Sunday evening, Sept. 21st we arrived in camp, it was unseasonably warm, the moon was full, the camp cook had just been,” let go”, neither one of the guides that were supposed to be there showed up……the rut was basically over. The elk were bugling the first week of September but, were now as quite as church mice. The outfitter / guide was in town buying some supplies and trying to find a cook.
So we unloaded our gear, made ourselves at home for what was to be a seven day archery hunt.
That night I got up to tee tee at about 3:30 a.m. and couldn’t sleep so, I just sat outside and listened to the elk bugle the rest of the night till about 9:30 that same morning. Of course by the time we decided to go after one of the bugling bulls….they shut up.
Well, Mr. Quintana made it to camp Monday afternoon with some supplies. The good news was, that he had hired a cook and found a guide to help out……he tried to let us know in as painless a way as possible that the hunting had been horrible.
On Tuesday a.m. the 23rd Mr. Quintana and I left camp and started the long walk down sawmill road to the backside meadow of Wikenson Mt. We checked an abandoned wallow, and an old homestead cabin. We left the cabin undisturbed and a little unsettled that someone had poured so much of their life into this ole place and now it is simply falling in on itself. Progress…..hmm is it really that much nicer to pull a 5th wheel RV back into some of those places, than to fix up the old cabin? Ok, I won’t go there…..
We were sharing philosophical ideas about life, and in the course of the conversation we started discussing how, that sometimes when you want something so bad, it becomes even more elusive. With every failed attempt you add more pressure to yourself to redeem and be successful. In my case I had blown, whiffed, choked, and generally managed to mess up several golden opportunities over the last 8 years in a row, trying to fill an over the counter archery elk tag in Colorado.
Man, when you go back home and re-live those hunts (the good and the bad) over, and over, waiting for the next year to make new memories and hopefully erase some old ones.
I have been really blessed to have been on some awesome wilderness hunts in places like..
Elk park, Molis lake, Whitehead Gulch, Lost Lake, Benito Canyon, to name a few.
I would have returned just for the horse back riding in those areas, the hunting was a bonus.
But, those are brutal hunts, me and my buddies Tommy and Bill are not spring chickens and they had taken there toll on us. By the grace of God we met and hooked up with Mr. Bill Quintana and went from 10,000 to 12,000 feet hunts on horse back to 7,000 to 8,000 foot hunts on ATV’s and on foot.
Tommy my buddy, who is really more like a brother, killed a nice 6x5 the previous years, after paying his dues, which included nearly 10 years of unfilled tags, a blown disc in his back. Dreaming and pursuing that dream, on Sept 22nd the crowning jewel and culmination, of lots of hard work, blood, sweat and tears……what a celebration of the moment when we found his bull. Tommy always said “ When its my turn to kill an elk, I will kill one.” And indeed he did.
So, here we are, back once again, trying to join the precious few who put a tag on a Colorado rocky mountain elk.
Stunned and surprised by the bugle above us, reality sunk in and we moved as quickly as my burning lungs would allow. If you have never experience the adrenaline rush of a bugling bull, which is enough to take your breath away….try sticking your head under water for about 2 minutes and then run up hill………it is tough.
We set up and Bill gave a little call on his bugle…..the bull responded and came in to 47 yards away….we think he caught a little movement and was gone as quickly as he had come in.
We moved up to get around him and tried again….this time, two bugles, and close, maybe 300 yards or so. We closed the distance and found a nice open spot just above the tangle of oak brush just below us.
Bill set up about 50 yards behind me; I took out the range finder and clicked off some reference points. 27yards to the cedar tree straight ahead of me, 17 yards to the big pine below me, and 41 yards to the forked pine above me…….
While ranging I see a 4x4 about 80 yards above me, staring at me…..he turns and walks off, I think the deal is done. Then I see rack coming straight at me thru the cedar tree, at 50 yards he stops and bugles, at 27, right behind the cedar tree he screams at Bills calling and raking of a tree.
He screams again and starts up the hill towards the 41 yard forked pine; he crosses in front of it and starts back down and toward me a little. (Pick a spot, Pick a pin, God help me not to mess this up!)
I said that to myself three times……settled in on his left shoulder with my 30 yard pin and squeezed my realease…I saw the arrow hit and heard it, whack!!…..the same sound I have heard a 100 times on whitetails back in Oklahoma…..I knew it was in his chest dead center, but just a bit back, I should have stopped him.
He ran about 75 yards before Bills bugling stopped him. He looked back and then disappeared.
I marked carefully where I saw him last and turned to see if Bill was on his way to celebrate with me.
Sure enough at about 50 yards I raised my fist to him to let him know I had done my job, he raised both of his, like an Olympic athlete on the medal podium. When he reached me, we had a brief celebration, and then tried to settle down for the ensuing recovery.
We waited for what seemed like hours, but was only about 30 minutes to go look for blood where I shot the bull. NO blood, not a speck, I was sick……..we went to where I last saw him and started to look in the oak and aspen jungle to no avail. We were actually leaving when Bill jumped the bull….I was still groping around in the oak brush and heard the bull crashing thru it…..I worked my way to the edge of the oaks and hollered at Bill, “He didn’t come out” we meet at the bottom of the oaks and while we were standing there debating what to do next, Bill spots the bull on the move 400 yards below us…we wait for about 20 minutes and work to the spot where we last saw the bull…..blood! We finally have a faint blood trail and a single set of tracks to follow……Now, I am getting excited and hopeful. Another hour of trailing and tracking we hear crashing and a weird sounding grunt in aspen grove just below us and slightly off to the right. We wrestle with the question again, It’s early in the morning, we have blood, we know where he is….do we back out now, or go a little farther. We move down to the edge of the aspens in hope of finding more blood and find this cool ATV trail. I walk about 10 yards up the ATV trail, Bill takes a couple of steps and the bull stands up 10 yards from him…..wobbles around and trots off…….we back off and go to camp. That evening about 5 hours later it is 80 some degrees and my buddies insist that rather than go hunting they would rather come help me find my bull….wow!
We trek back to the spot where we last jumped the bull to look for blood, spread out and start to sweep the area…I go about 20 yards and there in the sunlit cathedral of God, lay the most spectacular sight……my bull elk. My time had come; we paid our respects, took our pictures, and finished making the dream a reality. After 8 long difficult years I wrapped my fingers around the antlers, and patted the bull on the side…..thanked God for my family, friends and freedom, finished the job and rode off the mountain. Sept 23 2008

