One Heck Of A Ride

155 World Record Tur the entire flight. They refused to budge when the stewardess asked them to move or allow others to sit in the empty seats, and they were the first off the plane when we landed at the airport outside Odessa, where they were picked up by the driver of a long black limousine that was waiting on the tarmac for them. I’d felt uncomfortable sitting near them, and I still don’t know if it was money or drugs they were carrying. An interpreter and a bodyguard wearing camouflage and a handgun -– he was six feet four inches tall and weighed 300 pounds -- met me inside the terminal. The interpreter, a young lady who spoke good English, said the bodyguard was needed because the city wasn’t safe for foreigners. The lodge where I spent the night was clean and comfortable. The guy at the desk said rather proudly that all the vodka anyone could drink was included in the room rate. We beganmy hunt the next morning by driving into the mountains and parking at a trailhead, where the interpreter, our driver, a housekeeper, a cook, my guide, several other people whose job was to help carry my tur off the mountain and I and started walking and leading a packhorse loaded with our food and gear. After about five hours on the trail, our large group came to a rock house that would be our camp for the next four Guide looks down at the one –room makeshift rock hut that provided shelter for the entire eastern tur hunting party. Author rated the nearly vertical rocky terrain the second-most dangerous place he ever hunted nights. It had only one room and everyone slept in it. We didn’t see many animals in the days I hunted there but I eventually shot the best tur I could find, a small but mature male. I had taken it in the most potentially dangerous place I had ever hunted up to then. The terrain was nearly straight up, and it seemed every rock for miles around was loose and ready to come tumbling down on us. This is where all the extra help came in. Everyone helped carry my tur to a stream, load it on the packhorse and lead the animal back to the rock house in the lower mountains. Back at the little house, our crew had set up two card tables with big jugs of vodka near a fire and served tasty snacks of the tur’s heart and liver that we washed down with vodka. I spent some time inspecting my tur before it The mountains on the Caucasian chamois hunt. The Chamois landed on the first shelf