Hunting

"I'm not scared"

Oren's New Hat

Picking Blueberries

Winter Wonderland

I went on a moose hunting trip a couple of weekends ago. I took my boat down about 10 miles to Nunacruk. A long side channel that has some seriously good moose potential. We left early afternoon on Saturday. We planned on floating inside the creek and then finding a camping spot on a stretch of river where we could see for a distance both ways.

 Nunacruk

We stopped and hiked into a few different clearings, but we didn't see any moose. As we were leaving one of the spots Zachary slipped and fell in the river. We got to the other side and he hopped back out of the boat to change his clothes. While we were waiting there we heard a moose calling across from where we had just come. We hurried back to the other side and tried calling. It sounded like it was coming towards us for a bit, but it was directly downwind of us. It must have spooked before it got close enough for us to see it. We kept trying to call for a while longer, but we finally gave up so we would have time before dark to set up camp.

 

Moose Camp

We set up camp about midway down the stretch of the river. We cooked hot dogs and potatoes for dinner. There was no more action that night. We slept in the next morning. It was cold! While we were cooking breakfast we could here a moose thrashing the trees. We tried thrashing the brush and calling from where we were but it never did come to us. In hindsight we probably should have cruised a little ways back up the river and closer to where we thought the sounds were coming from. We finally packed up camp and headed out around noon. The ride down the rest of the ways was uneventful. The willows down there are really thick and its hard to see off the river at all. We turned around and headed back up. Just a little ways downriver from town I heard a thunk, thunk, thunk coming from my motor. Uh oh. I stopped and sure enough going into forward the propeller was missing. I tried going upriver in reverse, but the current was too fast. I called Stan on my phone and he came down and towed me back. Unfortunately the driveshaft on the other lower unit I had didn't match the one that I took off my boat. End of the boating season for me.

 Getting a Tow

At some point here I will try to switch the drive shaft if I can get it. I was wondering a little bit because it happened just when I was cruising. I was talking to a guy in town and he said. "Yeah that can happen. Priors." To back up a little, the river has been really low most of the year and I hit hard my fair share of times this year, so I guess it was bound to happen sooner or later.

 Gas at Ricky's

This past weekend I took a trip upriver for caribou. I went with Mike and his wife. We left on Thursday evening right after work. We made it up to Ricky's camp by about 7:30. We decided to stay at Ricky's instead of trying to go farther and set up a tent.

 

Sauna

 Inside Sauna

A little while after we had unloaded our gear Ricky walked in with a sheep. Apparently he was just getting in from sheep hunting in the mountains, and he had a nice 3/4 curl ram on the pack frame.

Lookout Tower

The next day we loaded up and headed out. We planned to travel and check different spots for caribou. Later in the day we would find a place to set up camp. We traveled and stopped a few different times.

 Going Into Canyons

Mike pointed out local spots of interest. Finally we stopped just above Sepun Creek to eat and have coffee. As the coffee was just getting done Jared from the other boat walked down the bluff and calmly stated that there was a bull moose across the river and up a little ways. Sure enough. They took off after it. We watched and saw it fall and then almost two seconds later heard the gunshot. They got it!

Canyons Again

Jared said he did a cow moose call, and the moose came trotting towards him. He turned and ran for the boat. His grandpa yelled at him,"What are you running to the boat for? You got a big gun!" Mike told the Jared about big bull that somebody had shot close to town. The hunter that shot it did a bull moose call and that moose was snorting, stomping, thrashing the trees, and raising it hackles. Jared thought about this for a second and said, "Hoooo, good thing I didn't try a bull moose call!"

Named for Looking Like Intestines

We set up camp at a place called Kaliktovik. Apparently its been a camping place for many years. They said there are old artifacts in the creek behind the willow island.

 

Camp

 I looked around some, but there wasn't anything that caught my eye.

 

Lookout 

The next day we headed upriver to try to get a little farther up than where we had been the day before. There were some boats that had came down the river the day before that said there were caribou way up high.We headed up that ways to see if any of them would come on down. We went up to the second set of canyons, buts it was snowing pretty hard up there. We turned around and started drifting our way back down. We stopped at another bluff overlooking a flat.

 Next Day

Sure enough there were caribou out there. Four bulls just being lazy. 3 of them were bedded down and one was standing. We drove the boat over to a dry creek bed. The plan was to follow the creek bed up to get close and then cover the last few hundred yards over the tundra. We followed the creek bed up and then climbed out on the tundra. The caribou were nowhere to be found. Mike had miscalculated and we came out of the creek bed still a ways away. No matter, we found them and there was a small hill between us and the caribou. We stalked up on them. I was surprised how easy it was to get close to them. We stalked to about 200 yards, decided we could get even closer. All four bulls were bedded down now, they didn't sense us at all. We crept even closer. I saw one of them wind us and stand up. Mike shot, missed. All four of them took off. I shot, hit, and dropped one. We tried to get one more, but we both kept missing. Then the caribou I dropped got up and started running to the other ones. We still walked up and tried to get another one. I shot the one I dropped again, but it got up again. At this point the caribou were starting to get a ways from the rive. Mike figured maybe we should just try to get the one then. The one that I shot started to climb up the hill and I thought, "uh-oh". I walked up to shoot again, but I missed. Now I had only one bullet left. It still stood there. It looked like it was hit good on both shots. I decided to climb above and see if I could heard it back towards the river. I climbed above  and waved my arms and yelled. The caribou took off across the hill. "Shoot, that thing still wants to get by me and climb." I took off across the ridge to cut it off. Suddenly it cut back down the hill and headed towards the river. "Perfect" I thought. Then it just kept going and going. "Oh boy" I was still up on the ridge and the caribou was a good quarter mile away just cruising back to the river. I saw Mike angle back to the river. I was hoping he would get there in time. I tried to run across the tundra. It was rough going, and I was still beat from going up the hill. I heard a shot. "Good, Mike got it!" I thought. Ten minutes later I was getting close to the willows on the river. I tried yelling, but nothing. I starting thinking, "Man I hope he got it and didn't run out of bullets like I almost did." I got the the dry creek bed we stalked up. I still didn't see anything. I yelled again. This time I heard answering yell. I walked over. The caribou was on the ground! Phew! I gutted it while Mike got the boat. We ended up packing it only a couple hundred yards instead of a half mile, so it worked out well.

 Bull

 

Ride Home

We camped one more night at Kaliktovik. The ride home was uneventful. We saw a ton of bears fishing. Must be time for them to fatten up before heading for their dens for the winter.

Oren Cutting Meat