Depression from not drawing that coveted tag that you have diligently applied for for over 20 years.
Exhilaration when that coveted tag is in your hand.
High anxiety to be able to make the time away from work, home and family to have even a slim chance of success.
Tough wilderness mountain hunts in crazy country for such amazing creatures as sheep, goat, and moose are the most precious and coveted of those tags. Many of these can take the better part of a lifetime to acquire.
Only a crazy person would apply for those super tough hunts with a bow. Only a truly insane person would think that they would have a chance with a traditional bow!
Guess I fall into the latter group...
Yeehaw! Let the games begin!
I had committed to helping one of my best and oldest hunting buddies for an elk hunt in Colorado. On top of that, I had also drawn a top shelf Wyoming elk limited draw that had taken 1 less than maximum points.
From where I sit, I was probably holding two “once in a lifetime” tags.
On top of that, I was right at a year into a new job with very limited vacation!
Anxiety ensued. In large doses.
Congrats in advance Tavis!!
Good luck, Robb
I was actually considering going deeper into the back country than what most hunters do on horseback. The trip to the area I was looking at is 18 miles from the south trailhead and would be quite the adventure.
May was still really early down in the San Juan’s this year. Still way too much snow. Colorado had a bumper crop of snow last winter and the SW corner really got pounded with around 500% of normal.
A buddy from down that way sent me a picture of what it looked like on the highway on one of the passes on May 16.
Scouting would have to wait a bit...
I have that same issue back in the mid 80'2 when I drew a Sheep tag for a 30 day long season. Told my boss that I had drawn a OIL Sheep tag (actually my second) and that the season was 30 days long and I was going to hunt every day of it if needed. Told him I would be back to work after I killed one or the season ended if he still wanted me back. He said to call him when I was back in town, when I did he told me I could come back to work the next day after hunting all 30 days.
That was not the first or last time I told a boss what I was going to do or quit a job for a hunt.
Jake, I will touch on Wyoming a bit further along.
Ron, I pulled off as much time as possible! Had a couple of things pop up right in the middle of hunting season that I had to deal with though. More detail to come...
Must be getting old.
Working at an office 4 hours from home is a real pain sometimes. Time to do the things I want to do becomes very precious. Weekends home become relegated to yard work, repairs around the house, plumbing, painting, spending time with the wife, vacationing with the wife, etc.
Not much left over for shooting, getting in shape, scouting, etc. I did get in some fishing and one good scouting trip to Wyoming, though.
Not sure how many big Ford and Dodge diesel trucks got pulled out of the mud by the little toy, but it was a few!
A bit unexpected to get this much snow the first day of summer but we are in Colorado after all!
I did get to shoot one range and went home totally beat. Awesome event!
A major proposal had me tied down as soon as I returned. Double Damnit!
Finally got the fires beat down enough to meet my buddies in Wyoming for elk the 22nd of September. That hunt did not go well and lost a lot of hunting time to weather and logistics. A couple of close calls but did not close the deal...
Work took me out of the country again in early October but I was able to get back for a few days to help my buddy get a nice bull with his rifle.
Time was not on my side for the goat hunt, but I was still determined to give ‘em hell! Finally got a break on the work front on October 17 and actually had a buddy with some time that was fired up to come along for the ride!
The truck was packed and we were off!
We glassed a number of basins and walls with no goats spotted.
That was OK though because we had a plan! Headed to Goat Central the next day! The place where there were so many goats that they were a considered to be a nuisance! Actually follow the hikers around trying to get a candy bar or a bit of salt from the urine!
Hell yeah! Easy Peezy! We were gonna be neck deep in pet goats! Even someone with limited shooting ability like me could even have a chance!
Set up the round trip to leave Saturday and come back Wednesday.
Dang! Can’t get the pics to straighten out after the first one. Sorry about that.
Should be plenty of time to kill a goat in there!
Just wish I could show you guys some of the video from the phone. Really cool stuff, there!
I’ve never had a tag for that unit, but I can say that it’s worth a train trip to the Chicago basin. For a hike, camp or climbing. Just a fun little adventure even without a tag.
Having a goat tag would be a big cherry on top. Successful or not. I will just experience it through your story.
Keep it coming, Tavis!
Treeline's Link
Videos suck! Hope this works.
This one was cool busting up the mountain!
Treeline's Link
Hopefully some will like those videos. Not professional or even amateur level but limited by my stupidity!
Think that first hitch was around 6 or 7 miles to get to camp.
Not too bad, but pretty sure we took too much stuff. The weather was slated to get a bit cold so we took a lot of extra clothes and gear to try and stay warm.
No fires in Needle Creek so could be interesting. We also took climbing gear just in case we might need it.
Treeline's Link
The self bow was made by Jake Powell for a good friend, Ted Grover. Ted passed away before he ever got to take that bow on a hunt. I hunted with Ted’s bow for most of this hunt with my bow in reserve.
I say a little something about it on the video link.
Treeline's Link
Treeline's Link
After getting camp squared away, we climbed up to look for goats.
Treeline's Link
Since we hadn’t seen any goats the evening before, we climbed to the top of the hanging basin above camp to see if there were any goats back there we couldn’t see from below.
Tough camping conditions for sure! Especially with the fire restrictions!
