Another Gen. Season Meat Bull

BLooDTRaCKeR

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It has been a while since I posted up a story. Now that things have calmed down enough to peck at the key board, I thought I would take a minute and share the details of my Elk hunt.

The elk hunt this year was much different than any of the previous years hunts. I took a job promotion to the position of maintenance manager back in March and ever since then, my life has been extremely busy with school, work, and family. I have had very little time to think or prepare for the hunt. Before I knew it, the hunts were upon me. I scrambled to get everything ready-never did get to load any bullets for the ultra mag. I was down to a few rounds of 200 grain Accu-bonds that I had loaded up years ago. I planned on using my uncles 30.06 for the primary gun and my 300 ultramag as the back up. I purchased 40 rounds of 180-grain factory ammo for the 30.06 earlier this summer with plans of sighting it in after what had happened to me last year with this gun.

With no time, I planned on taking Friday off work and leaving Thursday after work so that I had time on Friday to sight the gun in up at our elk camp. Thursday came, and I had what I thought was everything I needed loaded upin the trailer. Dad was at my house waiting for me to get off work. The plan was to leave work at 3:30 pm, get on the road at 4:30 pm and arrive at our elk camp at roughly 9:30 pm. As luck would have it, I had an audit that week at work. The closing remarks were scheduled for Thursday evening. I did not get home until 7:00 pm! Frustrated and feeling rushed, I forgot some of the refrigerated food items as I hurried home and hooked up the trailer so we could head out. Knowing we were going to arrive at elk camp after midnight, we tried to hurry the remaining event of loading the truck bed with the rest of the gear. When I turned the truck lights on, the trailer running lights went dim and then stopped working after a minute. We could not go anywhere without running lights or at least brake lights and turn signals.

I got out of the truck to investigate and immediately smelt burned wires inside the trailer and out. I pulled out the flashlight and started looking things over and noticed the wiring harness was melted going up under the skin of the trailer suggesting I had a major grounding issue on the trailer. I had also blown my 40 amp fuse for the trailer located under the hood of the truck. This fuse provided power to my trailer brakes and lights! Dad and I worked on it until midnight before giving up and going to sleep at my house. Friday morning, we got up at 7:00, went to the hardware store and purchased $100.00 worth of temporary tail lights and turn signals hoping to by-pass the shorted wiring mess and get on the road. At about 11:00 am, we had temporary lights. I am not looking forward to pulling all the aluminum siding off the trailer this spring and fixing the shorted wiring mess!

We arrived at elk camp close to 3:00 pm and found our elk camp empty! We celebrated and set up camp. With no time to sight the gun in, I opted to use the 300 ultra mag on the opener. We rode our mountain bikes up the logging road to the top to see if anything was out or bugling that evening, but did not see or hear anything.

Saturday rolled around and we were on our way to the top. We had some competition this year as two young kids in their twenties came hiking past us on their way to the top to hunt where we hunt. One kid showed me his phone map and pointed to where he was planning on hunting and then asked where I was planning on hunting. He happened to have picked the same spot I was heading so I just told him ?I have no clue where my dad and I will end up. It depends on how far my dad can get up the mountain before the sun comes up?. This eased the kids mind and he went on his way. I didn't tell him my 70 year old dad was on an electric mountain bike and was ahead of me, probably already on the top!

For the first time ever, dad beat me to the top of the mountain! Not only did he beat me, but he had been waiting for me for almost 20 minutes! I found a calm and rested old fart with a big smile on his face. (not fair, I thought, but I still got him on vision, hearing, and stride haha!) We laughed about how easy it made the trek up the mountain for him at his age. We decided to leave those two kids to the area we were intending to hunt and headed for other areas we had seen elk in years past. Dad and I split up, but stayed fairly close to each other just to see more ground on the opener. I got to a vantage point and glassed up a herd across the canyon. There was a rag horn 5 point in the herd and roughly 7 cows. They were too far away to go after with my dad. I worried that trip would do him in for the hunt if I were to shoot that bull so I let them go. After that, I saw a couple of deer and then decided to hook up with dad and see what he had saw.

Dad hadn't seen, nor heard anything so we decided to push the knob like we did last year and see if we could see any elk in there like we saw last year. Last year I missed a monster 6x6 on top while trying to push the trees for my dad. Dad saw the same bull coming at him but could not get a shot before the bull turned and went up through the pines. I set dad up in the same area, just farther in the trees this time and then I went all the way around the knob, came up the back side and started into the trees like I did last year. I immediately cut fresh elk track in the snow, but they were all going the opposite direction that I was heading. Then, when I got to the spot where I shot at the big six point last year, I cut some big fresh tracks going in the direction I was heading. I followed them and they started to go down off the backside of the knob. I took a few more steps and the herd erupted below me. The problem: there was a shelf below me and I could not see any elk bodies. The only elk I saw was the big six point from last year! The only thing I could see was his rack sticking up above the shelf below me. He went back and forth like he was confused as to what direction to go. I had cross hairs on his rack, but could not get even a head shot at this bull before he took off.

