Fathers pass on hunting camp tradition to their young sons

What’s in a name?

On their face, they don’t really mean anything; but taken with their deeper context, a name can sometimes tell a story.

We have names for the places at our elk camp in southwest Montana.

There is Lost Tooth Creek, where my young son lost a tooth one year; There is Eight-Second Ridge, where I was thrown from a horse while chasing loose horses; and there’s Laira’s Spring, where a friend shot her first elk. Those names now are being passed to the next generation of elk hunters in our camp: our young sons. While my sons have been experiencing our elk camp for a few years now, my friend Robbe’s son is the newest addition to our elk camp legacy. 

Getting to our camp is not always easy, and when it’s a six-hour drive from Bigfork, it can be grueling. I showed up at elk camp last Saturday morning after a long slog through the night highways. I left my car at the trailhead at about 4 a.m. and struck out into the cold morning air. After a 30-minute steep hike to camp, I threw my gear inside my tipi and shouted to the wall tent next door. No one was up. 

“Hey Reese, throw another log on our fire, will ya?” Robbe asked from inside the tent. I peeked inside and was hit with a nice gush of warm air from the stove; standing outside it registered 11 below Saturday morning. Plus wind chill.

Robbe’s son, Parker, was sound asleep, curled up in his sleeping bag. I walked off into the light of the morning. Our creek had four inches of ice on it.

The cold had a purple feel to it. Everything looked purple; the sky, even the air.

 I hadn’t slept all night, and was on my own in the arctic weather. I hiked to the ridge above camp, and lasted about an hour before I succumbed to the cold and lack of sleep and trudged back to camp. I fired up the wood stove in my tipi and drifted into slumber.  

Robbe, his son, and I had a pleasant afternoon hunt later that day. It was good to see how Robbe interacted with his son, 12. Robbe has always been a very outspoken and strong-willed member of our camp since its beginning in 1993. I have been to blows with him before, good naturedly of course, and we were left bruised but better off for it. We respect each other. Seeing him working with his son on all the aspects of hunting — from how to make a fire, to gun safety and helping cooking — made my heart smile. On Saturday night, I watched a few stars drift past an opening in my tipi, while Robbe and his son played cards next door. Families have their own languages and dialects. I listened as Robbe and Parker shouted, laughed and sang into the night. Theirs was a language all their own.

Here in this tiny piece of heaven we are passing on our stories and our place names to our sons.

While our hunting camp is a long way from the Flathead Valley, when I look at photos of the camp and the memories we’re making with our sons, one word comes to mind: home.