I had always planned on doing a mountain goat hunt someday, but always seemed to keep pushing it off for one reason or another, and before I knew it, I was over 60. By then, I figured I’d better do it in the next few years or I wouldn’t physically be able to. I started doing some research on outfitters, and what better place, than Bowsite? After talking with several different Bowsiters and outfitters, I chose Lloyd and Jack Hooper with Babine Guides & Outfitters in British Columbia. Every past client of theirs that I spoke with, gave them very high marks.
I called Lloyd in early 2023 to see what they had for openings in the next couple of years. Lloyd said he actually had an opening in early September of ‘23, but my wife and I had a 2 week trip to New Zealand scheduled in March, and I couldn’t swing 2 extended trips in the same year, due to my workload. I should’ve booked that trip! My friend Paul Vice (pav) did, and killed a Booner goat on that hunt! I ended up booking with Babine for the very last of August of ‘24.I turned 63 in February and figured I better get my fat hind end in shape for this hunt, or I’d suffer the consequences.
I started out pretty well, but kind of fell off the wagon for a while, before starting back up again. In reality, I trained very poorly and only sporadically for this hunt and knew I’d pay for it, but felt like I’d survive. My biggest concern was not being in better shape might cost me an opportunity that I might have capitalized on had I trained harder.
By the end of July, I had most of my gear rounded up and in a pile in the basement, except for a pack. I had an older Kuiu 5000ish cu. inch pack, but didn’t think it would be big enough for this hunt, so I started researching packs and spoke with several Bowsite guys about packs. Paul (pav) graciously offered to let me borrow the Stone Glacier pack he used on his goat hunt. Luke A. (Caribou77) called me and said he had a pack I could borrow, as well. Since Luke lives only a couple of hours from me, I met up with him and he actually had two different Stone Glacier packs to choose from. Thanks again, Luke! (and Paul) Bowsite guys are the best!
I always like it when they have this type of display at your hunt destination airport
I always like it when they have this type of display at your hunt destination airport
Departure day finally arrived, so I hopped on a United plane in Des Moines, and headed west towards Smithers, with stops in Denver with a changeover to Air Canada in Vancouver along the way. What could possibly go wrong?…..Air Canada! That’s what. I’m a little disappointed in Rod A. (Ambush) I thought he was the guy that coined the phrase “Air Canada…We’re not happy, unless you’re not happy” Turns out EVERYBODY uses it!
I used my backpack as a carry-on and checked my other bag. My carry-on was almost too big, so they ended up checking it all the way from Denver to Smithers. It actually made it there, but they lost my checked bag in Vancouver. I had an AirTag in each bag, and my checked bag showed it was sitting just across the tarmac from the plane right up to takeoff. It didn’t show up, so we did all the necessary paperwork and other BS in Smithers and prayed that my luggage would make it on the next morning’s flight.
Lloyd was waiting at the airport, and after grabbing the one bag that DID show up, we headed to their lodge on Babine Lake, about an hour from Smithers. Since we couldn’t get my gear, bow, etc packed and ready for the hike in, Lloyd suggested we might as well go fishing for the evening. I stowed my stuff in my room and we headed out on the water to try and catch a sockeye or two…and we did!
The next morning, we contacted Air Canada and they told us that it showed my luggage did, indeed get loaded onto the morning flight for Smithers, however, after departure from Vancouver, my AirTag showed it was still on the tarmac in Vancouver. I thought “well that really sucks!” And texted my frustration to some Bowsite buddies on our group text. One of them said that he uses AirTags all the time, and that oftentimes it doesn’t show any movement after the plane has taken off. I was sure hoping he was right….He was. Thanks Brotsky! (good thing to know in the future) After confirming that my bag DID arrive, Lloyd’s FIL, who lives in Smithers, picked it up and brought it to the lodge for us. The bad thing was, it looked like we possibly had some weather moving into the hunt area, and we might get shut down in trying to hike in. We got busy packing everything up, and after getting both packs loaded, we headed towards the trailhead, an hour away, to see if the weather would cooperate….No dice. We headed back to the lodge, and hoped things were a go the next morning.
