn't have done well with a girl, mainly because I had a lot of karma coming my way. But I think I'm recouping some of that karma with teenage boys. Teenage boys are the worst. They're hard. They cry way more than my daughter, but keep going. I'm sorry.
00:23:02
Speaker
Yeah, they're just difficult. I don't have criers necessarily, but I have defiance occasionally. But no, my kids are, they're incredible. It's definitely been a journey. I was a single mom for over a decade. And you talk about wearing both of those hats and having filled both of those roles. I will never pretend like my kids didn't have their dad because they definitely had their dad, but I had to fill a lot of shoes. And
00:23:30
Speaker
I don't think I necessarily did it right. I just did it the best way that I knew how and it looked a lot like actually I remember shortly after we got divorced and I just wanted to continue to do the things that I love to do with the kids and not feel like I couldn't because I was a quote unquote single mom.
00:23:45
Speaker
And so I started by just taking them camping. We would use the traditional campgrounds to where I knew that there was a bathroom and I knew that there was a camp host if I needed them. I felt a little bit safer as opposed to just doing some like dispersed camping. And I bought a tent that was just one of those really easy to pop up ones. So I didn't have to feel like I had to struggle because I didn't have another adult there to hold the other side. And you just figure those things out. But it has been quite the journey. We've got to do a lot of really fun things.
00:24:13
Speaker
I guess it's one of those blessing and disguises, but I had been living a pretty fast-paced life. I don't tend to let myself slow down enough to absorb sometimes. I'm like repacking for the next thing, repacking whether that's a work thing or just a fun thing. And so about 10 years ago, my grandma got sick with pancreatic cancer and she really helped me see the need to slow down.
00:24:41
Speaker
And she said to me, the last words she really spoke to me was, Courtney promised me that you won't get to the end of your life wishing you would have done the things that you really wanted to do. And I applied that at the time to not only my own life, like my own desires and the things that I wanted to do, but I wanted to help try to fulfill my kids'
00:25:00
Speaker
memory banks, like I wanted to help them fill those up and do those things. And so we started doing a yearly road trip, we'd take two or three weeks and we'd drive around, we'd hit all the different states and we'd start knocking these things off of their own bucket lists, which has been super fun.
Hunting Opportunities for Kids
00:25:14
Speaker
But we try to just keep it really adventurous and entertaining.
00:25:18
Speaker
I joke sometimes that being a mom to teenage boys is, it's like constantly finding a new hobby to do because the older they get, the harder it really is to spend that quality time and engage with them with things that fill their cup. And a few years ago, despite my being a really crappy bike rider,
00:25:38
Speaker
I got a mountain bike and we started mountain biking because that's what they wanted to do. And I think it's just trying to constantly figure out where their passions are and what things excite them and do those. When it comes to the hunting, hunting is obviously one of my favorite pastimes, whether that's shed hunting or mushroom hunting or big game hunting, but it's not necessarily their passion. And that's something for me that I've had to just try to let it work out how it's going to.
00:26:07
Speaker
We try to invite and create those opportunities about shoot my kids like youth big game hunting and like the draws and like all of the different opportunities that these youth have like kids to realize these incredible opportunities and take because they're like no I've got sports or no which is great too and I don't want to take away from their academic or sports or anything but
00:26:31
Speaker
It is hard sometimes I feel like man if they only knew what incredible opportunities these were. For example last year we were going to do a backcountry moose hunt in Alaska and my dad was going to be the primary hunter but our youngest son had the opportunity to take the second tag and he's yeah no I just don't want to go do the field day. So he didn't do it and there's part of me that kind of kicks myself because
00:26:54
Speaker
Yeah, they're teenage boys. They can make some of their decisions and choose if they want to do this hunt or not. But should I have pushed him to finish the field day so that he could go and have this other tag and do this thing? I think for me, I'm the kind of person, I'm the kind of teacher and leader in my family where I'm going to help you have the opportunity, but you also got to get skin in the game.
Recognizing Children's Interests
00:27:16
Speaker
Yeah, I'm doing the same thing, right? Kids are awesome. My boys hunt.
00:27:20
Speaker
But I don't know that, like, my oldest boy's gonna be 18 this year. He's had a license for two years now. He never went out on his own last year.
