The Rabbit Hunter

A couple weekends ago Andre and I had the chance to get away for a couple days and stay up in the mountains in West Virginia. My parents--or rather my dad, since my mom doesn't really ever go there--own a hunting camp in Cass, not far from Snowshoe. We used to go up there every Christmas break as a family and go skiing, and I even took a big group of people from school last February for a ski trip. But after five years, Andre still had not had the pleasure of staying at "camp" as we call it. On the drive there, he tried to get me to explain more what it was like. "It's a cabin, right?" he asked. Mmm, that sounds a little too quaint. "A lodge?" Still too quaint. It's just a very hard place to describe. It's an older, two-story house with five bedrooms but only one bathroom (although there is a VERY nice outhouse for when the house is full), furnished and decorated mainly with my mom's (and other wives) discarded things and all the animal heads/antlers/skins that are not allowed in to be hung in their home. I will say, the kitchen is kind of charming because there is this big old wood burning stove and a huge farmhouse sink.

Anyways, we went up there to get away and just relax before the craziness of third year started. We were planning on going cycling on the trail, but since the forecast called for thunderstorms every day, we didn't even bother taking our bikes. We did take fishing stuff, but didn't end up doing that either. So what did we do? Well...we went rabbit hunting. (Ok, not really hunting--we just took a long walk around dad's property, and saw a bunch. No animals were harmed in the taking of these pictures.) It turned out to be pretty easy, since my brother-in-law apparently planted several small gardens just to bait the animals out into the open. Thanks Brian!

Here are some pictures of the rabbit hunter in action.

No deer sightings until our drive home--we saw three, very conveniently running right in front of our car. No close calls though, and everyone lived. There was even a little tiny spotted fawn with its mama. Maybe one day I'll see that fawn again...in a bowl of stew.