We got up early the next morning to some clouds and mist. Not the best start, but the forecast said it was supposed to clear off fairly quickly. It rained a little on the way to the trailhead, but stopped shortly before we got there. Things were looking up! We threw all our gear into the Ranger for the hour long trail ride to where the real work would begin.
We hopped in the Ranger and it only took us about 50 yds down the trail, to realize we should’ve put our rain gear on. Plowing through the alders hanging over the trail, we were pretty well soaked in no time, however, the temps were pretty mild, so we just kept going. An hour later, we got to our starting point for the 6-8 hr hike to where we would camp.
As I threw my pack up on my back, slipped my arms through the straps, and clipped the waist belt in place, I thought “holy crap! Why’d I bring all this stuff?!!” The first step is usually the hardest, so off we went. The first mile or so wasn’t too bad, with only a couple a shorter ascents and descents, plus, thankfully we were only at 3-4,000 ft elevations, so far. The next couple of miles were definitely harder, with more and steeper climbs and back down again. Lloyd did an excellent job of keeping us out of the tanglefoot for the most part, but occasionally we’d have to fight our way through a patch here and there. Not sure which I hate more…tanglefoot or alders. They BOTH suck!!
After getting maybe close to halfway, we stopped for a quick lunch and some glassing for goats, that we may be able to target, if we had no luck in the main basins we were headed for. Lloyd quickly spotted a pair of goats that he thought were most likely billies, along with a nanny and kid on another peak in the same basin. We made a mental note of them as we continued on. By now I was starting to pay the price a bit, for not training like I should have. Still, I kept plugging along, trying not to think about my hips and quads too much.
A nanny and a kid just to the right of the tip of the pine tree in the foreground.
A nanny and a kid just to the right of the tip of the pine tree in the foreground.
At about the 3/4 stage, I was beginning to wonder if I could do this for 8-9 days! I just needed to put it out of my mind and embrace the suck! We continued on into several different basins, stopping occasionally to glass for goats. We found a few more potential suitors in different spots.
As we got closer to our destination, I’d have Lloyd point out to the next peak, ridgeline, rock formation, etc that we were headed to. It seemed to help me to concentrate to get to one spot, then the next one. Finally, we crested the ridge to our destination basin. Unfortunately we had to fight through some more tanglefoot to get down to the small lake we were going to camp near. It was a wonderful feeling to finally peel that pack off! I felt like I was going to float away. Lloyd commented that we had made pretty dang good time getting there. Not sure if he was blowing smoke up my skirt, or just setting me up for tomorrow’s a$$ whippin.
We looked around the small lake and finally found a level spot with a good patch of heather to pitch the tent on. Lloyd told me that heather does a great job of keeping the tent floor a lot drier in wet weather. We got the tent set up, then Lloyd went up the mountain a little ways to glass for goats, while I got my bow and camping gear situated. We had quite the view.
He came back shortly, stating he had located 3 goats. Two together, that were almost certainly billies, and a lone goat on the other end of the mountain, that he was fairly certain was a billy, as well. All three were visible from camp. I got my binos out and quickly spotted them. It was too late in the evening to make a play on any of them, not to mention I was totally spent. We decided to get up early and see if we could spot them at first light, then figure out a game plan. We finished getting camp all situated, ate supper and turned in.
The next morning, after a delicious oatmeal breakfast, we loaded up our packs for the day and headed to the glassing spot Lloyd had located the goats from, the night before. We quickly spotted the lone goat on the far west face of the mountain. He was bedded on a shelf up in a big, nasty rock formation. Still, he might be stalkable. We couldn’t find the other two goats. Lloyd thought there was a very good chance that they were still on that part of the mountain. With the given wind direction, he thought the best plan would be to work our way all the way east of where the pair of goats were spotted, then come up the back side of the mountain, all the way to the top, then work our way west and see if we could lay eyes on the pair.