00:27:28
Speaker
And I'm like, take a shotgun, go hunt it. You know, he never really, and I was talking to my 15 year old too, like, I'm like, man, son, like, I feel like I'm spoon feeding you guys these hunts. Like we were talking this weekend, like, at what point are you going to get on X and start looking for yourself? At what point are you going to start looking up what tags you want to go on where I'm not finding them for you? And so I think it's important as a parent to realize like, your passions aren't going to be theirs. Like your abilities, they aren't going to be the same. They're going to be such, they're so, like I have five kids,
00:27:57
Speaker
And they are all so different. And so, like, I don't want to force them to ruin them. Like, they might not. Like, my oldest boy might not hunt when he turns 18. Like, he might just go about life. He's going to go to college. I'm sure he's going to move away because he hates California. And who knows? He might not hunt. So, yeah, there is. I guess it's important to, what do they say, meet him where they are?
00:28:19
Speaker
meet them where they are. So like my 15 year old loves dirt bikes and so do I. So that's just been like an awesome hobby for us to go do that together. Or my daughter, she loves going to Sephora and going to makeup. Let's go to Sephora, honey. What do you want to do? You want to sit down and she loves eating chocolate and baking. So we'll bake stuff together. I'm not going to force her. If I forced her yesterday, we went out. I'm like, Hey, babe, you want to go? We're gonna go shoot shotguns. You want to go? And she's like, Nope.
00:28:41
Speaker
I'm like, you sure? Nope. I'm like, all right, cool. I'm not going to force her to go do it. That's not where she is. She doesn't want to be there. But that can be like as a parent, you just think especially as a dad, like you just assume like there's no love what you love and that's it. And then you realize that they're just their own human beings, right? And we're seeing that with my oldest boy, especially with my wife right now, there's this butting head thing going on to my wife and my oldest son, because like he's becoming a man.
00:29:07
Speaker
in our house and I'm like you didn't marry him so we have this grown man now who's like. Basically a full grown man and they're bunheads a lot of stuff and it's he's separating from her and that's been a weird struggle for us to in the house we're dynamic as they become adults becoming their own person and going out doing stuff and like allowing them to fail and not getting in there and.
00:29:28
Speaker
Like, oh, no, no, don't do that. No, let him mess up. Let him screw his truck up. Maybe that's going to cost a bunch of money. Let him do stuff. It's just, I don't know, it's part of parenting. But again, that kind of goes the difference between a father nurturing his child and a mother nurturing her child. Because, you know, I feel like both are super valuable. Like, both of those either toughen up or both of those kind of, I want to help you not bump your head so
Lessons from Hunting Experience
00:29:54
Speaker
much. Like, those are both really important things to have. But you're right.
00:29:57
Speaker
at the end of the day, you do have to let them figure it out. This is the point to maturity, right? This is the point to growing up is that you are capable of going out on your own and starting your own household and someday family and all those things. But if I'm being totally honest, I'm in the middle of a midlife crisis right now with my 18 year old getting ready to like graduate and be out of the house. I'm losing my mind right now. So
00:30:21
Speaker
I have zero advice to give in this realm, but I can definitely relate with your wife Lauren and how that's going. It's a rocky, it's a rocky road, but I think at the end of the day, you just try to instill as much morals and let them know right from wrong and give them a spiritual foundation and love them through it. They're going to figure it out and it'll all work out in the end. I don't know why I didn't put two and two together with this was like your channels called her outdoor journey. And so is your podcast and your company.
00:30:50
Speaker
Yeah, our event company is called Her Outdoor Journey. The podcast is called The Soul Summit podcast. Soul Summit, that's right, Soul Summit. So where I was going with that is you talked about, okay, you got divorced, and then you decided like you want to do things with your kids, so you went and bought a tent. And I don't know why I just clicked right then. I'm like, oh, that's like when this journey started. Is that kind of like where that journey started? Because it sounds like you weren't going to Alaska 10 years ago.
00:31:13
Speaker
Nope, I was not going to Alaska 10 years ago. I grew up hunting outdoors and fishing and all that stuff, but it really became important to me to create space and find opportunities and learn because it's when I switched to bow hunting. So I grew up as a rifle hunter and when my grandma got sick,
00:31:32
Speaker
My dad stopped hunting. He was my hunting parter. And so when I didn't have him anymore, I was like, I'm going to do something new. And then that new thing looked like putting a bow in my hand. And then when I wanted to ask questions, I didn't know where to go and who to go to. And so the events were really stemmed out of that.
