Day 10
The last day for adventure
I gave the outfitter full warning that this
day, like all other hunting days, would be a big one and that the guide should
have his Weeties for breakfast, as I was planning on hiking my heart out on
those mountains in search of a good Caribou bull. Being my last day, there
would be no turning back from where we needed to go to make it happen. The
morning had us looking over four big bulls up high that were laid up for the
day. Wed keep them in mind, but for now continued up river. Ten plus kilometers
from camp, we caught sight of a big white chest. "Bull," I whisper excitedly as
I can already tell its heavily antlered and the binoculars confirmed that.
The bull was out feeding with six cows and
they all looked pretty relaxed, but no sooner had I closed the gap and the Caribou
started to graze up river. The wind had me up on the mountain and the Caribous
steady stride had me jogging in and out of crevices, through thick scrubs and
jumping and climbing up rocky steep cut draws.
I couldnt make it happen even at this pace,
I was barely keeping parallel to the big bull. I kept trying hoping to get in
front of the bull that was still just grazing along, but the last draw really
slowed me up. To get to the river in a hurry and try one more stalk, I jumped
down onto a rockslide and started to descend, but gathered way too much speed
as the rocks slipped on each other like shale. I hit the river with an abrupt
stop and instantly it felt like I had broken my heel bone all over again.
I staggered out onto the river and glassed
upstream to where the bull was last seen. I could just make out the tops of his
antlers and limped up towards him, keeping to the base of the mountain. Again I
couldnt close the gap and had to watch the bull fade into the distance. We
clocked the stalk at just over three kilometers and most of it in some
unforgiving ground. I didnt say anything to the guide about my heel, as I
didnt want him worrying about me especially when there was more hunting to be
done.
Time was running thin, as there was less
than two hours of light remaining on my last hunting day in the Northwest. We
walked and glassed for the next hour then a bull appeared that had it all. I
couldnt believe it, this must be it I thought. Instantly I was in stalk mode
and started to close the gap, a couple of hundred meters to get to thirty
meters, bobbing and weaving through cover slowly and steadily. The bull was
scraping its antlers behind a couple of trees. All I needed was for him to walk
out into the clear either angling away or broadside. Broadside it was, twenty
five meters away. The bull walked out and I eased to full draw. The Carbon
Matrix flexed again, the arrow left the string and blitzed straight through the
big Caribou bull. It was perfect at that, as the center of the kill zone
instantly turned red and the lungs depressed.
The bull literally hit the ground running
in mere seconds and expired. This bull had it all. Last hour on the last day
some ten plus kilometers from camp. Totally stoked to say the least at an
animal of a lifetime on an adventure of a lifetime. Night was already just
about on us and we had a lot of meat to recover. We made quick work of the
photos and moved onto recovering the beast, which was about twice the size that
I had given them credit for. I caped while the guide started recovering the
meat.
Eventually we arrived back at camp at some
ridiculous hour of night or morning, we were greeted by all the staff and sat
up talking and laughing for hours at what had been a very enjoyable and
successful hunt.
The deep draw that I hunted my Caribou bull
in, photographed while flying out.
I feel like I will need to come back every
year now to satisfy the urge for a Land Before Time.
A Massive thank you to South Nahanni Outfitters (Sunny Peterson,
Werner Aschbacher (THE OUTFATHER) and Guide Byron Gagne)
