And in a world where troubling things like to compound by happening at the worst time, S/O's car started to have issues. At least we've had good service from the dealership. It might be more expensive, but being over 1000 miles away makes me between helpless and useless. The dealership will almost certainly cost more, but in this situation, it is likely the option which makes the most sense.
The situation ended up (probably) not being the battery, so hopefully no more issues. This isn't as gratifying as it would have been if I hadn't been so far away.
After breakfast, Chris took Pat and I out for fishing once again. Numbers of fish were good. There were a few periods where we seemed to drift into schools of small pike. I also brought in one decent smalley as it took a few fantastic jumps out of the water on the way into the boat.
Near the end of our fishing morning, we came across a couple eagles. We wanted to lure one of them in close for some pictures, but fishing slowed down a bit and we couldn't even seem to be able to catch small pike by that point.
After lunch, Lockler took Carla and me out for bears. I was dropped off at Wall-E Bay. Forecast for the evening was rain, but as I got settled it was quite pleasant with a light warm breeze, mostly away from the bait. As the afternoon progressed, wind picked up and clouds thickened.
I was wearing my rain gear, which felt like the right decision even if it was claustrophobic and sticky. I'm not sure why, but I had a very difficult time getting comfortable on the stand. Was that the slight angle it sat at? Or is it just me after 18+ hours in tree stands? Maybe I'm just getting older?
It was still a nice afternoon, but I started to get a bit apprehensive as I could hear thunder in the distance. The wind increased to where, at one point, I heard a large tree nearby crack and fall to the ground. I grabbed my phone and dropped off Airplane Mode to get a look at the short term forecast and radar. Rain was definitely approaching the area.
I looked up to see a bear walk into the bait. It looked at least reasonably sized so I dropped my phone and slowly brought my gun up. The bear was very skittish; he stuck his nose into the air and sniffed, took two steps, looked right through me and left. I kept my gun on my shooting sticks for the next 30 minutes hoping he would come back.
It felt worse that I was looking at my phone when the bear came in, although the rational me knows that the situation would not have been any different regardless of what I was doing. Unless I had had my gun up right when he came in, any shot would have been impossible. But I still mercilessly beat myself up over it; I'm very good at this. The time the bear was there wasn't even enough time to adequately size up the bear. In my memory, it was taller but rather thin. I'm not sure I should trust that claude-glass perception though.
It started raining around 7:00. I had made a plan for this eventuality and was dressed for it, so it wasn't terrible. I'm not sure what happened to the big blob of rain I saw on the radar, but after 15 minutes, the rain tapered to just intermittent spits. With the heavy clouds it got dark early; I was more than ready to be out of the stand. The (open) boat ride back to camp was quite unfun as rain decided to pick up again at that point.
Back in camp, Pat had got a bear. Dinner that night started with one of Rick's donated backstraps which Carter had cooked exceedingly well. People were going to start leaving in the morning, with four of us yet without bears.
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