As you may have seen I had a thread called dilemma. In the thread I had mentioned I killed a bull in the Thorofare. This is him. He is a main frame 6x6 with an extra set of browtines above his main browtines. He is not a giant but I am sure tickled to death. The trip started when I moved to Wyoming a little over a year ago. I like doing stuff the hard way so I decided to go into the Thorofare with a buddy from GA. I was really hesitant because if you look in forums the only thing you can find was from 20112 and 2012. Nothing recent and those reviews were not good. However we wanted the experience in the Thorofare and I like it to be difficult. Well We both flew into Cody on Friday did some odd and end things then headed to the trail head. I rented three horses for the season. They are about two miles from the TH. We got loaded up and that is when hell started. As soon as I got on my horse he about threw me. I will be the first to tell you I am not a cowboy. I have hunted about 4 times on horses and that is about all of my experience. Comes to find out my scabbard was digging into his shoulder. After some help form the packer we got it fixed. The horse was still acting funny and did not like the head lamp. Guess he didn't like the drive in. Wee here goes the second attempt. I get on the horse and he goes crazy and about throws me again. I am like hell no I will walk. So I walk to the trail head. We say the hell with it and setup camp. Get a good night sleep and hit the trail at daylight. Sat we ride all day taking our times and yes the horse calmed down and ends up being a pretty good horse. After riding all day with minimal horse problems we get right to the Thorofare and my buddy looks down and says I lost my damn Jacket. I say well go look for it. We had gotten off a couple miles earlier so we knew it was not far. While he is gone I setup camp and we get some shut eye. The next morning we wake up and head on in. We camped 300 feet from the Thorofare. While riding in we saw a few outfitters packing racks out and I talked to a few hunters and they said the rut was on. The anticipation is pretty high at this point. We ride past one outfitters camp and notice some pretty good look drainages. on both sides of the trail We ride 4 miles in and see a decent looking opening and decide to setup camp here and get to hunting. After camp is setup we hit the hill. It is around noon and very windy and slight rainy. We ease up into the drainage and right off the bat come across bones. I consider myself an aggressive hunter and we did some major running and gunning. . After about 4 hours we are headed back to camp and stop on the side of a hill to do some glassing. after glassing for a good 45 minutes I notice a bull chasing a cow. We watch them for a few minutes. They head into a small patch of timber at the bottom of the hill. Now it turns into South GA turkey hunting. We haul arse down the mountain across a creek and field and get to the edge of the timber. I start taking it easy threw the timber lightly cow calling and doing a lot of looking. After about 20 minutes of doing this knowing they are more than likely still in the drainage I cow call and throw a bugle in with it. I ease about 30 yards. I put my right leg up on a blow down taking it easy while listening and looking. after a few minutes I look up and bam that son of gun is 40 yards away looking right at me. Now my leg is still on the log and he is at my 3 clock. There is no way that I can draw or reposition. After seems like 30 minutes of staring which is really probably two minutes he turns his head. I drop the leg, raise bow and pull back. He proceeds to move broadside from left to right.. I say hey to him to get him to stop aim and et the solid broadhead fly. He runs about 30 yards and stops. then runs off and I hear him crash. I can not begging to express the excitement. I have just shot my first Bull Elk with my best friend. during all of this he eased off to see if they moved out of the drainage. I meet up with him not far from where I shot and I start doing the ole fist pump. He said now way I said I drilled him. We walk up and find him not 40 yards from where I shot him. I drilled him right threw the ole pump station. I was super impressed with the solid. Complete pass threw. To some up the rest of the trip the next morning we hunted that side of the mountain but one drainage over. I called in a 5x5 for him and he had bow problem and missed at 20 yards. During that time the herd bull heard us and moved into the drainage. I called him up hour later and he shot him at 7 steps and we could not find him. The next day we looked for him and could not find him. After hiking all day we move into another drainage and hear 2 bulls. They go quite and as we are walking out we jump a decent mule deer up and he shoot him. He was a 5x6 about 150. From what I hear he is a really good buck for the Thorofare. While we are cleaning him a bull bugles below us and I call him up. However we were on a cliff had one elk down and a deer with one pack horse. We decide to not attempt to kill him and got back to the trial at 1 am. Also who ever says it is cool to see a bear they have never seen one in the wilderness. with leg quarters draped over your body.
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