Saturday was the last day of the convention which ended with another dinner event at the Peppermill. Obviously, tonight would be the grand finale because Sarah Palin was going to be the keynote speaker. She’s been the hottest ticket in town.

We finally had a day to sleep in and lose a little money at the tables after two straight days of running the convention floor all day long. I was beginning to see african art in my sleep. (Luckily, I didn’t make it down in time to bet on the aggies against nebraska today.)

Five people from my group had tickets to tonight’s event in the Tuscany ballroom.

Just like last night, the place was jam-packed with suit-n-tie wearing hunters from all over the world. What I found interesting about a lot of the guys I talked to was that most of them will leave the country for three or four months to hunt, and they’ll travel to 4 or 5 different countries during that time. No wonder every award winner that stepped to the podium that night thanked their wives first.

SCI presented the Hall of Fame award, the International Hunter of the Year award & the Diana award (for an outstanding female hunter) to get the night going. I’m starting to realize that there’s a whole different level of hunting that goes on around here. At least different than what I’m used to.

One of the night’s surprises was Larry Potterfield. He gave a rousing speech about the direction of our great country and the important roles that the people of the Safari Club and the NRA should play in leading it. I always thought Larry was just some gunsmithing guy who paid for a lot of Midway USA commercials on the Outdoor Channel, but he was really inspiring. He even had to assure the audience that he wasn’t running for office. It was that kind of speech.

The bar was set for ‘former’ governor Palin to come out and she hit the stage running. She talked mainly about hunting, conservation and politics of course. Without taking many breaths, she continued the theme of making our country better and what she believes it’ll take to get that done. She took a few swings at the current regime in Washington, much to the delight of this crowd. She also talked a lot about her upbringing in Alaska and how connected her family is to the land. It’s no wonder that hardly anything the media dishes out phases her. She walked off to another standing ovation.

And that concluded our weekend with SCI. We left before the auction started. I think the first item was a guided hunt with Jim Shockey. I doubt it would’ve been in our price range.

It was a whirlwind weekend to say the least, and I’d feel remiss if I didn’t thank the Safari Club Foundation for creating an award in the very obscure field that we call ‘disabled hunting’. Thanks to you and all the donors that support your programs, Oelofse Safaris, Sandhurst Safaris, Highveld taxidermy, Fauna & Flora and Cabela’s. We’re going to be able to reach more people than you’ll ever know.

It was a little bit awe inspiring when rolling into the Tuscany Ballroom at the Peppermill hotel where all the nightly events were held. This room is vast, which seems to be the theme of everything I’ve been to this week, almost 3,000 people were seated for a dinner event. Tonight, I’m being presented with the Pathfinder award which is given to accomplished disabled hunters who have helped other challenged outdoorsmen & women get back in the field.

The stage was set and I got ushered to one of the head tables near stage left. I had no idea this award was so prestigious until now. My sincere thank you goes to the Safari Club for creating an award in this obscure field we call disabled hunting. I can feel the electricity in the air.

I got to sit by Ron bartels’ lovely wife Jackie, both of whom are from Louisiana. Naturally, we got along great since half my family is from there (so long as nobody brought up the cotton bowl score.) I also had an entourage of friends & family there to share this night with me. They had a reserved table right next to ours, and the party was just getting started.

Before I knew it, I was backstage and watching the video that they made about me before I was presented the Pathfinder award onstage. Let me tell you, I was 50/50 on whether I was going to cry or not out there. I was already tearing up when the video started. Hard to believe the journey to this spot began 25 years ago with some cloth tape and a flimsy metal device they sent me home from the rehab with (for holding a pen). That’s a long stretch of time guys, lots of ups & downs. I held my water though.

Maybe I can post the video on youtube someday when I get it. Anyway, Alex Oelofse presented me with my award and we got a standing ovation, even though we couldn’t see it with all the q-beam strength lights in our eyes. A grand time was had by all.

Two lessons I’ve learned over the years:

1. Learning takes the sting out of failure.
2. When your life is changed by a tragic event, as soon as you find some meaning in that journey, it ceases to be a tragedy.

Made it over to the convention hall about 9:40am this morning. Eva Wilson & Ron Bartels were both waiting there for me at the Humanitarian Services booth. (That’s the branch of safari club that runs the blue bag program and all the disabled hunter services which includes the pathfinder award.)