After the excitement, I started walking in my dad?s direction and saw him standing not even 150 yards from where I had just jumped all these elk! We talked about the experience and then decided to sit in there and see if the elk would circle back around. We did not see an elk the rest of the time in that area. We headed over to the cheese hole for the evening hunt and saw nothing over there either. We walked to our bikes in the dark and dad says. ?Go on ahead, I will catch up to you?. Knowing he would, I got a head start in the dark. Before I dropped off the top I decided to wait for dad. As I stood there, my head lamp beam reflected off a set of eyes off to my right and very close too! I watched the eyes for a minute. They were roughly 15 yards away. Finally I identified it as a deer. There was a small herd laying down right off the logging road just watching me. About 20 minutes went by and still no dad so I turned around to go find him. I found him walking down the road with his bike. I quickly found out that his brand new bike had broke the chain. Dad somehow found the pin that links the chain together, not even knowing if it was part of his bike! We made the long 4 mile walk off the top with our bikes and arrived at camp at almost 10:00 pm.

Sunday we stayed in camp and recuperated. We were able to sand down the pin for dads chain, reinstall it and ping the end of the pin so that it would not come back out. We were excited to get that fixed because the ride to the top takes its toll on dad without the electric assist. We also spent some time sighting in the 30.06. After 8 shots, we had it dialed in dead on at 100 yards. The first shot was five inches to the right at 50 yards! I shot two more just to be sure the gun was consistent and it was. After a quick dial to the left, I had it shooting dead on and moved the target to 100 yards to confirm. Everything was sighted in and ready to go. We cleaned up the camp spot, cut a bunch of firewood with the chainsaw, and prepped our packs for the following days hunt. That evening, a storm rolled in and it started snowing. We went to bed wondering what Monday would bring.

Monday, we woke up to eight inches of fresh snow with more falling. We could not ride the bikes, therefore, we set off on separate logging roads just to see if we could cut any fresh tracks. The plan was to meet up at ?Joe Boo? road at around lunchtime and report out on our morning. (Joe Boo road got it's name almost 14 years ago when dad and I met a hunter on that road who told us a tale of an elk he had shot in the heart and tracked 20 miles before finding it. We could not remember the storyteller?s name, se we named him Joe Boo) I took the lower logging road and dad took the upper. The fog was thick and the snow was off and on for most of the morning. A few tracks were cut, but nothing fresh. All tracks seemed to have a distinct direction they were traveling, which was down to lower ground. We worried that the elk would move out of our area and we would struggle the remainder of the hunt to figure out where they went. Dad and I met up at Joe Boo road at about 11:00 am after establishing radio contact and deciding we were close enough to each other to meet up. With the fog still thick, wind still blowing, and uncertain about when the weather would lift, we headed for camp and decided to drive into town to get something to eat and let things settle down. We didn't even get to the freeway before we were out of the clouds and could see down into town. There was no snow at the lower elevations and the skies were blue as far as the eye could see.

After getting a bite to eat at and hitting up the store for some groceries I had forgotten, we headed back up the mountain to our camp. Once we arrived back in camp, dad picked up the 30.06 off the back seat and the turret for the elevation on the scope fell off! Without knowing if it affected the gun, I shelved it and pulled out the 300 ultra mag. This trip was just one thing after another that kept going wrong. But, at least we were able to solve each problem! We hunted the evening on the lower road and then headed for camp after dark with no luck locating any elk. We did see a few fresher tracks, which got our hopes up.

Tuesday morning we headed down to the lower gate down below our camp that we used to hunt years ago and walked the logging road just to look for tracks. We ended up hooking up to the upper logging road that we usually hunt after checking the ?gravel pit clearing? and finding a lot of fresh tracks coming up and over the saddle and down into the canyon where Joe Boo road is. We decided to split up at that point. Dad stayed in the gravel pit clearing and I headed over to Joe Boo road. Up to this point, I have only ever gone 1/3 of the way down that road. I have never explored to the end of the road until now. I headed down into the valley/canyon and hooked up on Joe Boo road. I cut fresh elk track everywhere down there in the snow and even cut fresh bear track! I walked up the road until it dead-ended and kept seeing more and more elk track in the snow. I realized that the reason the elk were using that hillside was because it was a south-facing hill. Out of the whole valley, the snow was burning off that hill the quickest. I slowly made my way up the logging road, blowing on my cow call every five minutes until it was roughly 5:40 pm. At that point in time, I decided I needed to stay somewhere close by until dark and see if anything came out to feed. I found a stretch of road that I could see 100 yards ahead of me and 100 yards behind me, and roughly 50 yards below me through the pines and about the same distance above me through the pines. I took my pack off, set up my shooting sticks, layed the ultra mag on the sticks and checked clearances through the scope before setting it down against the sticks and digging through my pack for something to eat.

