Heads up this was a rifle hunt, read along if you wish.
Fortunately for me a good buddy from Pennsylvania I met elk hunting in 2017 by chance was not planning on hunting elk in CO this year and it's always been on his list to hunt Alaska. He was 1 of 4 people I asked and really only 1 of 2 I would of preferred for the hunt. We'd only met that one day elk hunting, but stayed in touch over the seasons and could always tell he hunts hard and takes the steps necessary to give the best chance at success and do things right.
One more fortunate occurance of many on this hunt. Couldn't of asked for a better man to be on the hunt with me. He quizzed me as much as I would of myself and studied just as hard as if the tag was his to make sure we were ready.
We spent from that call in February to September reading articles, making calls, training, practicing calls, and just all around getting ready for the hunt.
Wanting to hunt more than the 10 days if possible I had asked the pilot if we could arrive early and in the event he had an opening for him to fly us in earlier. He wouldn't make a promise on it, but let me know it wouldn't bother him if we came early just in case. So we had set flights so that we would arrive on the 8th, which turned out to be a good choice.
His friend met us in the shop and as we visited the pilots son-in-law rolled in, then the pilot, everyone assumed we wouldn't be flying that day. Knowing the protocol we planned to roll with it. Lucky for us after about an hour and a half the rain stopped and clouds down low started to break.
Even though he had sheep hunters up high begging to come out he couldn't reach them with the clouds still up high on the mountain. A lucky break for us! The pilot asks if we want to go in and can get ready that day. Umm, yes! We hurried over to the lodge ate a fast breakfast, grabbed our bags, and back over to the pilots to dive into our gear boxes and get gear from the boxes into our bags and packs. Didn't time it but the pilot was shocked at how fast we were ready to go! We even had to wait a bit longer for the clouds to clear up enough.
When they were they took a gear load in first as we actually hunted close to the pilot's airstrip and he decided to just take an extra load rather than cram us full. Next flight was me, followed by my buddy in with the other pilot assisting. By 1 PM we were in camp.
This is the part where I'll share that all my ideas for how we'd be hunting moose were thrown out the window by the pilot. As he asked if we were okay hunting off a glacier valley where our strategy was to sit on the glacier and glass then put on a stalk if we saw a bull we liked. This was not shown in any videos or part of any articles I read. But the pilot said he hadn't put hunters in this spot for 2 years and said it produced good bulls so we were in.
Not sure why they used the glacier as at the base of the mountainside was some small ridges that made for excellent vantage points and kept us that much closer to the mountain should an opportunity present itself. We elected for this. The first evening we glassed 4 bulls and several cows on the mountain. To us two looked like for sure shooters and a possible 3rd. We called scouting quits early as they worked their way up the mountain and decided to get a good meal and nights sleep in. We had our plan for the morning.
This is the part where I'll share that all my ideas for how we'd be hunting moose were thrown out the window by the pilot. As he asked if we were okay hunting off a glacier valley where our strategy was to sit on the glacier and glass then put on a stalk if we saw a bull we liked. This was not shown in any videos or part of any articles I read. But the pilot said he hadn't put hunters in this spot for 2 years and said it produced good bulls so we were in.
Not sure why they used the glacier as at the base of the mountainside was some small ridges that made for excellent vantage points and kept us that much closer to the mountain should an opportunity present itself. We elected for this. The first evening we glassed 4 bulls and several cows on the mountain. To us two looked like for sure shooters and a possible 3rd. We called scouting quits early as they worked their way up the mountain and decided to get a good meal and nights sleep in. We had our plan for the morning.
Tired of eating mountainhouse and others preservative filled freeze dried meals my buddy decided last year that he was going to start a freeze dried food business and I'll be damned if he didn't! His mission is to keep all their meals home cooked and preservative free. They just got full state and federal licensing this summer so ours were some of the first meals for the season. I might be biased, however his meals really do have good flavor and it's nice to know that the meal is home cooked. Currently almost all of the ingredients are also locally grown either in their 60 acre garden or by local companies. To say we ate well is an understatement! If you're interested (I'm not affiliated with his company, just proud of a friend) On Point Adventure Foods is his company.
Our tent setup was Seek Outside's Redcliff Light with the SXL stove. Perfect setup for two and leave plenty of room for gear and small wood pile inside. I even set up my camp chair inside for the one rainy afternoon we did have. Being a floorless tent, we cut pieces of synthetic roof underlayment to set under the cots and an extra strip for along the top of the tent to lay gear on. Definitely was helpful in keeping gear clean.