00:31:51
Speaker
like me looking around and be like, I don't see any other women here doing what I'm doing. And just feeling like the odd duck, which I felt like in different scenarios my whole life, like the odd duck, but I just, I was like, man, women need another female. They can ask these questions. We need to know how certain things fit our body differently. And you know how we're going to have different scenarios in the field that our husbands or boyfriends or partners can't show us. They don't know these things. And so that's really where that stemmed from.
00:32:20
Speaker
And so that journey started and how did that evolve for you like hunting wise? Were you going out in the field on your own? Were you starting to do guided hunts? Like how did you, how'd you start to figure it out hunting wise?
00:32:30
Speaker
Yeah, so again, grew up hunting with him forever and I knew rifle hunting and I knew mule deer in Eastern Oregon. That's all I grew up hunting. And I lived on the west side of Oregon my entire life. And when he had to switch his gears and do something different, I just started figuring out on my own. And the first few times I always laugh and I think about this so often and it comes up pretty frequently in conversations.
00:32:57
Speaker
like that confidence building piece, like how did you get to where you'll walk umpteen miles into God's country by yourself? It didn't start there, I'll tell you that. It started with going for drives and getting familiar with the roads or units I was in. It looked like going 400 yards and doing a call setup instead of a mile in, two miles in. So again, I think it goes back to my philosophy in life is you just show up to the things that excite you but also scare you.
00:33:26
Speaker
And then you continue to just put your energy and effort and your skill and your knowledge into those things. And before you know it, you're capable, you're confident, you're successful. And that evolution, again, it wasn't like a linear path for me. Some days it's a little easier to go out into the back country by yourself. And some days you've got a little fear that sneaks in. But I've always said, anytime somebody says, how do you get past the fear? Like you don't get past it. You just stop thinking about it.
00:33:55
Speaker
That's awesome. Yeah. And I think sometimes it's important to just start. If you like, you have to just start, even though you're afraid, just start somewhere small. Like I like what you said, like sometimes it's 200 yards off the road, but you're going to figure it out. No one gets there. Like I'm very, like I don't make sure myself a great hunter. Like I'm, oh, I'm still learning. I'll be learning till the day I die. Right. And I think it's important to recognize that, but recognize that like, I'm going to continue to start and learn and go do things like I'm going to do
00:34:21
Speaker
a high country mule deer hunt this year in September. It's going to be above 12,000 feet. I've only been up that high once or twice in my life. I'm from San Diego. I live at the beach. We are sea level. That's what we are. But I'm going to go do that. I'm going to figure it out. I've gotten to that point by going to places like
00:34:36
Speaker
Idaho or Eastern Oregon, I hunted over there, and I've been hunting now for 10 years, and it's slowly getting better and better, but I had to start somewhere and make a lot of mistakes. I think it's important to be willing to make those mistakes. You're out there on your own, you're doing this stuff, you're bow hunting, which you had to pick up the hardest part of hunting. Tell me about the first success. What's your first success with a bow?
00:35:00
Speaker
Oh, first success with a bow. I'm going to tell the story. It's a success and it's not. And the reason I chose this one is because of how impactful it was for me in learning and the curve between a rifle hunt and an archery hunt. This was I think the year after I put a bow in my hand, it was a little bit later in the year when I started archery. And so it was the next year that I hunted.
00:35:24
Speaker
It was on a blacktail hunt on the west side of Oregon. We had a stand, we had cameras up, seeing lots of deer. And I had a buck come into the stand and I pulled back, took the shot, looked like a great hit, was super excited, adrenaline hit. I'm like, whoa, like that was, this is crazy. Like, awesome.
00:35:43
Speaker
And so I proceeded to get out of my stand and go find the buck that I just shot. No time pass. No, nothing. Just, okay. Just I'm gonna go. And I ended up finding my arrow, finding lots of good blood, pushed the deer. I could hear him at one point. I'm just like,
00:36:00
Speaker
Rifle hunting, it's like you shoot, it goes down. But I was at the edge of this ridge line, and so he went down. And I tracked him right down to the stream. And then I was like, okay, Dawn's on me. I need to pull back and just give him a little time. And it started downpouring. If Western Oregon, it can get it.
