Luck Strikes Twice
I have never been one of those hunters that the minute draw results are posted is logging in to see if drew. I usually just wait and see what comes in the mail. 2018 started pretty much the same as every other year but outside circumstances would influence the draw results notification for me. It just so happened that the day draw results for sheep and goat results were posted for Colorado, I received a fraud notification on my phone for my credit card. So, of course, I logged in so that I could verify charges and as I was doing so I noticed a charge by CDOW. My heart skipped a beat – is it possible I had drawn a goat tag. I knew it wasn’t a sheep tag as I drew my sheep tag the previous year. In fact, luck had indeed struck 2 years in a row.
I knew that I was going to have to scout as much as possible early because being in ranch real estate the summer is my busy season and I would be in Alaska most of September right before my goat season opened. Well with a busy real estate season things were just not cooperating. Seemed like every chance I was free to scout the weather did not want to cooperate. Rain and clouds would move in making glassing very difficult if not impossible.
I was able to get in a few good days and spot several good billies.I knew finding a billy in this unit that would break 9 inches would take a lot and a 10 inch was a monster. But I had selected the 3rd hunt because what I really wanted for my 1st mountain goat was a good billy with a beautiful coat. If it happened to be a monster that would just be icing on the cake. For me, the experience is what I am really after and why when I have the choice I prefer DIY hunts and hunt alone a lot.
Well, I was definitely in for an experience for sure. The opening week there was bad weather moving in with a chance of snow later in the week so I wanted to get in the mountains as soon as possible. Most of the goats that I had spotted had been 10,000 foot plus so with weather it was going to be tough.
I decided based on some intel to try an area I had not scouted and was a pretty good hike just to get to some glassing vantage points. A light soaking rain started shortly after hitting the trail and by the time I finally reached a glassing vantage point most of the higher elevation was socked in. As I huddled up under some trees and glassed what I could, which wasn’t much at all, I contemplated my next move. Give up and head back to the truck, sit it out and see if the weather cleared which didn’t sound likely from the weather forecasts, or go higher and top out on the ridge and hunt the ridgeline.
Giving up is not in me and just sitting in the rain waiting didn’t sound great as I hate being cold and wet. So heading higher it was. Once I reached the ridge I again was faced with another decision. Visibility, of course, was poor at maybe 150 yards and the wind was blowing 15-20 mph. Do I tough it and start along the ridge taking it slow hoping I might catch a break or tuck tail and head back to lower elevation. Knowing I wasn’t going to have a chance to see anything from a lower elevation and seeing I was already there I decided to tough it out and make the most of it.
As I slowly worked my way along the ridge, the clouds would come and go taking visibility from maybe 150 yards down to 50 yards or less and every now and then maybe out to 2-300 yards. I was just topping a point when the clouds were moving out and giving a brief moment of higher visibility when like a ghost out of the darkness a goat appeared and then an even bigger goat a little further away. I knew right away they were both billies but with the visibility, it was very hard to judge. So for the next hour or so we played a kind of cat and mouse game. As they would move away feeding along the ridge disappearing into the grey wall of clouds, I would pursue until they came back into view and try to judge whether I wanted to go ahead and take the larger billy.
Finally, the pair were side hilling angling upward slightly away from me offering a perfect broadside and the clouds parted enough that I had good visibility. I knew he wasn’t a 10-inch goat but he was a big billy with good length and when he turned broadside could tell he had a beautiful coat. Knowing the weather wasn’t supposed to get any better the rest of the season I decided he filled the bill and I settled my crosshairs high on his shoulder at about 150 yards and sent my 150-grain core-lokt downrange dropping him in his tracks.
The weather broke a little shortly after taking the shot allowing for some quick pictures. As I was just finishing gutting my goat the weather was starting to make a turn for the worse so I elected to head back to the truck and gear up and come back in the morning to cape and debone hoping the weather would improve. Little did I know over the next two days the weather would continually worsen and by the morning of the second day as I was coming out with the cape the wind was howling along the ridges gusting 35-40 mph. Several times fighting to stay upright along the ridge I was knocked over by brutal wind gusts.
To say the least, I was very happy when I reached the truck with the last load. I was even happier with my decision when I looked at the weather the next day and saw that snow had stacked up with more snow on the way and pretty much snow the rest of the season.
Some of the worst conditions that I have had to hunt and very thankful I was able to persevere and notch my tag. It was one of those hunts that definitely glad when over but will never regret or forget the experience of it all.