Back in August, I got an email from Travis Black about a program called Hunt of a Lifetime. They are a company that has hunting and fishing opportunities for children with life threatening diseases.

  Travis contacted me because he is familiar with my 14 yr old son, Bridger.  Bridger has a an inoperable brain tumor on his brain stem and we have been dealing with it since he was two years old but he functions very well in society and absolutely loves hunting and fishing with his Dad and Brothers. Hunt of a Lifetime had some hunts that were still unassigned in August so we fired of a quick application to Terry Petko and we were soon informed that they were sending us to Arizona to hunt elk in Arizona unit 27.  This is an area that has fantastic trophy potential and some amazing country.

  I was soon contacted by Nate Medcalf from Arizona who was to be his guide for the hunt.  Nate informed me that he had several friends that would help in the guiding also and he touched bases with me several times before the hunt to see what Bridger's capabilities were.

  Hunt of a Lifetime also supplied Bridger with a 30-06 for the hunt and Barnes Bullets supplied the ammo.  Leupold supplied a scope and set of binoculars.

  We flew into Albuquerque NM on Thanksgiving day (paid for by Hunt of a Lifetime) and got a rental truck (also paid for) and drove from there over to Alpine Arizona where we met up with Nate and followed him to our camp for the next four days.  They had a wonderful camp set up with trailers and wall tents and a coral for the horses and mules.  We were fed a great turkey dinner that night and felt very spoiled at this point.  Infact food was great the entire time as Nates Mother in Law was there as a camp cook.  They had five "guides" working to find Bridger an Elk and they all sat around and told stories that night that got us all very excited.

  Opening day was cold and snowy and the area is heavily timbered making visibility very tough.  Our guides all split up and looked in many areas to find a bull for Bridger.  The weather was not our friend on this trip and that plus the tough terrain made for a very difficult hunt.  Nate and the guides all worked very hard for Bridger and treated us like kings but it was hunting and an Elk was not to be seen by Bridger after 4 days but he had a great time hunting and riding horses and has zero regrets.

  I want to thank organizations like SCI for helping put this dream hunt together and my hope is that many of you will help make these kind of dreams come true for kids like Bridger.  I really want to thank Travis Black for starting the ball rolling and for being a great friend and thinking of my son when this hunt came up.

 Thanks to Nate, and all our guides who made the hunt very enjoyable despite not killing an Elk and thanks to Bridger for keeping his spirits high and knowing that it is the hunt and not the kill that makes our sport so great.

Dave Card
Barnes Bullets Inc.
Customer Service/Sales