00:36:17
Speaker
And I never found that buck, but I learned so much in that experience. And that was honestly one of the moments where I was like, I have a lot to learn. It doesn't just translate from rifle hunting to archery hunting. You have to apply yourself and do things a little bit differently when you're archery hunting.
00:36:37
Speaker
And so it was a good lesson for me. Okay, I've got to slow down. I've got to invest in this. I need to know the ins and outs. I've got to ask the questions and find a good mentor. But yeah, it was definitely a pivotal moment for me that I still would say, obviously it's the worst of the worst as a hunter. You end up losing an animal. I'm sure it was a fatal hit. There was lots of lung blood, but you didn't get to bring that full circle. You didn't get to not your tag on that and bring it home and put it in your freezer and show your family.
Mental and Physical Challenges
00:37:05
Speaker
but I still find so much value in that. I think that's one thing really important about hunting in general is not leveling yourself up to where you are only successful or a failure based on a tag notched or not. Yeah. Speak to the mental side of that, the failure side of that and the mental side of what you just experienced. One of my biggest struggles on hunts is the mental aspect. We spent 14 days hunting this year in a row.
00:37:35
Speaker
And there was times where I was just like missing my kids, but there's been times in my life where I have hit an animal, rushed a shot, lost the animal. And there's one thing I particularly went home because it just, I was just done. I was like, I'm going home. I can't, this is, you've been doing this for three or four days. You're tired and you just blew it and hurt an animal. How important is the mental aspect of hunting?
00:37:58
Speaker
Oh my gosh. The mental part of a hunt is everything. And I don't think that in my opinion or my experience, you never completely own the mental fortitude. It's always like that exercised skill in the moment because I still find times every single season on an every single different hunt.
00:38:21
Speaker
where I have to dig in. Shoot, I cried on my elk hunt this last year on an archery hunt because I was so homesick for my kids. I'm like out here and the wind keeps swirling and we're in elk and then we get screwed out of them because of the wind and all these things. And all I can think about is I'm sacrificing my time.
00:38:42
Speaker
people I love the most to be here failing and having this wind screw me up. And I sat there and had a little moment and just was like, I just want to go home to my kids. And I ended up saying a prayer and I was just like, Lord, if you present me this opportunity, like I'm going to take it. I'm going to wrap up. I'm going to go home and
00:39:01
Speaker
It was that afternoon that it all came together and I killed my bull, but to my point, like every single hunt taps me in some mental way. And it's, I think it's a good thing. I think I actually crave that because we're built to refine ourselves through those challenges and really feel like they make me a grittier human, which we don't all want to have to be gritty, but I think this life really requires us to show up and have that mental fortitude.
00:39:31
Speaker
Yeah, 100%. I spent, like I said, 14 days hunting with my 15-year-old. And we killed a coosier, and then we moved to another unit to hunt elk, and he missed opening day. And we had rain and wet and misery for seven days, and we had to go through some stuff.
00:39:50
Speaker
And I was like, we're not going home. And I tell him now, I'm glad you didn't kill an elk. Because that grit that kid has from that hunt, we actually use the word grit a lot from that hunt. It showed me a lot about that young man, the man he's going to become from having to endure that stuff and go through it. Hey, 4am, you're going out. It's not a
00:40:12
Speaker
I was joking around with somebody the other day. It's not like a jet boil commercial where you wake up and you're making your coffee and you're making your food. No, when you're hunting, you're getting up at 4 AM and you're sore and tired. You're rolling out of bed and you're hiking through bushes, not on a nice trail to get out to where you're going to sit and sit there for 30 or 40 minutes in the freezing rain or snow to wait for the light to come up so you can look for elk and then blow stock.
00:40:34
Speaker
But those experiences, I think, prepare you for life. I had this conversation with Clay Rich and they told me to talk about business, but I feel like hunting really does carry over into life. I think it's so important to have your boys out there doing it or doing it because you really just learn to endure. I've learned more about my physical body, hunting, than I ever have anything else. There's one elk pack out that I can think of where it was an eight-mile. It was a flying hunt. My buddy shot a bull eight miles from the airstrip.
00:41:04
Speaker
and we shot the bolt like 8 a.m. and got back to camp at 1 a.m. and I remember thinking I'm never gonna make it and like I made it. And like from that point on something switched from like my body's capable of so much more than I ever thought it was and I'm soft. Like I can get through this stuff and I can do it and I think that helps with all aspects of my life.
