Gary Reeder
Back to the land of the living.....sorta
Monday, February 27, 2023, 13:12

Got back mid morning yesterday from 5 days at the Safari Club Convention center. 5 days counting the flight in and out. Larry Farley, Alcorn Russell and I had a really good time although extremely tiring walking several miles a day trying to take in all the top of the line guns, accessories, clothes, and hunt booking agents. Spent some time with Bob Baker of Freedom Arms, gun writer Mark Hampton, the folks at Hornady, the people at Life Form Taxidermy in Africa, and my very close friend and African Professional Hunter for over 30 years John Abraham and his wife Lauri of Madubula Safaris. I am sure there were a couple dozen more that I can't think of right now, but it was a great if tiring time in Nashville.
The only bad time was leaving Nashville and heading home. I flew out of Nashville Saturday mid afternoon. Arrived in Phoenix Saturday evening. Headed home in I-17 Saturday evening only to see signs everywhere saying "Flagstaff Closed" and saying all highways closed due to extremely heavy snowfall. I turned around and headed back into Phoenix. I pulled into almost a dozen motels only to find they were all filled due to some sort of golf tournament. I ended up staying at some flea bag motel in the really bad part of town. I heard several shots before I even got my bags out of my truck into the room. I slept on top of the sheets so as not to bother the cockroaches. And slept with my 45 in my hand.
I got up early, and went to grab some breakfast and heard that I-17 was partially open. I got home about 10AM yesterday only to find we had well over 90 inches of snow while I was gone. The news said Flagstaff got 90 inches. Out where we live at over 8000 feet we got considerably more. I had to park my truck on the side of the road as the snow in my drive way was around 5 feet deep. Colleen's truck was also on the side of the road. She had a young man lined up with a big front end loader to clear out the driveway. My driveway is about 65 yards long and the front end loader came close to getting stuck in the low spots. He got most of it cleared down to about 18" deep. After he left I got my big snow blower and from about 11:30 AM to 6:30 last evening I spent trying to clear the driveway. Unfortunately the wind was blowing at 40 to 60 MPH across the drive so the snow kept piling up as quick as I could get it moved out.
So all in all I think I will pass on the convention next year unless they have it in June.