It has often been said that behind every great man is a good woman. Well I think the same can be said that behind every successful woman, there is a great man. I have always known that the guide service is a joint effort between Big E and I. We each put ourselves into everything we do, one way or another. Yesterday I went out to establish some new bait sites, and had to do so without the company of Big E who is healing from a recent surgery. I have always been the navigator as I can read and interpret a map and compass very well. I have a fair understanding of a GPS. The large land owners who we lease hunting lands from require GPS coordinates for all bait sites. Easy enough. I mark their locations and name them so I can look them up on the GPS and it tells me how close I'am to the nearest and so on. However, yesterday I could have easily thrown our Garmin E-Trax out the window in pure frustration!!! Big E and I went over these new grounds early this spring and it was no problem for me to use the Gazette and navigate the roads we were on to the locations we had chosen. However, to find the exact spots was a bit more difficult. I will give myself some credit as the majority of them I walked to the exact location, but not because of the GPS, but because I remembered exactly our thoughts and reasons for the positions we chose. Here is where a few got really frustrating; things looks much different with full foliage and marking tapes tied to limbs that were naked at the time disappeared. Not only that, and I have noticed this before; there is marking ribbons all through the Maine woods!!!! I mean they are everywhere and every color!!! Therefore out of the 12 sites I visited, I found 9 with no trouble at all, however the other 3 were aggravating to say the least! I wasted an hour going back and forth before I gave up on one and just said, well boys, this looks like a good spot!!!! Big E kept track of me and the crew with the occasional phone call to my cell asking how are you doing, and how many have you got done, but without his eyes....well I did the best that I could. Beautiful bear grounds with excellent sign, after all, does a bear...well you know...in the woods?!
Anyway......I had 15 sites to open up, of which I accomplished to do 12. Now I feel this is also a good thing as often it takes us the same amount of time to do half the number of sites. Of course we need to go back, clear the paths and make them clearly identifiable for our hunters, trim shooting lanes and place tree stands and blinds which will take a great amount of time and effort. I will admit that part of the business I don't often do. I enjoy running the bait sites, but when it comes down to the nitty gritty of getting the sites prepared Big E usually over sees this part of the operations, and that was before his operation! So I will once again have to venture over with the crew and get this work done and in the mean time the preparations I usually take care of back at home base are waiting....... On top of all this, my alias, of which I have 2, One is "Lady Guide" and the other is "Blackcloud", the later being that if something can go wrong it will, and it did. My 1998 truck which we have been trying so very hard to keep on the road as it is the major vehicle we truly need for the business ended up being left for the wrecker to retrieve. We have put a rebuilt motor in her back in 06, July 06 to be exact, and a transmission last fall. Now I'm not a mechanic. I have a general understanding of engines thanks to my Dad, but no matter what, it is not good. Big GYM as we call her lost power, bogged down and we could not finish the last 3 baits I had set out to accomplish. So this rolls around to...I need to do many things and I need to do them without some of the most important parts, Big E and Big GYM!!! This should get interesting........
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