00:41:23
Speaker
Totally, it's life requires discipline. I don't care who you are. If you want to do life and you want to have some sort of success, it requires discipline. It requires you showing up on the days you don't want to. But I have this mentality in this house that you don't want to. No one cares. You just still have to do the thing.
00:41:43
Speaker
And I agree with you, I couldn't agree with you more that the hard hunting hunting in general, but the hard hunting experiences, the ones where you're like, did I really screw up by saying yes to this? Or should we have gone this far? Or should I think those are the ones though, that really, I come home with like wings shot out of my back.
00:42:02
Speaker
Like I can do all things. Certainly there's a foundation for that confidence. And I think a lot of that is attributed to my like spiritual. And elections is just, I trust that I can get through this thing. I trust that whether I'm in the field or I'm at home, like one foot in front of the other is going to get me to the end point. Yeah. Type two fun is fun afterwards. Not during that's for sure. And we started doing this thing now. Um, do you ever listen to Chuckle Willick at all?
00:42:33
Speaker
So Jocko does this thing which says, thank you, in this Jocko voice. And so when you're doing something saki to say thank you. And so we started doing that because we hunted a lot. We killed five elk in three days and we had to pack all of them out. My 15-year-old, I give to say thank you. So there was times I heard him on this elk hunt in December, which was just a suck fest for a week.
00:42:54
Speaker
saying thank you. Like we had one night, it was like three and a half hour pack out of this canyon back to our truck. I think it was just, I heard him saying thank you. And then we're just exhausted. But yeah, that mental fortitude is something that is just lacking and I think it's important to do and have it. Cause if you can do that, there's certain times you go on a hunt, you're like, man, if I can do that, I can do anything.
00:43:13
Speaker
a thousand percent. Yes. I still frequently reference the first sheep hunt I did and I won't get into all the details of how hard and how heavy and all the things, but I thought I was going to die. It would make it worse. I have a bad back and my back was spasming the entire time in. We're 26 miles into the back country on the sheep hunt and
00:43:35
Speaker
I think about that moment frequently like one of the nights the night before we ended up going out and killing that ram we like we legitimately slept in the cave with nothing we slept in our packs like it was pretty gross the whole thing was not fun but i constantly think back to that and when i'm like.
00:43:54
Speaker
in my normal day-to-day life or work isn't going the way I want or things just aren't aligning or I feel like I'm in the storm, I'm like, you can do so much harder than you give yourself credit for. Remember this time, remember this experience, and I think that can carry you a long ways. It does for my kids as well. Our youngest son, we've taken in the back country on fly-in hunts in the bush of Alaska several times, and I can see his confidence growing because he's doing those hard things.
00:44:24
Speaker
Definitely. So we touched on the mental side of it. I don't want to jump around too much, but what about the physical side
Fitness and Health for Hunting
00:44:30
Speaker
of it? Because I know you're a pretty healthy person. Like you're eating healthy and you're exercising. And are you doing any kind of like personal training as well? I don't know. I'm not anymore. No, I didn't. So talk to that. Speak about that. What does that look like for you?
00:44:45
Speaker
Yeah, the physical thing is something you definitely got to stay on top of. I would have considered myself an athlete for much of my life and I took a turn and this is probably not going to be the answer you were looking for, but it's my story. During a bunch of endurance training and when I was like at my peak,
00:45:01
Speaker
I started just feeling not myself anymore. And I've had some health issues I've been trying to figure out and facing for quite a while, but it's crazy when you go from being able to perform in a certain way and a certain level of fitness to I'm 39 now, but I feel like 39 feels different than I thought it was going to feel.
00:45:23
Speaker
And something i've been thinking about a lot lately as i'm trying to really work in being proactive to regain my health and regain the endurance and strength that i had is you just end up taking it. For granted a lot and i actually felt like i was somebody who frequently.
00:45:40
Speaker
really dug in and really felt thankful for having legs, for having legs at work, for having legs that will take me up a mountain, for having lungs, for just having the ability that I know not everybody has. I try to be really grateful of that, but what I'm finding that I took for granted was how quickly things can change once you start backing off from your routine or your discipline.
