English Days was a gathering of coon hunters, especially those who hunt English dogs, in Lima, OH. Zeb, Zach, and I decided to go and hunt Joe on Thursday night. Our friends, Josh and Steven Reed went along also. We left after Bible Study on Wednesday night. We met the Reeds in Ashburn and their Dad, Rod, prayed with us. He asked that we would meet people who would encourage us and people we might encourage in the Lord as well. God heard and answered his prayer.
We drove above Atlanta on Wednesday night and stayed in a cheap hotel. Jessica thought it was hilarious when I told her that we took Joe into the room for the night. We wanted him to have an air conditioned place to sleep as well. I think he really enjoyed it because he kept wagging his tail and putting his muzzle into our faces while we tried to sleep.
We arrived around 3 PM on Thursday at the location of the meeting. I had arranged to meet a gentleman who purchased Speck from me. I decided not to breed her to Joe after all and did not need another female of her age. We enjoyed a meal at the English Breeder's Association. That night, Zeb, Zach, and I hunted Joe in a 1 hour hunt (Josh and Steven hunted Annie in the youth hunt). Our cast traveled about 90 miles north toward the Michigan border. I was amazed at the coon hunting---a lot of coons and easy access to the trees. Joe did great. He came in 2nd out of the 20 Grand Nt Champions hunted. We came up 25 points short of winning the Grand Nt contest. We would have won but time expired and seconds afterwards Joe treed. That would have given him 575 points but we settled for 375 points. A man named Chad won with 400 points. However, we were really excited just to be in a great hunt no matter what the final scores were. The cast was enjoyable, the hunt was great, and the location was terrific.
We met a lot of nice people who shared with us knowledge of coon hunting and the English breed. When I saw Rocky II I could not believe the size of this hound. I was able to pray and talk about the Lord on our trip with several folks. Also, Josh and Steven had several people mention what nice young men they were. Too, we run into several people who publicly owned Christ as Lord. In this way Rod's prayer was answered. We do praise the Lord for His work of grace among his people in all places. "Do all to the glory of God" (1 Cor. 10:31).