We skirted the mountain down low for probably close to a mile or more, then worked our way up the back of it. More friggen tanglefoot! We finally got out of the tanglefoot after a couple hundred yards, then up a long shale slide. The footing in the slide was actually pretty decent for the most part. That got us probably halfway up the backside of the mountain. The rest of the way up was pretty steep and very rocky, with a few sketchy spots, but manageable. We spent a good deal of time glassing as we picked our way up through the rocks, and by the time we got to the top, several hours later, we still were unable to locate the pair. The backside of the mountain was lots of sheer face and super jagged vertical rock. It was Highly doubtful that the goats were on the backside. We ate our lunch about 2 and continued working our way west, towards where the lone goat had been bedded at daybreak.
We got to a point where things turned into a razor’s edge and could no longer continue on the path we were taking, so we worked our way down the mountain a hundred yards to try and find another route to where the lone goat may still be. We made some good progress, but then ran into a very sketchy spot. We had two choices. Either go waaay down the mountain to get around the rock face we were on, or we could go almost straight up for about 20 yards, on a rock face, to get to where we could continue. I thought long and hard on it, discussing it with Lloyd. It looked pretty solid with a good amount of hand and footholds. I finally told Lloyd I was ok with it. He asked me 3 times if I was sure, then said ok. I strapped my trekking poles on my pack , then watched Lloyd go up first, slowly. After Lloyd made it up to a good spot I started my ascent, tested each hand and foothold as best I could. I creeped my way up the formation until I finally made it to where Lloyd was at. It was definitely a relief! I’m not afraid of heights. I worked 90’ up in the air as a derrickhand on an oil rig back in the 80s, but I’m also not a big risk taking daredevil, either. In hindsight, it probably wasn’t one of my best life decisions, but God was watching over me. Once we cleared that spot, things were more manageable.
We finally reached the east side of a big saddle, and the goat had been bedded west of the saddle, in a big jumbled rock formation. As Lloyd was working his way to a little better glassing spot, I happened to look over towards those rocks just as the goat walked out of them, about 500yds away. I whistled softly to Lloyd. We were tucked back behind a small ridge and watched as the goat worked his way out of the rocks, heading slowly towards us. He was feeding as he was walking our direction. I finally lost sight of him, but Lloyd could still see him from his position. Lloyd crawled back up to where I was at, to figure out our plan of attack. It took him about 30sec to get back to me, and in that time, the goat disappeared. He had either veered hard to our right and gone up through the saddle, into the hellhole on the backside of this mountain, or he had moved closer towards us, and was in the swale in the bottom of the saddle. Lloyd was pretty sure he hadn’t gone through the saddle, so I asked him what he thought about me quickly trying to slip up close to the edge of the saddle and trying to relocate the goat and possibly get a shot. There was a small ditch that cut towards the saddle. It wasn’t a lot, but it would keep my profile a little bit lower. Lloyd said to go ahead and try it. With catlike stealth (ok maybe not) I slipped down and got fairly close to the edge of the swale, and spotted his back straight below me. I slowly raised up enough to get a range on him. 37 yards. I tucked my rangefinding binos back in, and clipped my release onto the loop. The goat was quartering to me. I was kneeling in a bit of an awkward position, so I tried to reposition my leg slightly, but the billy caught my movement. The stare down was on. I peered at the goat through my bow limbs, hoping they’d possibly somehow break up my outline. Yeah, right. About 5 seconds into the stare down, the billy spooked and started to run. Lloyd was about 10 yds behind me, filming with his phone. I drew and stood up as the goat started to run, and both of us bleated to hopefully stop him. It worked!! He only ran a few steps before he stopped, slightly quartered to me. I put my 40yd pin on him and released. At the hit, the billy took off, making a big arc, but only made it about 60 yards before tipping over!!