00:46:05
Speaker
And so that's something I just can't say enough about. I feel whether you're from the Midwest or maybe back East and like we hunt a little different out West. It takes a little bit more out here on some of these big game hunts than it does in some other places. And so everybody's fitness level for what they want to do and how they want to hunt is going to be different.
00:46:24
Speaker
But I will just say, don't take it for granted because things like mobility or range of motion or balance, right? Like those things change so quickly for us. And so I think staying ahead of it is really important. If you can get out of the mindset of, I'll just, I'll get in shape right before season happens or I'll start rucking four or six weeks before the kick of off of September.
00:46:49
Speaker
If you can actually implement a little bit more of that, I think that there's a lot to be said for the longevity of the physical ability. Yeah, for sure. I'm in the gym like four or five days a week and a lot of mobility stuff like you're talking about. And I'm 38 years old, so you are my senior by a year. But things have just, it's just not clicking like it did. It's really strange, right? Like this last season, I was like, man, like,
00:47:15
Speaker
I already have my shoulder rebuilt and now my left shoulder I think is what's hurting me and like I put my pack on and I'm like turning my pack on and then my left knee always hurts. Like it does. You do take it for granted. I think I took my twenties for granted. I think I definitely drove it by like I stole it riding dirt bikes and hunting and doing stuff. Like I definitely wasn't the kindest on my body.
00:47:34
Speaker
But i think that the year long prep is so much better than the like six weeks before prep for one like you probably not gonna get in shape for two you probably not even do it because you don't have that routine like for me i'm so routine driven like i'm gonna get off with you today i'm gonna go to the gym today.
00:47:51
Speaker
I go every single day. I try and find a time to go to the gym, not every day, but five days a week, something. But that routine is so important for me. And it's so hard to get into that. If you stop going to the gym for three months, it's really hard just to start back up and go to the gym, try it. The same thing with eating. I do meal preps now.
00:48:10
Speaker
You don't realize how terrible it is eating Jack in the Box, or McDonald's, or maybe within San Diego, some Mexican food every day. You just, for one, you're addicted to it. You don't realize it. But the ones you start eating healthy, you're like, oh, I feel so much better. But it takes time to do that. And if you get that routine.
00:48:28
Speaker
Mm hmm. Absolutely. No, it makes a huge difference for sure. I just was coming back off of a little bit of downtime. And yeah, I was like, man, this is so much harder than if I would have just stayed in this routine. So definitely worth it if you can stay rooted into that discipline.
00:48:44
Speaker
off topic, my wife, my best friends are senior pastor of our church.
Mobility and Injury Prevention
00:48:49
Speaker
And he is, we have a mega church and he's one of the guys, whatever he's doing, everyone's going to do it. So he's running a half marathon. So he decides everybody up and I'm like, screw you, bro. I'm not doing it. Come on. I'm like, no way. I know my knees. I cannot. I running is not my thing. I do a lot of mobility stuff, but if I run on asphalt, like I'm in knees, get messed up. So my wife, like it sucked into this thing.
00:49:09
Speaker
And her first day running court, she's, I'm not a runner. This is the worst. I don't think my body can handle. I'm so sore. My hips, everything hurts. And now here we are three months in and she just did 12 miles on Saturday. And she's got these like special running glasses. She's got the belt. She's got the whole nine running a marathon two weeks and she's just going to crush it.
00:49:27
Speaker
But yeah, they have special shoes. They're all geeks now. They're all runners. But it took that consistency to get there. Just trying to start up and do it. That's a great example for hunting too. You just try and throw a pack on and go or throw some boots on and go. It's miserable. How much of your training? I want to hear more mobility. I love that you said that. For me, maybe it's because I'm
00:49:47
Speaker
Question 40 now, like stretching, mobility, my hips, that stuff has been critical to me. Like doing single leg movements has been critical to me being more effective in the... So speak to the mobility part of it, and then there was one other thing. Speak to mobility first. Go ahead.
00:50:02
Speaker
Yeah, no, I just think a solid routine that you'll do because it's like you talked about your wife and you guys who's saying that they aren't runners. I think that it's really important to train in ways that you enjoy as far as your foundational fitness. But when it comes to mobility, everyone needs to be mobile. Everybody needs to keep
00:50:24
Speaker
good quality joint movement and full range of motion. So I think for me, it looks like about four days a week of spending 20 to 30 minutes, um, of just working through stretches and a lot of things that I do. So I've had my hip done and I've had a shoulder done. And so I go back to those PT things and doing it on both sides just to keep everything moving and healthy. But I think it's just the consistency, not doing it for a month and then not doing it for six months. It's not going to help you. It's like,
00:50:53
Speaker
you have to stay on the routine of keeping up on it. But I think other things like cross training can be really good.