At 5:45 pm, I was fumbling through my pack and happened to look below me. I thought I saw two legs move and then stop under a pine tree. I stared at the spot for 30 seconds before confirming something was below me. It began to move again and started quartering toward the road I was on. I caught a glimpse of elk hide and then thought I saw what appeared to be a spike antler through the trees. I grabbed the gun, already kneeling down; I pointed the gun down the road, resting it on the shooting sticks. I saw that the elk was heading up to the road, so I patiently waited for it to arrive. Once the elk walked up on the road, I made a noise and stopped it right in the middle of the road. I was surprised to see it was a five point bull! I squeezed the trigger and down he went, right in his tracks! The shot was 61 yards. Dad heard the shot and called me on the radio. I confirmed that it was me, and that I had one down! He quickly made his way over to me and we cut the elk up in the dark, hung the meat in the pines, and headed for camp.

We spent Wednesday morning hauling the elk out on the logging road. The 3-4 mile trip would not have been so bad had the roads not been covered in snow and mud. It took both of us to push that load up the logging road until we were at the turn off where the road gradually feeds down hill to camp. Even when I started down the easy section, I had to pedal that load due to soft snow and mud on the road. Usually, when conditions are dry, the road is hard packed enough to let the weight of the elk push you all the way to camp with little effort.

Dad stayed up in the area to hunt the evening while I took the meat to camp, hung it all in a tree and made a lunch for dad. After a few hours of separation, I was back in the area where I left dad. We ate a late lunch and stayed until 6:30 pm without seeing any elk. We hiked out of Joe Boo road, grabbed our bikes and headed for camp. Thursday morning we woke up with plans to go to the top to find dad a bull but dad quickly learned that his body was not going to let that happen. So we hopped in the truck and went for a drive for a few hours. Once we returned to camp, dad said he was done. He had no energy left to hunt another day. We packed up camp and left for home.

This elk hunt helped me realize how tough it really is to kill an elk even when you are in an area where you know how they move and know where to hunt. An observation I made this year is that we did not hear one bugle or cow call. The elk were done talking for the year and this made the hunt extremely difficult to locate elk to hunt. This is the first year that I can remember this happening. I just turned 40 a few weeks earlier and the past couple of years have been different on my body than when I was in my 20?s and early 30?s. The sore muscles seemed to set in quicker and the energy levels just have not been the same. I cannot imagine how my dad must feel at the age of 70. He has a big heart for this sport. With each passing year, we observe subtle changes in our health that contribute to the difficulty of this hunt. Regardless, we will pursue our passion with vigor and innovation to prolong our hunting heritage as long as possible. We will adapt to our aging bodies and adopt the game of patience and wise thinking to reverse the side effects of age, (at least in our minds) so that we can enjoy these precious times together. I felt bad that we did not get dad a chance at a bull. As we packed up camp, he told me, ?You are my son. Therefore, your success is my success.? That statement impacted me in many ways knowing that my dad brought me into this hunting realm and taught me so much about how to hunt and where to look for animals. Although I still feel bad about not getting him a chance, I see the bigger picture he is trying to show me. Thanks dad, for your friendship, long talks and time we have spent together over the years as father and son. There are no words to describe the value of this relationship. I am looking forward to next year, and what we can do and see!
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A tired old man towards the evening of the opener.
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Zoom in on this photo and you can see the bull laying in the road.
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Dad next to the trusty old red neck deer cart
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And last but not least, what would elk camp be without a pic of the camp meat pole.
 
Congrats. Thanks for sharing. Make as many memories as you can with your dad. They are the ones that you will remember the most.
 
Cool story, I like your dads perception on the success of the hunt. I wish my dad would still go hunting. He has no desire to now that he's remarried kinda pisses me off but oh well.

"We don't have a gun problem we have prescription drug problem."
 
I really enjoyed this read. while not 70 yet I'm fast approaching and have a son that is my best hunting partner. I have a lot of memories as I sit in my trophy room but they don't really center on the animal they involve the friends/family that were there on the hunt. I really love your dads quote, You are my son, your success is my success. I have got more joy out of my kids/grandkids accomplishing something that I have helped with (on the ball court, in the field, on the mountain... (can't really say in the classroom:) )
Advise I would give, do it with who you want and when you can cause ya blink and all a sudden instead of tearing up terrain you may be the tired old man needing to "rest just a minute"

Thanks for the story.
 
Thanks for the kind words. Sorry the write up was looong winded. Smokepole, you are right about time passing by quickly. In my younger years I thought I had all the time in the world to conquer the outdoor world only to find out now that time conquers all and we must make the best of what we have left with thise we love.

Like you, I have a lot of antlers on the wall. Over 30 racks. But the antlers mean nothing to me. The experience associated with the antlers and who I spent that time with to get those animals means more than I can describe in words.

I've always been a believer that a trophy is in the experience, not the inches of antlers on the wall.
 
Sweet Story and great pictures, Love your Hauler.
Can the battery Bike pull that hauler if you would hook it behind it.

"I have found if you go the extra mile it's Never crowded".
>[Font][Font color = "green"]Life member of
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Great story! Thanks for all the details. It was like I was in a page of bugle magazine. I too absolutely love your fathers quote of success.
 

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