Now this gets me fired up!! Llyod is an unbelievable goat guide! I cannot wait to get back up there to experience it again. Huge congrats on your adventure hunt Troy!
man, great recap... I want to do this hunt too! But just reading your recap of the cliff faces, i just don't think this is something i should be doing.. Heights and i do not get a long very well...
Great read. Brings back memories of my hunt with Lloyd. Dang that was 10 years ago and he was pondering how long he could continue as a goat guide. Glad to see he is still at it and grinding away! If anyone recalls my write up from back then, Lloyd made my hunt. He's a super goat guide. Thanks for sharing, but the story is only partly told. What about the pack out? And we all want more photos! Revel in this moment because it is a great accomplishment you will remember for the rest of your days. Congratulations.
You’re getting the best of BC Buddy! Congrats again!! And fresh smoked sockeye to take home to boot. If I wasn’t up a river in elk camp, I’d drive up the Lake to see you.
What an amazing (short) hunt ! ;-)). The video was awesome ! Congrats on your mountain goat Troy, and the shot that you made. The write up was great too, an all around great trip. (Did I mention it was short ?)
Thanks, guys, and thanks, Nick, for posting the video. I appreciate it, buddy!
After watching my goat pile up, and some handshakes and backslaps with Lloyd, I made my way down towards the billy. Once I reached him, an unusual heightened sense of achievement that I hadn’t ever felt before, struck me at that moment. It’s hard to explain it. I’ve had a fair amount of success bowhunting over the past almost 40 years, but this was a little different somehow. He wasn’t a world class animal by any stretch, just a nice goat, but I was sure proud of him.
I notched my tag and we spent a little time cleaning him up, then took some trophy pics before finally skinning and deboning him in preparation for the pack back to camp that evening.
It took Lloyd (and me) a couple of hours to skin the goat out and get him boned n bagged. I’m probably going to do a half body mount, and Lloyd is extremely meticulous with his caping process. He did an amazing job. There will be very little fleshing needing to be done on the cape once it gets to the taxidermist. .We shouldered our packs and weaved our way down towards camp, dealing with seemingly a little bit of everything on the way. Fortunately, minimal tanglefoot.
We arrived in camp about dusk, and unloaded the packs, taking the meat in the game bags out of the garbage bags, and hung them to cool overnight. Same with the cape. After a quick Mountain House supper, I decided I was going to take a bath in the lake. I stunk like a goat, after two days of hard hiking, and man! Did that bath ever feel good! Crawled into the sleeping bag and slept like a baby for a big portion of the night. We woke up around 4 to light rain hitting the rain fly. Looks like it might be a crappy pack out in the morning. Went back to sleep and woke up at dawn to clouds, but no rain. We might just get lucky.
We ate a quick breakfast and broke down camp in short order. Unfortunately we had practically the same amount of weight to pack out that we had packed in, PLUS the goat hide and meat! We had only burned through 4 MH meals, plus some oatmeal and a minimal amount of the lunch snacks we had brought with us. Lloyd had a couple of failures on his battle tested pack and frame. That thing had been through hell over the years with Lloyd. After some ingenious MacGyvering (or Red Greening since Lloyd is Canadian) We got his pack functional again with some mule tape and strategically borrowing a pin from another part of his pack, he was back in the game. I had basically everything I had packed in, plus the cape and the tent poles, and Lloyd had his stuff, plus the meat. My pack was horrible, but I’m sure his was easily over 100 lbs. after struggling to our feet, and a quick selfie, we were off.
Lloyd decided to take a little different route back on the first leg of the pack out. Unfortunately it involved going through a couple hundred yards of tanglefoot, right off the bat! I won’t bore you with all the details, I’ll just tell you the pack out sucked worse than the pack in! I never cratered once going in, but had 2 minor wrecks on the way out. Once in some tanglefoot and once on a mildly steep shale slide. Both were fairly minor, but could’ve been much worse without trekking poles. They are invaluable, IMO. We were blessed with terrific weather for the hike out, thankfully. Cool, cloudy conditions with an occasional light mist to keep us cooled down. Again, we made very good time, according to Lloyd, and I was beyond relieved to see the Ranger in the clearing!
