It is the quiet season. Hunting season. That is a bit ironic, isn't it?
I started my annual invasion of Utah a couple weeks early this year. It was quite a surprise to see so many hunters around. A couple hunters explained to me about a change in the hunting season this year, resulting in a lot of elk hunters.
I never hear any guns during hunting season! Just think of all the equipment these guys own, the fees, and all the trouble they go to; and apparently, most of them never get a shot off.
Maybe they see hunting season as just an excuse to drive around in their side-by-sides in cool refreshing weather, camp with the boys, and escape the women-folk for a few days.
It can be enjoyable to be exposed to the culture and comradery of sports that you know nothing about it. I have experienced this with mule-handlers and long-distance horse riders. Even hang gliders, a couple times. I wish it happened more often. Fly fishing culture interests me; identifying animal tracks; learning survival skills.
Not everything is recreation. It is possible to have interesting conversations with gas-field workers, ranchers, firewood collectors, and road-grader operators! It takes some luck and skill to talk to guys who have a job to do. Ranching, in particular, is something that would be fun to know more about. It is what the land in the western states is best at. Oddly enough, I have never had a chance to talk to a logger.
It seems counter-intuitive but normally I avoid hikers and even mountain bikers, probably because they are part of the culture of the big cities. Oddly I am turned off by most campers, who seem like mere scenery tourists and generator-morons.
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