My rifle (yes I know) was a Tikka .308. I elected to keep with the .308 as first off it's my baby for rifles because I don't like recoil. Plus with the heavier grain bullets it hits hard, only 1 animal has went more than 50 yds from being shot with this or my .338 federal which is just the .308 necked up. More importantly my scope has windage dots in which I made a cheat sheet for 50" width from 100 yds to 500 yds set at 5.3x power. This made more sense then guessing the width based on distance between eyes and hoping I kept that distance correct. So I cut a 2x4 at 50" and checked what mil dots it was at for those distances.
With the rain consistent for so long having fire starters was an absolute must. The stoves for these tents are small, but even with the small pieces of wood and sticks it was all reasonably well saturated. It would of been an uphill battle without good firestarter to get one lit.
To the ridges we wanted to sit was about a 3/4 mile walk along the bottom of the mountain so no need to get up to terribly early. We arrose at 5:30 and on the trail by around 6.
I learned on this hunt we definitely have two different styles in getting ready. I'm almost over confident in that I have everything and am ready to roll quickly. My buddy takes more caution and triple checks everything. This actually worked as a great combination as I was forced to either look again for something or wait in boredom and he was pushed to check one less time and be ready to roll as I would be antsy to go.
Not wanting to overdo it I called for roughly 40 minutes and came back to glass. No moose spotted yet but it was early. Didn't take much longer and horns appear at the top of the mountain!
Of course up top is where they showed. As soon as the bull stepped out from a bush it was obvious this was the biggest one we saw the day before. Pretty soon his buddy showed as well and really confirmed these were the two bulls that ran together that we were all excited over the bigger of the two! At almost 2 miles away we of course judged an easy 60". Not only legal, but huge! Experts here.
When we flew in the pilot flew me down the valley and pointed to valley marking where he suggested we not go past. He said it's doable to go further but he'd seen a couple groups not be able to recover their bull for going to far and/or to high up on this mountain. Pretty sure our youth was half the reason he decided to put us in this spot. Didn't expect to hunt moose on a mountainside like elk.
Even my buddy and another guy he knew were not put in country like this when they hunted in previous years. It was more gentle valleys not a full blown mountainside!
So a bit of debate ensued, chase the bull immeditately or wait a minute. Again good for having a partner with more patience. He mentioned we eat breakfast as it was past 8:30 and just see what the bulls did. I agreed, they weren't going anywhere that we couldn't see.
If we went straight up the mountain to about 100 yds below ridgeline then horizontal over there would be a small knoll between us and the bull that would keep us out of site until within range.
So we went ahead and ate a nice bisquits and gravy and made sure the bull stayed put. Time to go!
The pilot and others at the airstrip warned that the brush was much taller and thicker than it looked. They were not kidding, this stuff was chest high consistently and small tree pockets mixed in that were higher.
This really was a part of why I wanted to go up and shoot this bull where he was. It was thinner up there.
Anyway we make it up and work over. Before the knoll we check our wind. It's quartering in our face, perfect. Plan is to ease over the knoll and be on alert.
My buddy is right on my hip and spots him first. He's standing now feeding on small trees, about 100 yds right from where I had estimated he was bedded. We slide up a couple more yards and drop down.
With this brush I'm very thankful to have went with a bipod with height for sitting. Even on the ground I was a bit low so I sat on my pack and extended the legs further. They were resting on the brush still not even the ground. However it was thick and I was steady.
Now the big test. Is he legal?
In hindsight I was over confident here I'll admit, however the judgement was correct he was legal. Anyone know how to upload video? There's several videos leading up to and after the shot.
Confident he's legal, steady, and a nice slight quartering away shot I'm solid. My buddy did an excellent job of staying in my ear to take my time, he actually got me to take one extra breath. The shot is crisp, smooth, and steady, the bull rocks back at the shot. It's one of those shots you know is solid.
After rocking back he runs forward and is immediately behind the bush he was by and over the little hill. Even though ready, zero chance at a follow up. We wait...
I rolled off to the right just to see if I could see him, however knew it likely wouldnt be. So come back and settle in and give him 30.
Fun for us! As his buddy shows up and starts grunting and raking almost where the bull was where I shot. We got some more video and checked him out. Also confirming that it wasn't the same bull I shot. We're pretty confident he's looking for his friend.
Right as my buddy goes to get out the big camera the 2nd bull decides he's had enough and wonders off. Guess it's time to go look.
He took the round and only took a step. Dead straight away now, luckily my buddy says don't shoot he's done. I was half tempted to for the principle of he's standing, but would have ruined a lot of meat. Quickly he takes a couple wobbly steps and is down.
What a feeling and a sight! This bull had the most beautiful view for his last.
