…stood in the high
snow-mist shrouded crags and watched the greatest of white rams
appearing and disappearing in the snow-mist like a ghostly shadow,
only to have his shadowy form slip away into oblivion---leaving you
trying to believe you really were there and saw it?
…sat spellbound and
shaking while the greatest of all land carnivores, the mighty brown
bear, slips his shadowy form into the water right before your eyes
and silently grabs a powerful King Salmon like it were a leaf and
retreat to the dense alders from where he came; making not a single
noise in the 30 seconds it took him to do so?
…felt the ground shaking
as the same brown bear makes his valiant attempt to show you that
this was his home and not yours?
…laid on the greatest of
all beds---the endless tundra on a clear day and watched as far in
all directions as you could see and not see anywhere that there were
not caribou moving like ants on a hundred anthills?
…been awakened in the
early dawn by the crashing of mighty antlers and got up to watch and
listen to what seemed like the battle of the century as two of the
kings of all deer, the giant Alaska-Yukon moose, made the whole
silent country sound like a battlefield as they fought for the
affections of a cow standing unconcerned nearby?
…ascended through the
mist of avalanche after avalanche to reach the base of some high
cliffs only to stand and stare in disbelief as yet another avalanche
rockets out over you from a thousand feet above---as you watch forty
yards away, a group of phlegmatic and ancient looking mountain goats
feeding amongst the falling snow, ice and rock debris as if nothing
was happening?
…laid awake on a
thousand different nights listening to the noise of the Northern
Lights and the mournful sonnets of wolves, hoping and praying that
you would find one waiting for you on your trapline the next day?
…just sat in the vast
silence where as far as you could see, there was not another human
soul and thanked God for that opportunity?
