I was probably no older than 13, but maybe 14. At least old enough to drive myself down in the pasture to kill a deer.

We had company in from California. My mother’s youngest sister and her husband.

Knowing I’d have better luck if I went across the fence that bordered us to the west. That was LCRA Property. There was no hunting allowed on the LCRA.

To young boys, especially sons of Cecil Lewis, there were certain rules that we didn’t abide by. Especially that one. Either those same deer had just left our property or would be crossing over to our land real soon.

We had deer, plenty of deer on our place, but it was hard to find the right vantage point to get the best shot. Hence my wanting to hunt in the LCRA. There was a high hill overlooking a draw where the deer traveled. Climb high on the hill and you could see almost all the way to tomorrow. That was good in more ways that just seeing a big buck. Just in case the Game Warden decide to come check on things, I’d be able to see him a long time before he got there. No decent roads led to that part of the LCRA Pasture.

Way before sun up I had made my way on foot to a nice perch on a hillside. As I started hearing the first gun shots of opening morning, that sound traveled for miles up the river on a still morning, I knew it wouldn’t be long before it was my best chance of seeing something.

I could hear noise down in the brush below me. The sound of sticks breaking and limbs popping. Then there he was. A nice buck, an 8 point. Then right behind him was another one, a 6 point. In no time at all I made 2 shots and knew I had 2 kills.

After gathering up my belongings, I always had to have a sack full of goodies to eat, I looked and here came a big doe. Never one to miss a chance to put more venison in the freezer, I laid her down too.

I guess I didn’t exactly calculate all my moves that morning. You see it was approximately 500-600 yards from the deer to the closest place I could drive the pickup to.

I field dressed all three deer and single handedly dragged them out over some fairly rugged ground. It turned into an all morning task.

Driving back up to the house with a pickup full of deer sure did impress those kinfolks.

I didn’t think so at the time, but now I look back to why wasn’t someone worried enough about a young boy to come down in the pasture to check on me. I guess that just shows that things were so much different growing up in the 60s.

The photo below shows the pasture road where I would have parked, but at that time the Park and all those houses and other roads weren’t there. There was nothing but me and nature there that morning.