It was kind of one of those spur of the moment ideas, I decided on Wednesday to take Friday off and head up into my favourite road closure with my backpack and towing my game cart. I'd spend two nights and three days chasing mule deer. Six am finds me headed out of town for the hour's drive to the beginning of the road closure. By 9:30 I'm at our campsite 
and ready to set up and drop everything but hunting gear. By 10:30 I've got camp set up, had a second cup of tea and was ready to head out with the intention of not seeing camp again until either I had a deer on the ground or it was dark.
I spent the next eight hours hiking, glassing, sitting, glassing repeat. I saw a total of 11 deer, three of them bucks. All two points(to be legal a mule deer must have a minimum of four points on one side, excluding eye guards) so no buck that day. It was a great day though as I decided to head into previously unknown territory. Lots of great habitat and tons of sign. Since I was hunting a road closure I was moving along old logging roads and hiking out to glassing points on cutblocks with some natural alpine/meadows mixed in.
It was just on dark by the time I was back in camp. It was a beautiful clear(cold -6C) night and the fire was much appreciated. Just before I headed off to bed a bull elk began bugling in the not too far distance. Maybe I'll see him in the morning I thought to myself. Nine bells and down comes the snow so I took that as a hint to hit the sack. After putting on close to 15km I slept very well(I really should not have had two cups of tea sitting around the fire). Five am finds me cooking up my porridge and coffee in my vestibule warming my hands and tent with my stove.
By six I'm on the block where I want to be, it's too dark to shoot but I can see well enough to know that everything I can see is within shooting distance. The furthest I can see is 300m but I can see a very large piece of the cutblock and I have seen a lot of deer over the years on this same block. I sit and glass for two hours or so until I'm beyond shivering, if I don't start moving and get warmed up I won't be able to shoot anyhow. Over the next hour I make my way slowly NE across the block up to the next set of benches where I can see a new section of territory. I get to a line of alders where I pause for a while before I have to cross a larger open area. I glass all around and then pass back over the area without the binoculars when I see the buck sky lined at the top of the ridge approximately 225m away. By the time I've got my binoculars on him he's moved down off the skyline and turned broadside clearly showing me four points on each side.
I get my pack off and set up on my shooting stick. As I find him in my scope I once again make sure he's legal before moving the cross hairs down and back just until they pause just behind his front leg. I squeeze the trigger and watch the buck jump straight up kicking out both front and back legs before heading straight downhill out of sight at top speed. A good hit I think. Keeping the scope on the spot where I shot him I took note of a dead broken off tree in between where the deer and I were, a good reference point for finding him. I head up towards where I last saw him but over shoot my mark and have to zig zag across the hill before I found the spot where I had hit him. I don't know about you guys but those few minutes spent searching for blood are gut twisting for me, I'm always second guessing agonizing over what happened. And then there it is a very large and clear blood trail with a beautiful mule deer buck 60m downhill piled up just over a small cutbank.
I cut my tag, make a cup of tea and just sit and realize the perfection of this morning. I'm solo on a pack trip and I'm sitting here on this perfect mountain
looking at this healthy fat buck that's going to feed my family.
Now I just have to get him the 600m down to the road, break him down, break camp, load everything on my cart and head back to the truck. I shot him at 9:30am had him gutted and dragged down to the access road by 10:30. Got back to camp and packed up everything and was back at the deer by 12:30pm. Broke him down and packed in game bags and on the cart by 3:30pm
. Headed home. I was home by 5:30pm and spent the Sunday butchering and grinding. The perfect weekend.
