Traveling Light Or Hauling In Heavy?
Real Small Or Real Big?
Just Off Horseback or Just Off Graded Road?
Bare Bones or a Canvas Hilton or 40' Motorhome?
What's Your Favorite Elk Camp Set Up and Why Is It Best For You??

(NOTE: Perfect For One Will Be Absolute Nonsense To Another!)

Good judgement comes from bad experience! Half of elk hunting is knowing what NOT to do!

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Outfitters tent, couple of propane stoves and a good pair of hunting boots.

"ATTITUDE REFLECTS LEADERSHIP, CAPTAIN!"

Four horses pack us back a mile or two. Canvas wall tent, wood stove, frame cots, chairs, steaks, salmon, homemade chili, fresh elk loins, you get the idea. If we are going to do it we might as well do it right. That's why we have horses. Did the light, freeze dried food thing before and this is much better. It's more work, but it's worth it.

I've got a 12x14 wall tent with 5' side walls. I use a wood heater. The tent says it will sleep 5---truth is 5 is way too crowded, 4 is OK, but 3 is perfect. I would like to get another to use as a cook tent. We 4 wheel drive back in as far as we can over some pretty rough trails & camp at the trail head to the wilderness. Sounds strange but I found that I like to take up 1/2 cord of wood that I cut & split in the summer---- It's already cured & dry---just throw a tarp over the stack. Cutting firewood for the stove takes some time during the setup & if it's snowing well everything gets wet including me !! For the campfire we will cut some wood up. That's usually thew 1st night after that it's dinner then hit the cot. Nothing like coming back to a warm camp after a long day of elk hiking !! No horses at my camp--It's the shoe leather express!! I use to pack the elk out on my back but the older I get the more I like using a cell phone & call my outfitter friend & pay a couple of hundred to get it back to camp.

I normally just camped in the bed of my truck under the camper. If it won't fit in the ford, I don't need it. I have propane stoves and heaters, a reasonable fire that I do most cooking on, a folding chair and a radio. Sit back and listen to Art Bell on the AM stations, watch the stars, hear the fire crackling...It's just as good as getting the elk. I pull as far off the main roads in the woods as I can. Wake up at 5:00am and hike to where I need to be. Have good padding under a good zero degree sleeping bag or two and your set to go. I bring a small tent sometimes if I REALLY need to get in the backwoods. Throw a camo cover over your truck parked in the bushes so no one will see it. And the tent is good when I just need to put some gear in it to get it out of my way.

"Hey ya'll, watch this"

We take 4WD t' the end of the trail and back pack from thar. My partn'r and I carry our camp on our back like some folks would do with a "spike camp" and hike back into the woods fer two three days at a shot. We done went injun, the tent is a Kifaru 4 man synthetic teepee, light as can be but bullet pruf in the wind. 4 man is really2 man in my mind. Use a super light weight foldin' stove with little vent pipe for heat 'n burn the wood found where we camp. This is a pert' small teepee and hides real good in the woods. It has a small volume so's it don't take much wood to get it heated up real nice. Sleeping pad does double duty as a chair when leaned up against yer pack. Regardless of the thir' below sleepin' bags, the heated evening hours are important to allow a feller's body to charge back'up and gets in a good hot meal, plus ifn's the weath'r is mean we sometimes head back to the tent at noon to warm up a bit since it is never too far from where we are huntin', us'lly 3-4 miles off the road. As I'm gettin' up in years the idea of leading a pack horse in ta hunt wit' is startin' to appeal and would make getting the elk out a bit easier.
Rackem

Edited by - Rackem on 12/05/2002 20:24:07

Rackem - that synthetic teepee set up sounds interesting. We use a heavy elk camp setup just off of graded road, which means its a pretty long walk in the darkness every morning and every night and if its mean weather, then shelter is a long ways away. Is there a web site or something for that tent, er I mean teepee? We are considering doing some sort of lite spike camp in addition to our heavy camp.
EKM


Good judgement comes from bad experience! Half of elk hunting is knowing what NOT to do!

Our current elk camp set up is a 16x52 wall tent structure with 5 foot sides with internal steel frame.
Divided up as follows:
16x20 sleeping area with a vented, thermostat controlled propane farm stove.
8x8 shower room/changing room
8x8 either storage or extra bunkage
16x24 kitchen, dining, loafing area with wood stove.

All lighting is propane lanterns
4 burner cook stove setup
110V generator powering a chest freezer and microwave

Plus a 3x3 by 7'high outhouse tent - heated with a lantern on a 20# propane bottle.

We go with this set up because our target hunting group is 10 (9 plus the chef, my wife). Last year had 6 hunters. We generally scout for 5 days after a day of set up, then add the five day season and a day for take down.. As I get older I just seem to appreciate the comforts of life when hunting plus its a good deal for the misses specially when you are in camp for 12 days or so and a raging blizzard keeps you shut in for 2-3 days. Each year we have our group and everyone who comes to visit sign a canvas panel in the wall tent and then we give a brief description of what happened that year!
Over kill I know, but we love it!
EKM



Good judgement comes from bad experience! Half of elk hunting is knowing what NOT to do!

Well, EKM I dont need thet kind'a comfert, but suppose things might change sum what wit' me gettin' older! To each his own! Must be a tussle hunting with nine hunters. Hope y'all can live up to yer handle, but sounds like you sur 'nuff got a place to put 'em! Hav'n a hot meal wait'n fer y'all at the end of the day mus' be a treat. Fer the teepee go to www.kifaru.net it'll make ya a fine spike camp I reckon.