It is interesting the actions and the manors that people get when they are hypothermic. When I took my last WEMT class it was at SOLO in North Conway NH, there founder Frank Hubbell is an expert at hypothermia and the effects.

I had once herd of a man who tested someone for Hypothermia with a snicker bar. When he gave the sinkers bar to the person who he thought was hypothermic, the hypothermic man broke down in tears over the fact he couldn't open it. My friend opened the bar for him and started Hypothermia treatment immediately. On the note of Hypothermia and SOLO one of the required items for there survival/EMS kits is instant JELLO (NOT the sugar free kind). It appears that Instant JELLO has all the necessary nurturance, carbs and the such to help a person recover from hypothermia quickly.
(Disclaimer, I AM a graduate from SOLO and I do encourage anyone who can to attend there classes, but I have no affiliation with JELLO or General Mills.)

During a SAR conference a class on analyzing people’s actions they had photos of a hunter who died of hypothermia. In the final hours his core temp dropped so much that he felt hot. He was found face down in a river taking off his belt.

So the fact that the hunter in the story was waving away the guy who found him is not surprising. He was very lucky.

ON a side note, I like horses and am glad that they were also rescued