Continuation of Tuesday.
I had run into another hunter who had a late season muzzle loader deer tag. We talked for a short while and parted ways. Shortly after I heard him shoot. We met back up and I asked him if he made a good shot or not. He said with all the smoke he didn't know where it went. He decided to give it some time andthen would go look for it. We were both in the general area and kept bumping into each other. I had seen a really nice buck and went to tell him about it. As I was looking for him, I found the deer he had shot. It was down exactly where he shot it. I wound up helping him gut it and he gave me the heart and liver for a needy family I know back home.
Tueday night while checking into the motel, I ran into yotewhackerguy and a couple of his friends. There jumped the border and was doing some calling.
Wed. morning I opted for some early coyote calling behind the motel. The sage was high so I used the stool and the benelli. Only called one, but she didn't get away. It was a brisk 16 degrees.
That afternoon had me scouting areas for elk again. Al Morris of Hunter Specialties was to be hunting with me the first part of the season. He had gotten a hold of me and asked if I had checked out a certain area. I hadn't , but made a run over there to do just that. Well, long story short, I rolled my 4 wheeler over ontop of my self when I was loading it back into the truck. Screwed up my wrist and broke the wheeler. Im just glad it wasn't worse. Al and I finally met up that evening at the motel , ate dinner and went to bed.
Thanksgiving day had Al and I spotting elk . He spotted quite a few, but all were in really high country with no road access. Like I said, Im in poor shape and no way would I be able to make it in and out especially packing quarters. We did find one bull that was some what accessable by road and a 2 mile walk around the top of the mountain. We decided that was our best bet.
Friday morning we did somemore scouting/glassing. Come 11am , we decided to go after the one we saw the day before.
We started the journey on the wheeler about noon to the top of the mountain. Then a short 2 mile walk (which felt like I just climbed the Matterhorn) followed by an hour nap waiting for the time to be right. Here's Al comeing back from a nature call after waking from his nap. This fella can sleep anywhere!
We headed down towards where we had seen the elk feeding the afternoon before. After looking around for a while, a couple of cow calls and a bugle or two later we got a vocal responce. Al spotted this bull about 3/4 of a mile away. t was a 5x5 about 230-250. Not huge, but I figured the shape I was in, beggers cant be choosers and it was far from being a dink. What happened next was nothing short of mirraculous. Ladies and Gentleman , Al Morris called this bull to with in 100 yrds from 3/4 of a mile away bugling and grunting all the way, and this was late November. It was awesome. I have never hunted elk nor seen one called in in person. This was a great experience for me and I glad to be sharing it with a great guy who made it happen. There is actually an elk in this picture, but it's not zoomed in enough to see.
The bull came up the sadle to the imediate left of the picture. Unfortunatly , the lay of the land offered only marginal shots at a head or spine thatI just didn't feel comfortable taking. The bull wound up getting down wind and bolting.
We started the long hike (for me at least) back to the 4 wheeler. About half a mile for the wheeler, Al rolled his ankel and was lucky to make it back to the wheeler under his own power. Im glad, because he's a big fella and I really didn't want to have to snuggle with him o help keep him warm till morning. After a cold sweat drenched ride in low 20 degree temps, we finally made it back to the truck. We opted to sleep in and then decided it was best if Al went to get his ankle checked out and I went home to get the wheeler fixed.
Thank you Al for spending your Thanksgiving with me out in the woods helping me to get an elk. Even though we didn't bag one, it was an experience I will never for get and im proud to call you my fried.
I'll be going back after the elk in a couple of days.
