Hunting Saturday February 28th, 2009 – 10:00AM
Valley Green Farm (Bridlespur Kennels)

Huntsman: Eleanor Hartwell (Jack)

Whips: Gene Deutsch (Gus), Lee Deutsch (Belle), Tess Fleishli (Waffles), Jill Wagenknect (AJ), Christy DeMauro (guest on Camo)

First Field: Jean Mutrux (fieldmaster) (on Pee Wee), Abby Mutrux (Hoppy), Ron Ausman (Toby), Michael Murphy (Fred), Leslie Granger (Lucy DoD), Joy Yates (Seamus)

14 couple hounds

GPS readings 10.7 miles – 2 hrs 6 minutes moving, 40 minutes stopped. Moving average 5.1 mph. Max speed 17.7 mph. Total time 2 hrs 46 minutes.

Lunch/Brunch – Southwest Chicken Enchiladas and Salad prepared by Michael Murphy. Apple pie made by Jean and Abby Mutrux.

I woke up expecting the hunt to be cancelled. They were predicting, snow, extreme cold, and high winds. I woke up and looked outside and there was no snow. I called the hotline and it sounded like things were still on. So I dragged myself out of my warm bed and started to get ready. The ground was frozen and hard. The temperature went from 26 degrees when we started and warmed up slightly to 28 degrees. The wind was cold and steady from the Northeast at about 10-12 mph with gusts over 20mph. The barometric pressure was rising slowly. There was not a big field as many others had expected the hunt to be cancelled. Christy DeMauro had won the “ride with a whip” at the Queeny Park silent auction and was riding with Jill for the day.

We headed down the driveway and Eleanor cast the hounds in the woods south of the driveway and the far east end of the property. We crossed through the woods and paralleled along the south side of the woods. When we were about to the creek, we heard the hounds start speaking. We cantered along the trail and the top of the cliffs back toward the kennels. When we came out of the woods to head down the hill to the driveway Joy was having problems with her horse. I pulled up to wait with her and we let the field go on while we walked down the hill and let him relax some. We picked up a trot at the bottom and crossed the creek. We could see Lee Deutsch in the distance headed east so we followed her. Jill and Christy were behind us. We figured the field would be by the dark house so we headed up there but they weren’t there. So Lee said we could hang with her so we went out the gate onto Welsh road and continued ease. We could still hear the hounds screaming away to the north and east of us. We continued East until all the whips were together very far east (at the cornerstone). Eleanor was to the North of us in a cow pasture and was having troubles following the hounds. We could not hear the hounds anymore at this point. We headed back to the west while some of the whips stayed east. We again heard hounds speaking to the north of us. We waited there for a while. Eleanor and the rest of the whips caught up to us and we headed west together while Eleanor was blowing her horn and gathering hounds. We came back onto the property and rejoined the field that was now at the dark house. Eleanor continued to gather hounds as we worked our way back to the clubhouse. We all enjoyed warming up in the clubhouse to Michael’s fabulous meal.