When the vehicle fairies dropped off a Cadillac Escalade last week, one of the guys at work took one look at it and said, “You can’t go hunting in that fancy thing.” So last weekend, I set out to prove him wrong.
The first thing I noticed Sunday morning, when I was loading my hunting gear into it, was that the captain’s chairs in the second row of seats were perfectly spaced to serve as a gun rack for my .270. The barrel rested on one seat, the stock on the other, and the scope hung down between the seats without bumping on anything. They ought to put those seats in more vehicles, so we can carry our hunting rifles without fear of knocking the scopes out of alignment.
Then there were those weird running boards that fold down automatically when you open the door, and fold out of the way again when you shut the door. While they didn’t do much for me in the way of helping me get in and out, at least they retracted up and out of the way so they wouldn’t scrape on the brush and the bumps on those rough county roads out in my antelope area.
It was a foggy morning, so I used the fog lights to help me find my way to where I was going to go hunting, and I used the iPod controls on the stereo system to listen to my Dave Barry audiobook on the drive out.
And after I had brought down a nice little buck antelope, slid him back out to the road on the game sled, and bundled him up in a tarp so I wouldn’t get antelope goobers in that fancy interior, I pushed the button to fold down the rear seats and loaded the goat into the cargo area. There was enough room back there for several antelope.
So yes, if you’re asking, the Cadillac Escalade works fine as a hunting rig. Just be sure to bring a tarp.
