Got out both Sat and Sun hooter hunting. Took my friend Charlie out for his first hooter hunt on Sat. First we drove up to Eagle Crest and on the way there, Charlie said his co worker had heard birds over at a spot on Admiralty so I turned right around and said let’s go there. We went back to the house and got the boat, but in my haste, I forgot the punt. The tide was only going to be flooding for about 2 hours after we got there, so we had about 4 hours of hunting before we needed to be back to the boat or it would be dry. Got Charlie onto 2 birds but he missed both. He won’t soon live that down. Not very far shots shooting a mammoth semi-auto 12 gauge (Browning, maybe?) that was his great grandfather’s, I think. When we got back to the boat ramp, the same bird that was hooting when we left was still hooting. I figured I ‘d go back and get him on Sunday. Sunday, I got that bird in a very steep place that of course was a lot further up the hill than it sounded from the beach. Then the next bird was even further up, and that bird was way very in the tree. I kept plinking at him with the open-sighted .22 but could not connect and ran out of bullets and too high to think the 20 gauge was going to do anything more than irritate him. It was a long walk back but the pouring rain actually felt good. I had my friend Doug look at a Henry AR7 survival .22 in Anchorage that I planned on putting a scope on. He said he thought it would be too small for me. I think I’m just going to bite the bullet and get a Ruger 10/22 Takedown stainless and put a scope on it. I’ll sell the two .22 over 20 gauges and a little Jennings .22 pistol to help pay for it. A lot of hiking for 1 bird in two days. But, I had the doctor look at my knee on Thurs. He said nothing but arthritis causing the swelling and gave me a shot to reduce the swelling and pain. And funny, but both knees were not sore or achy after Sunday, not just the one that got the shot. Gotta keep moving while I still can.