awesome!
Good story!

Thats a great story and a beautiful bull.

That's great congrat's

I haven't read the story yet but I want some of you who don't know, your reading a legend here. Bowdacious' username might say newbie but he's a long veteran of HNI. He started here back with us oldtimers. He was simply stovall back then, shortly changed his name to Bowdacious and man did we have fun back then. He's also the owner of the decal site, Decals Plus so check that out. He was if not still is a sponsor of HNI.

Some of you will remember him, others, watch out, he's trouble. [8D] LOL

Now we need his infamous, "walking in/out in the dark" thread. [8D]

Hey Rob you are way tookind.......those were the days though.....I no longer am doing the decals, but thanks for the plug.......looking forward to spending more time here again....love this place....it opened my eyes to lots of things not just bowhunting whitetail monsters......sorry about the post being so blasted big......my first post i a while and things have changed a bit.....Thanks and coo doo, hoorahs, to all.....stickem, whackem and stackem.

Glad to see you back, I hope you stick around Steve.

Congrats and

Thanks for fixin the post......I knew I could count on you.......

You think 8 years is a long wait? I have been chasing elk for 14 and have yet to take a bull so take that

Congrats on the success. I bet you were a bit nervy when there were no guides in camp, etc. I know I would have been wondering what the heck I got myself into. Sure am glad it all panned out for you.