2012 was a long fall hunting season for me.  September 1st I was chasing muleys in the North Dakota badlands without any arrows released.  Late September I was chasing elk on a weeklong backpack solo hunt in the Gravellies of Montana.  I shot at a nice bull the very first day, and I believe I hit him well, but I hunted that area four more days and never found a trace of him.  October brought a lot of pain as I broke my foot and still went pheasant hunting in the middle of the state.  November was North Dakota deer gun season, but none of my family or friends had a muley tag so I went to the Missouri River breaks of Montana with my son.  It snowed there on Thursday and we got there on Friday.  The roads were all clay and as slick as ice.  The heavy pickup couldn't stay on the road and we slid off into the ditch brush a couple times before getting traction.  It was miserable trying to get to the treed ravines that led to the river.  I tried one two track road off the main road and I almost slid the truck into a deep ravine and our death.  After hours of white knuckles on the steering wheel, I gave up and turned around to head out of the clay roads.  Luckily I noticed two deer within 100 yards of the road in a deep ravine.  We harvested a nice young (tasty) deer before dark.  After boning and hauling the deer meat out of the ravine and back to the truck, we drove two hours west to Lewistown and we hunted elk in the Little Belts the next day.  Zach was quite a trooper as we covered six miles through snow as deep as our knees.  Although we didn't see any elk, my 11 year old son got a taste of the harshness of the terrain and the challenge of elk hunting.  At least he should quite giving me a hard time each time I come back empty handed from elk hunting.

So by December I still had a ND archery tag and the weather was turning cold.  Late in the month I decided I was going one last weekend and I convinced my cousin, Adam, and a friend, Jake to go with.  With some second guessing, we went despite the night time low temps of 0 degrees.  We took my popup camper out to the badlands on Friday and when we set it up all the vinyl sidewalls cracked leaving big holes.  I guess 80 mph on the interstate for five hours at 0 degrees isn't good for a popup camper with flexible walls.  And to top it off, it was also too cold for our generator to start.  We took the handle off the generator, hauled the 150 lb. beast into the back seat of the cab, and turned the truck heat up until the generator would start.  We also used a portable propane heater to heat up the vinyl walls so they would unwrinkle and duct tape would stick to them.  After a couple hours of work we had a usable shelter.  We awoke at dawn to bitter cold and no wind which was very bad because there was snow on the ground and the deer could hear us coming.  We all went different directions, but on Saturday afternoon, Adam and I were watching the same deer and trying to sneak in from two different directions.  There was just a slight breeze from the south and the temps were in the teens so I felt a sneak would be useless.  Adam tried to sneak in from the SW and the deer sensed him.  It worked well as I was in a saddle above the deer and they came right by me.  I couldn't shoot a doe since ND had closed the muley doe season that year due to low numbers.  The last of the five deer was a small buck so I drew as he appeared at the top of the ravine.  He must have sensed me as he stopped.  I had guessed the range at 60 yards and sent an arrow right over his back.  He spooked closer to me away from the arrow.  He knew something was wrong in my direction. But it was too late for him as he cautiously peered around a small evergreen at 30 yards.  As soon as his chest was visible I put an arrow right in the center and it buried deep up to the fletching.  He bolted out of there but only made it 40 yards.  There was a lot of luck and gratitude involved in that harvest but now the work began.  It was about 3 pm and I had him boned and packed up by 4 pm.  It took a little over an hour to get to the truck two miles to the west.  That was a tough hunt mentally as fighting the cold while wearing three to five layers of wool clothing is straining.  And there was the constant downer of the loud snow which almost guaranteed stalking was pointless.  Thankfully a little luck met with relentless pursuit and there was venison in the cooler. 

My clothing worked well especially my thick wool pants and wool/poly under layers.  I got wet and the wool gets heavy, but I always stayed warm. 
Equipment: Hoyt Maxxis 35, Gold Tip Pro Hunter 7595, 100 Grim Reaper Razor Tip, Leica rangefinder, Truball handheld release, Swarovski binos, Kenetrek boots, Badlands 2800 backpack.