We all went over to the Oelofse’s booth so I could introduce my dad to Jan & Annette and Ron could present Jan with yet another donor plaque for his generosity toward the program. Dad bought Jan’s book and we had another long talk about hunting in Namibia. Alex and I talked about maybe going after a mountain zebra on my safari. I’m pumped!

From there, Ron took us over to Jim Shockey’s booth so we could meet and talk to him too. Ron has hunted several times with Jim and I believe he knows almost everybody that’s worth knowing in this whole building. About every ten steps, someone stops to talk to him. Ron said both Jim and his daughter Eva were there earlier (and that Eva is really “worth meeting”). They weren’t there though. Rumor had it that Jim had slipped away to book a few hunts for himself before his wife Louise found out about it.

From there, Dad & I headed off on our own to browse through the myriad of outfitters, artists, merchants, taxidermists, tv personalities & auction items that were spread out among four different rooms. The place was vast, and let me tell you, some of the highest quality show stuff I’ve ever seen. We could’ve literally spend three solid days here looking at just the art & awesome taxidermy.

Passed by the African Hunting Gazette booth next. As I rolled up, I asked the lady behind the counter if the next issue was out, to which she replied “Yes, and you’re in there. Don’t worry.” Ha! I wasn’t expecting her to recognize me. I didn’t know she was the person in charge of article submissions. Needless to say, I was impressed and now y’all know I have a published piece in one of the ‘big’ safari magazines. They gave me a few copies and we were on our way. Oh by the way, they had a full mounted porcupine at the booth that was a gorgeous mount. I’m putting one on my wish list for Namibia this summer.

Since my award dinner was that night, dad & I left early so I could get some rest before it was time. Whew!

(On the way out, we heard that we’d missed Sean Connery by about ten minutes at the humanitarian services booth. Sorry dad, you could’ve met one of your idols and the 2nd best James Bond.)

Landed in Reno, NV, about 10:30am last Thursday and my excitement level was peaking to finally be here. There was an accessible shuttle to Harrah’s, but since we’d have to wait a half hour for it, so dad and I took a cab. Safari Club booked a room for me at the Peppermill, but my ‘entourage’ of family and friends were all staying at Harrah’s downtown.

The weather is perfect, cool & sunny. After lunch, I left my crew and caught the shuttle over to the SCI convention at the Reno-Sparks convention hall. There, I found Eva Wilson at the Humanitarian Services Booth (who takes care of the Pathfinder Award winners.) She made me feel like a V.I.P. and took me over to meet Jan Oelofse of Oelofse Safaris. Jan and his family are going to be hosting me on my 10-day safari in June as part of my award. They generously donated the hunt to our cause. I immediately liked Jan. He’s a legend in the safari world because of his early work capturing animals for zoos, guiding John Wayne, and training animals for the movie Hatari. His lovely wife, Annette, showed me Jan’s book that she wrote called ‘Capture to be Free’, while his son Alex and I talked about hunting and some of the things I could expect to see on my trip. They are fantastic people with a passion for hunting. I can’t tell you how lucky I am to be going with them. Alex also showed me a bunch of pics from disabled hunters that they have hosted in the past, and we talked about me bringing my crossbow with me when I come. Booyah!

Alex then took me over to the Highveld taxidermy booth to meet Thomas. They are donating all the taxidermy for my safari so you dcan imagine what kind of day it was becoming for me. ‘Great meeting you Thomas!’

The SCI convention is flat out huge in every sense of the word. This is by far the biggest & best I’ve ever seen. It didn’t look like any expense had been spared and the sheer volume of things to see was dizzying.

I did spot Craig Boddington signing books on my way out. I couldn’t stay long today because I had to meet my people for dinner and then get back to the Peppermill for therapy. More tomorrow…

I hunt on private property in southwest Va. This year the woods in my area are plentiful in all types of acorns. Everyone knows nine times out of ten if there are many white oak acorns that will be a large part of the deer’s diet. All my preseason scouting lead showed that all the sign was not in the woods but in a natural funnel that went to a very isolated field on a logging road . This field was created by the landowner when he cleared out many autumn olive bushes on the road . The fields size was very close to a football field. He sowed grass and put down straw over the freshly reconstructed piece of land. As the tender young grass came up the deer could not get enough of this grass . I put a trail camera on the heavily used trail down through the funnel to the field.There was virtually no sign in the woods at all these deer were all flocking to this young grass. The problem was there was no possible way to bowhunt close to this field because there was no suitable trees around the field and the funnel was too thick to hunt in it . But it was an excellent muzzleloader and rifle stand . There were 3 nice bucks taken from this spot and one by me.