We both admire the bull and give thanks to God. It takes awhile to sink in, we really just shot a magnificent bull day 1 of a 10 day hunt on a DIY in Alaska. Words don't describe the feeling.
Plenty of photos later we get to work. The bull was shot at 11 AM, started butchering at noon, and by 5:30 he's completely quartered and meat down the mountain to the next flat about 100 yds away.
Elk sized game bags are not big enough for moose, thankfully I had two sets to put some over the top.
Always bring your frame pack. I had mine, however my buddy did not. He got the joy of taking two bags of miscellaneous meat swinging around down the mountain as they didn't stay tied well without support. Of course I had a hind quarter so my walk wasn't much easier.
Aside from his rifle (he bought a general license to carry a gun and maybe get a crack at a wolf) we left our gear and my rifle on the mountain. Only gear in our pack back to camp was water and medical kit. We had pack covers for both our packs and I put my rain jacket over my rifle in the event of rain.
We tied a couple articles of clothing to branches around the meat to help ward off bears. The pilot affectionately nicknamed this location Grizzly Point.
Yep, it hurt. As the crow flies we were 1.5 miles from camp, as we walked it was 1.7 and down a short rockslide if we went more directly to camp down the mountain. 1.9 miles if we went straight down, then followed the valley out.
Our load the first evening was direct towards camp. The next day first load was down, then back up for the second which we went the route towards camp. We missed our opening and found ourselves sliding down a dirt chute 30 feet to hit the valley floor. We joked that some would be so proud of our choice to slide down the chute holding onto a pack full of meat!
FYI if your friend ever is worried about bears DO NOT let them bring a whistle. Not only did we not have to worry about bears, we did not have to worry about seeing anything on the mountain. However we didn't see any grizzlys.
After taking this trip I'll forever be grateful for bringing a capable partner. Even had I shot the moose closer to camp having a second person was an enormous help. From cutting him up, to getting me up off the ground with the hind quarter straped on. Hats off to Kevin Dill for going solo. Definitely can see it being done if staying close, but man what a chore.
Timing couldn't have been more perfect. For a weather forecast that predicted over 50% chance of rain every day we had only experienced a 5 minute spatter thus far. With the last of the meat in and hung. We got water and were debating lunch when the rain came. Knowing the pilot wouldn't be in we decided this was a great time to utilize those shooters my buddy brought in.
Captain Morgan and Emergency makes a pretty good cocktail! After that we had a couple hot chocolates and fireball. Being that the work was done and it was raining we were happy campers to sit in the tent and enjoy.
We weren't real sure when the pilot would get us. All we had received was likely the next day. So the next morning we didn't get in a hurry and woke up to a breathtaking sight. The clouds had parted down the valley and we could see the snow capped peaks dead center with pink hues in the sky above.
Cameras came out and we snapped plenty of pictures. Shortly after my buddy is on a nature call and I'm journaling when we hear a familiar sound that's getting closer. Crap!
We scramble to get dressed and load the plane with meat, the second plane is in right after. How fast can you boys have camp broken down? Uhh, an hour I say. Pilot says okay and he'll be back.
Well 30 minutes later he's in and we had enough ready to send out my buddy. I break the rest and am ready for the second plane.
We spent the next couple days butchering the moose ourselves at an aquantaince of my buddies. Once done the meat went to the freezer storage at the airport, skull to a taxidermist for a euro mount, and off we went to do some touring of Alaska!
It's even more incredible that you shared this hunt with a stranger that you met literally in the woods on a previous hunt. Life's good!
Congrats a Dandy Moose,
Robb
could you tell me what bullet you were using in the .308?
Thanks everyone for the kind words. Lots of great memories from this hunt and trip.
Freezer is already full again so have made some calls to make sure there's people lined up for deer should I be fortunate enough to fill those tags this fall.
You should see the looks people give when I tell them I was going or went on a hunt with a guy I'd met once!
Congrats and thanks for sharing with us!
T-roy - Not taking that bet! We're already planning another we want to do but wanted to put all effort into this hunt first.
Jim - We only saw the one bull that was traveling with mine right after I shot. We got a pretty good show. After that between our walking around and my buddy blowing his whistle to ward off bears the mountainside was blown out. We did see some up top in another valley on the fly out.
For anyone going with a rifle, highly recommend using windage dots to judge width. Next time I'll go with 50yd increments. This bull was either 220 or 240 depending on which of us was either reading off of the bush or the bull. So it was a bit more of a estimate trying to understand the dots between 200 and 300 references. Still much better than trying to multiply his head width into 50".
There will be return trips up to Alaska.
