Hunting

A traveler meets you and exclaims that he had a successful hunt today. He shows you two notes, and says:

"I traveled the area in a loop, going to every square.
I made sure to avoid the obstacles, like trees, logs, and buffalo.
My path had no branches, and only crossed on the ice.
The ice was so slippery, that it was impossible to change direction while on it.
The buffalo were all stationary. Whenever I was staring directly at an alive buffalo, I shot it. (I wasn't able to see over trees or logs.) I didn't necessarily shoot them in the numbered order."

The traveler was muttering something about the characters enclosed in the loop's 8 smallest squares, reading from top to bottom. Then, he said "from the start".



# 2 6 I H U N
T E D S O M E
B U F F A L O T
O D A Y . W I L
D C O U N T R Y
I S I N C R E D
I B L E , I ' V
E B E E N S A
Y I N G F R O M
T H E S T A R T