David Smith
Whiskey Road Hunt Week, Aiken, SC
Installment Five
Whiskey Road MFH David Smith (left) greets Toronto and North York MFH Wolf von Teichman.Betsy and friends escape frozen Virginia for a week of hunting in warmer climes. We bring you Installment Five of her daily blog, exclusive to Foxhunting Life.
Monday was an open day. Gene and Barbara Hough joined me, Tom, Jackie, and Don for a hack in the Hitchcock Woods. We grabbed lunch at Rio Pablo, an excellent Cuban place downtown. There was a benefit for the Hitchcock Woods Foundation that night at the Wilcox Hotel, one of the town's oldest and most grand buildings.
Tuesday dawned cold and frosty but with that promise of spring in the air. There was a pretty good breeze, though, and I was uncertain of scenting conditions as we headed east towards Bill Scott's Fairview fixture near Lexington.
The Scotts own thousands of acres of managed timberland—pine forests cut for pulpwood and lumber—providing excellent habitat for game of all sizes. Gene Hough told me about hunting at Fairview a few years ago when the hounds held a four hundred-pound boar at bay until the huntsman dispatched it (then famously burned it at a pig roast later!).
Whiskey Road Hunt Week, Aiken, SC
Third Installment
Betsy and friends escape frozen Virginia for a week of hunting in warmer climes. We bring you Installment Three of her daily blog, exclusive to Foxhunting Life.Don Palus and Jackie Burke are ready for the Ball!
I know we need the rain, but, for gosh sakes ...who ordered El Nina?
Just as the weatherman warned, one hundred percent chance of cold, nasty, persistent rain today. Whiskey Road Master David Smith swore at last night's party—a humdinger of a time at new Folly downtown on Laurens Street (precious classic housewares and nifty interior items)—that the hunt would go on, weather or not. My crew consulted briefly at bedtime last night and agreed to put off a decision until the morning.
We heard the rain pelting the tin roof of our cottage all night, and it was without dissent that we collectively decided to can hunting. I heard from several other Hunt Weekers who bailed, too, and we saw more Hunt Week folks around town when we went in to check out the Aiken village,
Whiskey Road Hunt Week, Aiken, SC
Second Installment
Betsy and friends escape frozen Virginia for a week of hunting in warmer climes. We bring you Installment Two of her daily blog, exclusive to Foxhunting Life.
(l-r) Whiskey Road Field Master Geri Rapp, Fairfax Hunt members Ray Moffett, and PetraProbably seventy-five riders in the field this morning from the Batesburg fixture. Whiskey Road hosted a stirrup cup and snack before the meet after which huntsman Joseph Hardiman moved off with the mixed English and Penn-Marydel pack, east towards the cow field adjacent to the fixture.
Hounds struck immediately, coyote, probably, a brace or possibly a leash, and split into two or three groups. Hardiman went with one group, Master/whipper-in Lynn Smith with another, and (seemed like) Master David Smith and the main field with still another.