Gear Practice and Preparation
00:51:00
Speaker
Um, doing some yoga, implementing some foam rolling stuff. If you can get body work done, I think that those things really helped me stay a little bit more functional and headed the game. Actually just saw the chiropractor today. And this is like my analogy. It's I typically see somebody that does other kinds of body work instead of chiropractic chiropractic to me is like the reactive.
00:51:22
Speaker
therapy. So instead of trying to go in because I'm hurt, I try to do other things that keep me from getting hurt so that I don't have to go to the chiropractor. Same thing with mobility, just trying to keep joints loose, trying to spend some time getting into those movements so that I don't put myself in a position where the next time I go to draw my bow, my shoulders locked up or I get hurt. Those things I think are super important to keep.
00:51:46
Speaker
So you mentioned bodywork. I don't think I think most people are going to bodywork is listed in the fitness type industry. So you're getting cupping done. What are you doing for bodywork?
00:51:56
Speaker
Yeah, it can be a lot of different things. Like you mentioned cupping or you can do some tuning, breath work. For me, I do body work. She does some lymphatic drainage just with some of the things that I have going on. But body work is essentially things that help your body perform better and tons of different modalities for that. I do red light therapy, sauna. I'd like to say cold soak, but that really only happens in the summer. Let's face it for me.
00:52:22
Speaker
And so, yeah, just implementing those things into my weekly routine are helping me get back to where I want to be. My off topic, again, my wife has a red light mask and she looks like she wears it in bed and she looks like like Iron Man.
00:52:39
Speaker
I've seen those, they crack me up. Yeah, it looks really funny. So talking about mobility, now what about on the job training, like for hunting? I feel I could squat all the way in the world, but I put a pack on and my hips hurt, my knees hurt. But if I put a pack on, now do it regularly, hike regularly. There's joints in your feet, there's different muscles you don't use until you hike.
00:53:02
Speaker
how much of your hunting training is based on that kind of stuff, like in the field carrying a pack.
00:53:08
Speaker
Yeah. Good question. And that, that for me changes throughout the year, depending on what the season is. So right now we're in shed hunting season and it looks like being super functional, actually having the pack on and the boots on and going out there and doing those things throughout the year. Like I don't tend to rock all season or excuse me, all year. I tend to add that in on those few months leading up to the hunting season, especially on our big game hunts or some of those bigger hunts that we do.
00:53:35
Speaker
But I definitely think that there's, you have to practice how you're going to play. You have to put your body through those same movements. And it's like even just putting on your pack is more beneficial than not having that experience. Cause yeah, you're using your upper body. You're using your core differently. You're using your back, your stabilizers, your feet, your arches.
00:53:57
Speaker
So if you're not replicating that, it's going to be a lot harder when you do put the pack on and go to go on the hunt. But definitely I always am a big fan of practice how you want to play. Yeah, I'm very similar to that. Like I don't rock all year long, but I will.
00:54:14
Speaker
probably starting like July, August, like to start doing like, we have a hill and forever house and I'll walk the hill with my wife and the dogs and I'll put all the, she'll be walking when I should probably running now. She's running now, but I'll wear a 50 pound or 60 pound pack and I'll walk up to that hill with my boots on as well. Cause that's important too, is how the boots on and just to get the big thing for me is like the stabilizers, the knees, the hips, the joints and getting those things broken in. And if I do that for a month or so before season, I'm pretty good to get out there and go and
00:54:41
Speaker
I've learned too a lot of this stuff where people are just like out there just pounding hills like I'm not there anymore and I don't have to be there I can be successful and not have to pound like I can still go as far as anybody I can get there I just don't have to be crazy about it.
Hawaiian Hunting Experience
00:54:56
Speaker
We're hitting that hour mark I typically like to have one one good hunting story before I wrap up so you want to hit us with a hunting story? What kind of what genre are we going for here?
