The Goal Is to Wear Out Another Pair

I don't know exactly how many miles are on these boots.

My best guess is somewhere between 600 and 700 miles, with most of those miles coming from elk hunting in Colorado.

They don't look like much anymore. They're scratched, stained, worn down, and permanently carrying pieces of mountains I've walked across.

Every mark has a story. A climb. A long day. A wrong turn. A ridge that looked closer than it was. A morning that started before daylight. A walk back to camp when I was already exhausted.

Eventually, I'll replace them.

That's the goal.

I don't want a pair of hunting boots that lasts forever because they sit in a closet eleven months out of the year.

I want to wear them out.

More importantly, I want to have a body capable of wearing out another pair.

The Price of the Experience

Western elk hunting isn't cheap.

And I'm not just talking about money.

There is obviously a financial cost. Tags, travel, equipment, food, gear, and everything else that goes into getting yourself onto a mountain hundreds of miles from home.

But money might be the easiest price to pay.

There's time.

Time away from family. Time away from work. Time spent preparing. Days traveling. Days hunting. Months planning for a relatively small window of opportunity each year.

And then there's the physical price.

Miles.

Elevation.

Heavy packs.

Cold mornings.

Sore feet.

Long climbs followed by long descents. And waking up the next morning sore and tired, putting those same boots back on, and doing it all over again.

Western elk hunting asks something from you.

It requires preparation. It requires sacrifice. It requires a body that can perform and a mind willing to keep going when that body gets tired.

That's part of what I've come to appreciate about it.

We spend a lot of our lives trying to make things easier, faster, and more convenient. But some of the experiences that mean the most to us are valuable precisely because they aren't easy.

The price for these experiences is high.

That's part of what makes them valuable.

Where the World Slows Down

For all the physical difficulty of the mountains, there are moments out there that are almost the complete opposite.

Those may be my favorite.

You've been moving for hours and finally stop.

Maybe you're sitting against a tree. Maybe you're on the side of a ridge with miles of country below. Maybe you're waiting to hear a bugle somewhere in the distance.

And suddenly everything gets quiet.

No phone demanding your attention.

No schedule.

No emails.

No business problems that need solving.

No place you need to be in fifteen minutes.

Just mountains. Trees. Wind. The sound of your own breathing. And whatever happens to be moving through the country around you.

The world slows down.

You notice things you'd normally walk right past.

You listen.

You think.

You pray.

You become incredibly aware of how small you are compared to the country surrounding you, and how big God is.

There's a perspective that comes with that kind of quiet that is hard to find in everyday life.

"Be still, and know that I am God." — Psalm 46:10

There are places in the mountains where that verse doesn't just make sense. You feel it.

And those moments are difficult to explain to someone who hasn't experienced them.

Maybe that's part of why I keep going back.

There is something almost ironic about it:

Sometimes you have to work incredibly hard to get somewhere quiet enough to slow down.

And maybe that's part of the price too.

Hundreds of miles in these boots have taken something out of me.

But they've given me something in return.

Perspective. Experience. Gratitude. Resilience. And memories that were worth every mile.