I was tempted to stay in camp because I like to cook over campfires but it makes me more than nervous having meat in camp solo in grizzly country. I tend to want to get off the mountain as soon as possible. For those interested my gear used was a Tikka t3 featherlite 270win shooting 150gr Federal Fusions, Vortex 10x42 binoculars, Leupold 15x30 compact spotting scope, Alps vertex 2.0 tent, Northface sleeping bag, no special clothing really just good quality hiking gear in olives and browns, love the Kuiu and Sitka stuff just can't justify the money. Hope you enjoyed the tale I sure enjoyed the hunt. Thanks for taking the time to read about my perfect weekend.
and ready to set up and drop everything but hunting gear. By 10:30 I've got camp set up, had a second cup of tea and was ready to head out with the intention of not seeing camp again until either I had a deer on the ground or it was dark.I spent the next eight hours hiking, glassing, sitting, glassing repeat. I saw a total of 11 deer, three of them bucks. All two points(to be legal a mule deer must have a minimum of four points on one side, excluding eye guards) so no buck that day. It was a great day though as I decided to head into previously unknown territory. Lots of great habitat and tons of sign. Since I was hunting a road closure I was moving along old logging roads and hiking out to glassing points on cutblocks with some natural alpine/meadows mixed in.
It was just on dark by the time I was back in camp. It was a beautiful clear(cold -6C) night and the fire was much appreciated. Just before I headed off to bed a bull elk began bugling in the not too far distance. Maybe I'll see him in the morning I thought to myself. Nine bells and down comes the snow so I took that as a hint to hit the sack. After putting on close to 15km I slept very well(I really should not have had two cups of tea sitting around the fire). Five am finds me cooking up my porridge and coffee in my vestibule warming my hands and tent with my stove.
By six I'm on the block where I want to be, it's too dark to shoot but I can see well enough to know that everything I can see is within shooting distance. The furthest I can see is 300m but I can see a very large piece of the cutblock and I have seen a lot of deer over the years on this same block. I sit and glass for two hours or so until I'm beyond shivering, if I don't start moving and get warmed up I won't be able to shoot anyhow. Over the next hour I make my way slowly NE across the block up to the next set of benches where I can see a new section of territory. I get to a line of alders where I pause for a while before I have to cross a larger open area. I glass all around and then pass back over the area without the binoculars when I see the buck sky lined at the top of the ridge approximately 225m away. By the time I've got my binoculars on him he's moved down off the skyline and turned broadside clearly showing me four points on each side.
I get my pack off and set up on my shooting stick. As I find him in my scope I once again make sure he's legal before moving the cross hairs down and back just until they pause just behind his front leg. I squeeze the trigger and watch the buck jump straight up kicking out both front and back legs before heading straight downhill out of sight at top speed. A good hit I think. Keeping the scope on the spot where I shot him I took note of a dead broken off tree in between where the deer and I were, a good reference point for finding him. I head up towards where I last saw him but over shoot my mark and have to zig zag across the hill before I found the spot where I had hit him. I don't know about you guys but those few minutes spent searching for blood are gut twisting for me, I'm always second guessing agonizing over what happened. And then there it is a very large and clear blood trail with a beautiful mule deer buck 60m downhill piled up just over a small cutbank.
I cut my tag, make a cup of tea and just sit and realize the perfection of this morning. I'm solo on a pack trip and I'm sitting here on this perfect mountain
looking at this healthy fat buck that's going to feed my family. Now I just have to get him the 600m down to the road, break him down, break camp, load everything on my cart and head back to the truck. I shot him at 9:30am had him gutted and dragged down to the access road by 10:30. Got back to camp and packed up everything and was back at the deer by 12:30pm. Broke him down and packed in game bags and on the cart by 3:30pm. Headed home. I was home by 5:30pm and spent the Sunday butchering and grinding. The perfect weekend.I was tempted to stay in camp because I like to cook over campfires but it makes me more than nervous having meat in camp solo in grizzly country. I tend to want to get off the mountain as soon as possible. For those interested my gear used was a Tikka t3 featherlite 270win shooting 150gr Federal Fusions, Vortex 10x42 binoculars, Leupold 15x30 compact spotting scope, Alps vertex 2.0 tent, Northface sleeping bag, no special clothing really just good quality hiking gear in olives and browns, love the Kuiu and Sitka stuff just can't justify the money. Hope you enjoyed the tale I sure enjoyed the hunt. Thanks for taking the time to read about my perfect weekend.
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