Although it made for extra weight in the packs, we had packed plenty of warm clothes and gear to keep from freezing to death. We also packed in climbing gear just in case we might need it on ice covered rocks and cliffs.
You can embed your Youtube videos directly to your posts. On Youtube click on the "Share" button, then click on the "Embed" button. Copy the embed code, then paste it to your post. Like this:
Hope this helps. Enjoying your story.
Matt
I know this is carrying on a bit, but working on it in bits and pieces.
Pretty damn good adventure overall and thinking a lot of guys will enjoy the pictures and videos that show the story.
PS. There will be dead critters! You will just have to put up with my ramblings a bit to get there!
Multiple PMs sent. Hope they help.
Matt
Up we went.
And we climbed some more.
We kept climbing till we ran out of up.
Then dropped over into New York Basin. A good friend that had the tag a few years back had told me that it was full of goats. At least 60 in there and several billies when he had hunted the last week of the season.
Well, not when we were there. No goats again.
This is Treeline we're talking about here....was there ever any doubt? Ha! Loving the adventure so far Tavis!
They must be in the next basin! We will go find them and kill one tomorrow!
Weather came in a bit and the wind picked up. We headed back up to the notch out of New York and dropped the 2,440’ back down to a very cold camp.
I had a water bladder between my sleeping bag and pad and the damn thing froze solid.
Getting water at the creek was interesting. It was frozen solid and I had to break a hole to get to water. Put the pump in my pocket to keep it from freezing up. As soon as a water bottle was filled, it froze.
Really neat watching ice form in your water bottle like that.
Had a little snow. Just enough to make it interesting in the rocks:-)
Was certain that today was the day! Hell, with the fresh snow and ice, they couldn’t possible get away!
After 4 days in here and no goats seen using good glass, it was time to change plans.
We decided to go down and break camp and hike down to where New York creek joined Needle Creek and see what was happening there.
Rolled down the mountain and loaded up camp. Hiked down to New York in the dark and found a flat spot for the night.
We decided it would take forever to get up that way and that we still could catch the train out if we hustled.
On the way down we stumbled on an interesting edifice to the mining heritage of Colorado. A bit crazy back that many miles into the wilderness!
But no luck.
We ended up with time to spare When we got down and BS’d with the elk hunters at the camp when we got there. Also tried to catch an early ride out with one of the work cars. The hunters and railroad workers commented on the lack of game this year.
Guess that 500% bumper crop took it’s toll.
Just glad they stopped and let us on!
The cold beer sure was nice after our little jaunt, though!
I had several meetings and needed to catch up with some work at the office.
I was tired, sore, beat up, and a bit disappointed.
Pretty much game over at this point. Still had a ton of stuff to do to get ready for winter up at the house in Steamboat as well so was figuring on headed home after taking care of the work backlog.
Of course, that long drive to Denver would not be pretty...
We tried to get a room in a couple of places, but no one was manning the lobbies in those small towns. One hotel had 8 people crashed out on the couches and floor. Looked like a group of hunters. They probably had their tent crushed.
We ended up sleeping on the side of the road and in a hotel parking lot.
Enjoy.
Getting too old and the costs are getting out of hand to apply.
As I was driving up I-70, I made a call to an outfitter buddy. He offered up a suggestion for an area where he had seen some goats 10 days earlier. Only 8 miles or so in! Doable!
Called the wife and told her I was not coming home and was headed back to goat country! She wasn’t overly ecstatic and listed off the chores that needed to be done and told me we had a big winter storm coming in on Sunday with a lot of snow expected.
It was a tight window but possible! Heck, all I needed to do was find a darn goat and run over there and kill it!
Got to Silverton a little after midnight and we’re able to get a room. Backpacks were emptied and repacked for enough stuff to make it for two days - three in a pinch.
After a couple hours of sleep, we were back on the mountain!
We walked away from those goats and set camp where we had seen what appeared to be goat tracks several miles back up the trail.
On the way out, we ran into a buddy that also had a goat tag coming in. He had one day to hunt and had driven down from Denver in the middle of the night. Traded information and he headed up the trail for his last ditch effort as well.
Hit the snow and ice pretty close to home so it wasn't too bad.
And then some.
Hard to kill ‘em if you can’t find ‘em!
Whew!
Kind of a workout for an old fat man!
Goat hunting ain’t for wimps!
I feel your goat deprived pain and I can hunt them every year if I want. They just make you sore all over!!
We had the Swarovski 15’s and Spotting scope.
I am fairly good at glassing from years of Coues deer hunting. .
Maybe I was just massively unlucky to not find more goats. Maybe they picked this year to migrate when they never have before.
I think that there are a lot less goats in the whole unit. If I were to guess, I would say the population is down over 75-90% versus last year.
That over 500% snow down there probably killed a bunch.
Most spectacular mountains in Colorado!
Went by places that I shot my first elk and where I missed several world class mule deer 25-30 years ago!
Just kind of drew the short straw on the wrong year...
No one can ever say you half ass a hunt!!
Thanks for taking us along man.
Good luck, Robb
PS~~ the lil fella sure has grown up! My fav pic of him that I still have is the one when he was like 5 years old and had that high country lake fishing Trout pic!