00:55:05
Speaker
whatever you want. Just give me a funny one or a hard one or whatever you want. Something memorable. Something memorable. I am going to go with our trip to Hawaii last year. I got to take my best friend over to Hawaii and do an access deer hunt. And I'm going to spoiler alert right here. We did not kill an access deer. We didn't even
00:55:32
Speaker
fire any shots at this axis here but it was one of the coolest experiences and it was really cool because Christine got to be there and she's fighting stage four metastatic breast cancer and so just the ability to be out doing this experience and doing this hunt with her was really cool but we put ourselves up
00:55:51
Speaker
one day we walked up in this area that we were hunting and we found this really nice goal that was running down and there was sign everywhere and we were getting a little tired so we thought we'll sit down we'll just be quiet we'll hang out for a little bit she's the number one focus like I just want to get her an opportunity she's not something before I just really want to get her this opportunity so we're sitting there and we're just being quiet and
00:56:14
Speaker
The wind is good and all of us were sitting there for quite a while and all of a sudden she's like freaking out and like hitting me and she's, Courtney, there's an access to your right behind you. I'm like, how close right behind me? Like we had some communication things to work out. Like we had not hunted before together. And when you're with your partner, the lingo a little bit more. And so anyways, how close? And she's like eight yards. And, and so I'm like, get your bone. I can't get my bow. It's over there. So she couldn't move. And so I had my mind in my hand and,
00:56:43
Speaker
So my adrenaline hits. And I wish I could understand why sometimes it does and why sometimes it's a cucumber. I wish I could own that. And so I get it and I'm looking at her and I'm laughing. I look at her and I like show her my hand that's wiggling and we're kind of about it. And I get up and I'm able to move because he's moving behind this Ohia tree. And I get up and I get to full draw.
00:57:07
Speaker
And this thing totally pegs me and just from like probably eight yards away, just stares me down. And when he stopped, he was behind, he was perfectly had this like tree gap where I could see him. But then there was this rock. He was on the other side of this rock mound that perfectly covered up his vitals.
00:57:28
Speaker
And so I locked eyes with him. He locked eyes with me. She's crapping her pants. I'm pretty much crapping my pants. This thing's staring right at us and he just, he spooks and he turns and he made this really, it was almost like a bark noise. I had not heard an access to your make this noise before. And he was gone out of our lives. And then it just was like me saying several bad words in a row and then looking at her and we were laughing and we were crying and
00:57:52
Speaker
It wasn't a notch tag, it wasn't meat in the freezer, but it was so stinkin' cool to get to experience this incredible elusive public land animal with my best friend who's got this new lease on life. Like she might be fighting this cancer, but she's saying yes to all these adventures. So we had several fun and successful hunts this year with notch tags, but I think that one definitely stands out as being a big highlight for me.
00:58:21
Speaker
Yeah, I like where you're going with that. And my favorite part about hunting is that community that you have with somebody. I don't think anyone understands when you do something like that with somebody, there's a bonding thing there. It's almost like a carnal bonding. It's like we were meant to have. And to experience that with your friend is just a beautiful thing, and that's awesome.
00:58:39
Speaker
Where can we find you? You're on YouTube, you're on Instagram, you got podcasts, what you got?
Social Media and Podcast Invitation
00:58:45
Speaker
Yeah, I can be found on most platforms. Meta hates me, so I'm either there or canceled, who knows. But I'm on Instagram, YouTube, and our website at Her Outdoor Journey.
00:58:57
Speaker
And then you can also find the podcast on all major podcast apps and on Carbon TV, it's called the Soul Summit Podcast. And yeah, we have a lot of fun, talk about hunting and the outdoors, just trying to create space and opportunities for women and yeah, just bridging that gap of education. And if you want to get your wife to go to one of Courtney's summits, you go to her other journey.org.com. Dot com.
00:59:23
Speaker
And you can sign up for some of these events because it's several times coming up and that's when these events are, right? Coming up pretty quick. Absolutely. Yep. We've got some great things coming up this summer, including Alaska and Utah and Oregon and all the fun things. So definitely check it out. That's awesome. Thank you, Courtney. Of course. Thank you so much for having me on.
00:59:42
Speaker
Thank you for listening to the Tricer Podcast. Do us a favor and like and subscribe on whatever platform you are listening on. Give us a follow on Instagram and Facebook at TricerUSA and go and check out all of our innovative gear at www.tricerusa.com. Until next time, shoot straight, have fun, and always put God first.