One Heck Of A Ride

202 The South Pacific The frost still was heavy the next morning, and Marty again decided to relax at the lodge. I was having trouble deciding which of four stags The Author and a good Red Stag we’d seen both days I wanted to shoot. When Mike and I returned for lunch, Marty indicated she would accompany us for the afternoon’s hunt. Right away, we found the big stag and his partner that we’d been watching, and I put the largest stag down with one shot from Mike’s Mannlicher- Schoenauer .308 Winchester. The next day, the three of us headed for the highest peak around, where Mike asked Marty Marty and Author putting their rock on “The Great Wall of Happiness”. and me to each place a rock on what he called “The Great Wall of Happiness.” He said it was a tradition on that estate for every hunter who reached that site to be asked to add a rock. “It brings the best of luck and safety,” he said. About a third of the way up the peak, we bumped a herd of Arapawa sheep. “Take the dark one,” Mike said, and I did. (My ram had argali-like horns and a coat of fine wool. These feral sheep originally were found only on Arapaoa Island in the Marlborough Sounds where they were isolated from other sheep since their release in 1867. They were introduced to New Zealand’s hunting estates after the SCI record book began accepting their entries.) As we were heading off the mountain with my ram after leaving our rock, Marty said she would like to go to the estate’s rifle range and Guide Mike Moss and Marty at the range checking on the rifle do some shooting. We spent at least an hour at the range, and I could tell that she enjoyed it. We were returning to the lodge when we drove up on five rams, including one with exceptional horns. I askedMike to stop so I could shoot him. I changed my mind as I got off the all-terrain vehicle. “Marty, get over here and get a rest,” I said. “You take him.” Without stopping to think, she found the ram