We loaded everything up and hopped in the Ranger and hightailed it down the mountain, towards the truck, then home. We stopped about halfway down the mountain to pick a couple of quarts of huckleberries. The berry crop in the area was unbelievable this fall. There were huckleberries everywhere, along with an abundance of other berries as well. We probably would’ve made the hike in and the one out quicker, if Lloyd would’ve quit stopping all the time to pick them along the trail! They were sure good, though.
We finally rolled into the lodge in the evening and stowed everything. I couldn’t wait to take a shower. I had a heck of a time getting the leukotape stripped off my feet. This stuff is a lifesaver. I pretaped all my potential problem spots before the hike in, and retaped a couple of spots mid trip. My feet held up very well. I only got one blister on the bottom of the ball of my left foot, and didn’t even notice it until I pulled the leukotape off after getting back.
I still had 7 days of hunting left. What to do?? I still had a bear tag and wolf tag. Lloyd offers both s-n-s as well as running bears with his experienced pack of hounds. The bear sightings were down significantly this late summer, most likely due to the over abundance of berries. The bears simply don’t have to move much. I decided try spot n stalk first, then the hounds route if we had little luck finding any bears. I got my gear ready for the next days hunt.
A 100# pack sucks every time even on a paved road. That's a lot of weight to carry anywhere. I'm sure there were a couple spills along the way. If you didn't blow either knee consider yourself lucky.
Great photos. No one will ever question the size of him on the wall as very few even know the difference between a young nanny and a mature billy. He's a great mature goat, Troy! Congrats.
"My pack was horrible, but I’m sure his was easily over 100 lbs."
I can definitely relate! I'm sure that same pack of Lloyd's weighed well over 100lbs on our hike out last year. Pretty incredible guy for sure! Amazing that we both put billies on the ground the first day of our hunts with Lloyd. The man sure knows goats (and bears)! So happy for you buddy!!!
Nice! Way to make it happen. What are the odds that goat stops at just a few steps for the 40 to be true? Don't matter, cause we're reading the story on Bowsite!
Keep it coming! Boy that brings back memories! Especially the coming down off the mountain. That’s brutal no matter how happy you are! Did it go faster on the way down or about the same time?
The next morning we loaded up the dogs and headed down the road to try and cut a fresh track. We didn’t make it a mile, before the dogs started sounding off in the dog box. They had gotten a whiff of something! We stopped, and got Willow out of the box, collared her up, and she started working the ground feverishly back and forth. It wasn’t long before she lined out on a track. We collared and released the rest of the dogs. They ended up losing the trail. They ran into some neighbors out with their dog and so we caught them and went on. No other luck that morning, so we decided to drop the dogs off at home and head to Smithers to register my goat., then try to glass for bears in the ag fields and clear cuts in the evening. Checked the goat in. 8 1/2” & 8” on the horns. Turns out, my goat was 10 years old.
We had zero luck in spotting any bears, so we decided to run the dogs again the next day. The next morning was almost a repeat of the day before, minus the neighbors. Shortly after leaving the house, the dogs fired up again, so we turned Willow out, along with Chappy. They had a little difficulty at first, but soon, they were lined out on a hot trail. Lloyd then turned out Cedar, Toughy, and Gomer. In no time they were all sounding off, except Gomer, who is a Karelian bear dog, and only barks once he’s seen the bear. We watched their progress on the gps tracking screen. Pretty dang cool to watch, IMO! They made a big loop and were headed back towards us, when they stopped and started really sounding off only a hundred yards or so, from the truck, including Gomer. We grabbed our gear and headed their direction. It was some nasty, thick crap, but we only had to go a short ways in, thankfully. The dogs had the bruin treed up in a big cottonwood tree. Not a giant bear, but about average for the area. We studied him for a bit, and Lloyd determined that it was a boar. Sows are legal, but they try to take only boars. I decided that he was big enough for me, so we caught and tied the dogs off. And waited for the bear to give me a shot opportunity. Finally, he repositioned himself up in his perch, enough so that I had an opening. It was a very steep upward shot angle, and a bit awkward to make. I hit him further back and a little higher than where I wanted to, but I must’ve hit some major plumbing, (renal artery most likely) because he came down very quickly after the shot, and was dead when he hit the ground. After making sure the arrow wasn’t sticking out of him, Lloyd turned the dogs loose for their reward and a little taste.
