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Sep 30, 2024
10:12:26am
Mozey 3rd String
PCT: Break for eight day rocky mountain goat hunt in NW British Columbia
This ended up being one of the strangest adventures I've ever done. It was my 22- year old guide's second ever hunt, and had never been on the ground in this area before. We pretty much got weathered out six of the eight days. I saw 14 goats, but no mature billies, so I did not harvest a goat. We also saw two grizzlies, and at least five wolves. My outfitter always includes a wolf tag in the hunt package, but I never expected to actually see one. However, on the third day, after hiking across a plateaued mountain top, my guide needed to stop for a bathroom break. He took his pack off and faced away from me in direction we had just come from. He immediately spotted a black wolf standing on the horizon looking at us from about 250 yards and told me to grab my rifle. Just as I got my pack down and laid across it, four more wolves (3 black & 1 grey) came up over the horizon and started running directly at us. We had not been doing any predator calls or anything like that, so this was totally unexpected. My guide told me to pick the color I wanted and shoot. After looking them all over, it was obvious to me that the first one we saw was the biggest so I put the cross hairs on him and dropped him. This all happened in about ten seconds. After it was all over and we had a chance to reflect on what had just happened, we realized that those things were coming after us to eat us. It's a good thing I didn't realize that In the moment, because I may not have otherwise been so calm. I feel lucky that we had just stopped for a bathroom break. Otherwise, I was just following my guide and probably would not have heard them coming up from behind until they were already on me. In all my time in the great outdoors, I have never previously had to shoot an animal in self defense. I'm pretty sure I shot the alpha male out of that pack, but another weird aspect to all this is that we believe that alpha female continued to follow us for several miles over the next few days. Either that, or we saw two other separate wolves that looked and howled exactly like her. Days four through seven were rain, snow, and fog. My poor guide, who was wearing clothes made by his grandmother, was obviously on the edge of hypothermia, and frequently needed to stop and build fires to warm and dry him out. On the seventh day, we decided we better try to get out of there. Being unfamiliar with the area, my guide initially tried to lead us out by following the river, but that turned into a bushwhacking nightmare, with very slow progress. It was almost nightfall and we still had at least ten miles to go, and he again soaking wet and shivering. Meanwhile, I'm feeling a little guilty because I'm all comfortable in my goretex gear. We were on a steep slope, but managed to find a little flat shelf about 6' wide and 15' long, and decided to build another fire and spend the night there. Not enough room for either of our tents and a fire, so we decided to forgo trying to sleep and just stayed up and tended the fire the entire night. That was a pretty long night, but at least after three or four hours it stopped raining on us. The next morning at first light, we again started trying to bushwhack our way out of there. We'd only managed maybe a quarter mile when my poor guide, suffering from hypothermia, disappointment from not finding a mature goat, and lack of sleep, had a panic attack. He started with a string of F-bombs, and how we were never going to make it and how we were going to die out there. This is where I knew I needed to take over. I assured him that I had been in similar situations many times and knew that we would be fine, and that if he was willing to follow me, I would get us out of there. I know he was skeptical, but he did agree to follow me. He was not religious, but I said we could use some divine guidance, and so we first started with a prayer. After that, I started straight up the mountain, hoping to get to same route we had used to walk in there, which was about two miles up. However, we'd only gone a quarter mile when we came across a very well worn moose trail going through the bush in the direction we needed to go, so we followed it. After that ran out, we found another, and then another. Finally, after about five hours, we made it back to the ATV. As a parting gift, I gave my young guide my goretex hunting jacket. Weird, weird, experience, but still some very beautiful country. fbef7025afd0f587f7f84117ee25c779.jpeg29c8d1ee440ed06e1eb3c399cceb1bba.jpegbce13856b1d5d1c293daee48789b3bd0.jpeg395d4f7f11b0e67d32c9e2897c176c99.jpegdbfd7c9325ba701e2c2b12b6fe38d974.jpeg1a1e8bf66a2587308fa3df8192850f7b.jpegacba85bc4d9fe2072f50975bc15d24b1.jpege2839ae6e5a8dd90b87e7036faed06b5.jpeg490a0ac176c78facd19dc3a4e8096c1a.jpeg
This message has been modified
Originally posted on Sep 30, 2024 at 10:12:26am
Message modified by Mozey on Sep 30, 2024 at 10:39:49am
Message modified by Mozey on Sep 30, 2024 at 11:47:25am
Mozey
Bio page
Mozey
Joined
Feb 7, 2024
Last login
Dec 7, 2024
Total posts
252 (7 FO)
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