Gearing Up for a Hunt, Meeting George Clooney (and His Dad) and Missing the Kentucky Velvet

My husband and I are always keeping our eyes and ears open for good hunting property to lease, so how excited were we when two of our friends approached us this summer and asked if we wanted to join them on a lease in Kentucky. Our response? Heck YEAH! On the plus side, it was super affordable. Even better, it’s covered with turkeys. I mean, they could have just started out with saying turkeys, and we were in!!

Come whitetail archery season, which was Sept. 1-9, 2017, our husbands had to work, so us ladies took over camp. And by camp, I mean a teeny, tiny, old camper used basically for sleeping—and that’s it. So yep, we had to turn a groundhog hole in the barn into “facilities” and brush our teeth from water bottles, but that will always be my favorite kind of hunting camp. I’ve never been too worried about what I look like while hunting, but having just received my brand new  DSG Outerwear hunting gear, I felt like a rock star! A girl can never deny loving that she has new hunting gear, and covered in DSG Realtree Xtra Camo from head to toe, I was ready to go!!

We were extremely hopeful after our trail cameras showed some good shooter bucks coming in very consistently to corn and mineral over the last month, including a GIANT that my friend, Cheryl, has had her eye on since last season. The buck I was after was going between two different stands, and according to the cameras, I was unfortunately at the wrong stand the first two days. On the second evening, Cheryl drove back into camp, jumped from the cab while throwing her hands in the air and shouting, “I missed him, I missed him, Rachelle! He came in, and I missed him—twice.” Just then her husband called, and I stood there, speechless, listening to her explain the heartbreaking story as she tried not to cry.

Now at this point, I hadn’t even seen a picture of the buck Cheryl was after. She was keeping it a secret, and for good reason. After she calmed down some, we checked the trail camera photos from that evening and wowzers! My jaw hit the ground. It was every inch of a 180-class buck in full velvet. You could see that her arrow had landed about a foot in front of the buck’s head, so I tried to convince her that she must have hit a limb or a leaf. Cheryl said she wasn’t even shook up and felt that she took her time, but after missing twice, she felt like maybe her bow was off. The next morning, at 5:30 a.m., I was headed to the stand, once again sitting until late morning and not seeing anything. Cheryl had texted me and said she shot her bow and it was dead on, so the mystery of the two misses still remains.

We then headed into town to eat breakfast. Cheryl had previously told me that George Clooney’s parents lived a few streets over from the restaurant, but we never would have imagined that George Clooney himself, along with his parents, would be in the restaurant that morning. As I glanced over at him, I gave him a crooked smile and just took my seat. I didn’t want to be a crazed fan hovering over him with my camera in his face, trying to take a selfie or anything. But just then, George’s dad spoke to us, asking what we were doing up so early on a Saturday morning, and that we should be in bed. I chuckled, considering it was almost 11 a.m., and told him proudly with a huge smile on my face, “We’re hunting!” He replied with, “Oh, well I have the highest hopes for you to miss and go home empty-handed!” My smile immediately melted down my face. Ugh.

We of course didn’t take offense, and as funny as it was, sadly, that’s exactly what happened that week. Cheryl missed her 180 and never saw him again, and I never saw a shooter, period. But, we did get to spend time in the woods enjoying God’s creation, including some spectacular sunrises and sunsets, girl talk and a week of “roughing it.” Because hunting is never just about the killing!