Congrats on your bear Troy! That's a really impressive pack of bear dogs. Didn't get to hunt with Willow last fall...she was hit by a car a few days before I got there. Glad to hear she recovered and is back with the pack.
Congrats Troy! What a trip and challenge. And an excellent write up. At such a happy time for you I won't even mention the Hawkeyes as (maybe) your wife and I will have our time for that in a couple weeks!!
What an incredible hunt Troy!!!! Congratulations! Thanks for taking the time to write up the story. Very well done and such an enjoyable read.You sure don't mess around when you get a chance!!
It was so cool to watch the chase unfold and progress on the tracking screen. There was an Aussie bear hunter in camp, so I got to ride along and experience a couple more chases. The dogs struck a fresh scent trail, so we turned out on it. The dogs really struggled to figure it out at first, but finally they lined out, and the chase was on. This bear gave the dogs a run for their money, and took them through some nasty blowdown, devilsclub, etc for 2-3 miles, before they finally treed it. We climbed through, over and under all that stuff for a half mile before getting to the tree. The bear was perched about 40’ up in a pine tree. We studied on the bear for 30+ minutes, but couldn’t get a good look to see if it was a boar or sow. The Aussie hunter didn’t want to shoot a sow. Lloyd finally took the identification process to another level, and started climbing an adjacent tree to get a better look. He ended up almost eye level with the bear, before determining it was a sow. That’s dedication!
I had a soft spot for Chappy. He was such a sad sack looking fella, but was probably the most determined one of the bunc.
I had a soft spot for Chappy. He was such a sad sack looking fella, but was probably the most determined one of the bunc.
Gomer is the strong, silent type…..unless he sees the bear.
Gomer is the strong, silent type…..unless he sees the bear.
After determining the bear was a sow, and the Aussie decided to pass on it, we leashed the dogs and brush hogged our way back to the truck. The dogs were very disappointed, to say the least.
Troy, I ran around behind those dogs last winter. Great fun! Cedar is just small enough to sometimes escape the dog box and I had to catch that little bullet with a full on flying leap as she sassily whipped past me several times. Most all hounds and especially those sight chasers do NOT come when called. But they sure are dedicated to the chase!! Gomer ran down a slightly wounded wolf last winter.
You sure got the most out of a BC goat hunt a guy could get!!
Wow unreal Troy! You are an absolute UNIT. To accomplish this in your prime at just north of 60 is freakin unreal way to go! Thanks for the story and all the photos. CONGRATS!!!!
Haven’t come to bowsite much anymore, but shux, come back, politics is gone and Troy’s slaying in northern BC!! Makin Bowsite Great Again!!!!
Hey Troy, sounds like we both had a great adventure this season. The good thing about Mt. Goat hunting, 99% of the time it is down hill after the kill and back to camp. Nicely done on both hunts. Glad to see a flatlander survive the high elevations and then be successful. My best, Paul
Great write up and pics/video Troy. I have a BC Goat hunt booked for next year. I'll be turning 57 this September so I was very interested to see how you did with the terrain and conditioning. Very happy for all your success. I'll probably be PM'ing you to get some more info on how to prepare. Thanks again.
Spectacular hunt and recap! Congratulations on the two-fer Troy! You definitely made the best out of that trip with good fishing, a great goat, and a couple of bear hunts! Way to go!
Congratulations on a great goat. Thanks for sharing. My goat hunt with Babine was one of my favorite hunts. I am Spring bear hunting with them next Spring and need to schedule another goat hunt before I am too old.
