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Returned Sunday nite from the annual Colorado elk trip. This year was very successful.

The hunt was full of old and new lessons. It started back this spring when I met claybreaker for lunch to discuss elk hunting. We had a long conversation and I invited him to go with my group. Things were going well - money sent, hunt booked, days set - until about the middle of September. The outfitter had some family squabble issues that involved the family Nat Forest lease. It fell apart pretty quickly for the year. Two of our guys backed out.

Three of us decided we were going anyway and would do it on our own in an areaa I hunted 2 years ago and should have killed a bull but didn't. We were scheduled to leave Tuesday after work to get to Denver in plenty of time to get a camp set and do a little scouting. Sunday night our other partner developed truck trouble. By Tuesday AM he hadn't got it straightened around so claybreaker and I decided to go.

We arrived in Denver in good time, picked up our pop-up and headed to camp. Got camp set up in good time by nightfall and decided to take a ride to see who was where. We were plenty surprised and more than a bit discouraged to discover the area had alot of camps set up - and it was only thursday. On friday, we walked several miles up a drainage to find a good route into a drainage we thought would hold elk when the shooting started. Claybreaker affectionately called the trail "the goat path". It was a bit steep.... We discovered we didn't need/want to head up the goat path to get where we wanted to. In fact, it was preferred we didn't go to the end of the goat path.

We headed up the trail at 5:45AM on Saturday and got onto a good vantage. 12 hours, a big hike, and lots of doe mule deer later, no elk but did come across a nice 6x6 a guy shot. Tuesday dawned the same way - clear, warm, and claybreaker seeing two elk, BW no elks. Monday we moved behind camp and decided to hike into an area 3+ miles from the road and into some isolated black timber. Claybreaker say 5 with a couple of bulls and one 'maybe' legal. I saw 2 cows way back in but we were still elkless.

By Tuesday, we had covered more than a few miles but the combination of too many guys with warm weather was proving to give us a tough hunt. We decided to take Tuesday off because the weather was going to be warm and we needed a shower and real food, plus the weather was to change Tuesday night bringing us snow.

Wednesday dawnwed cold (5 deg) with 3-5 inches of snow. We awoke to frozen water, propane issues, and significant snow falling. We took care of the housekeeping issues and headed out mid-morning. We split up and headed in opposite directions in an effort to cover more ground. With fresh snow, we should be able to see where the elk were. Claybreaker covered alot of ground behind camp and came up with a single track. I covered a big hunk of ground till late PM and came across 2 tracks. We were tired and getting discouraged. The bonus was that with the snow the exodus of camps began on Tuesday and by Wednesday PM we were getting pretty lonely.

Wednesday night involved more topo map searching and a decision to head into an area I hunted two years previous. It is a 1.5 mile walk to get to the aspens and another 0.5-1.0 to the black timber. Clay and I headed in different directions into the new area on Thursday mid morning. The goal was to cover alot of ground, compare notes and decide how to spend the next day or two. We both climbed the slope 1.5 miles or so and began to run into elk sign. After talking on the radio, we decided to pull up a likely feeding area and see what evening brought.

I chose an aspen filled meadow that I've seen bulls in before. It is honeyed right up to the black timber and has a gps point in it called the 'elk hidey hole' - for good reason, I've jumped elk out of there before. As evening set in, the temps dropped into the 20's. Not to worry because at 5:30, I saw elk running out of the timber into the aspen meadow. Unfortunately for me, they were on moving along the crest of a knoll 200+ yards away. I was seeing pieces of elk - a leg here, head there, and at least one with horns. As per the norm, the cows fed into the only opening I had and posed for a while. They worked down over the hill and took at least one bull with them. I had been watching these elk for 15 minutes and couldn't get a shot at the bulls. I was sitting there pondering next moves when I saw the straggler elk had a rack - a nice rack. And he was feeding out the same ridge as the cows. I spied a 2 foot square opening in front of him and clicked the safe off and waited for about a week for him to feed into the opening. He slowly sauntered into the opening and stopped - posing like the Hartford stag. I took deadly aimed straight up the leg, mid body, and squeezed the trigger. At the report, I saw him casually look behind him. I had missed a bull elk at 200 yards from a good rest. I racked another shell into the gun and noticed a few unforeseen branches just in front of me. I scooched over 6-12 inches, leaned over my knees again and laid the crosshairs on the shoulder. I squeezed the trigger again and saw him collapse in the scope. I quickly re-loaded and headed down the slope. I called claybreaker on the way and said I had one down but couldn't seem to locate him. I lost sight of his whereabouts while moving the 200 yards to the elk. I called claybreaker again and said I couldn't locate the elk. He didn't respond - which I thought a bit pecular at the time.

I realized the elk was to the left of where I was and this is the sight I saw:



I quickly called claybreaker to tell him I found him and it was a nice 6x6. Still no answer.

Suddenly a shot rang out a long ways away. Two minutes latter claybreaker comes over the talkie and says "I got a nice 5x5". We had two nice elk down and it was getting dark. We had a lot of work to do to get these things quartered, hung, and back to the truck. I told claybreaker I had an issue because my elk fell into a log pile - and I couldn't move him into a good position. He agreed to tag his elk and head my way.

To be continued by claybreaker..............

So far so good. Now.....I want the rest of the story. Please, please, please?

Looks like your perseverance paid off, nice looking bull you got there.

Sounds like a great hunt, congrats.

Congratulations! Sounds like you guys had quite a hunt.

Well, I will give it a go, but first I'l give a little introduction, since I'm not a big poster and a little more of a lurker.
Background & getting started.
I'm in my early 50's and have hunted whitetails since my teen years. But I have never hunted elk nor anywhere other than TN & KY. I had dreamed of hunting Elk out West someday and was beginning to wonder if it was going to happen. So after reading this forum many times over the years, I realized I needed to start trying to get something going because I wasn't getting any younger. Part of the issue for me was that I knew no one that went elk hunting. I'm fairly conservative naturally so a complete venture on my on wasn't going to happen. So the plan was to find someone I cause talk to face to face and get info from. Then do my best to convince one of my whitetail hunting buddies to go with me to help share cost etc and learn together.
So I see this post last year here in elk hunting on 24hcf by "bwinters" who lives in area. I offer to buy lunch to talk elk hunting. He accepts but with travel and schedules it takes a couples of months before we finally have lunch. We had a great long lunch with much discussion about families, church, hunting, reloading, guns, & more hunting. And toward the end I get a great surprise when bwinters (Bill) tells me that they have an opening this year for their drop camp and I can have it. I first said "I will think about it"... A few minutes later I said "I'm pretty I'll take it", just need to make sure with the love of my life.
IT'S A GO!, let's start getting ready...( and it's January). I put in for and got drawn for a cow tag. Long story short... about Sept the outfitter has some issues and can't fulfill our hunt. My heart sinks, man I was so looking forward to this now it is all in question. But bwinters has a backup plan, I'm all ears, It a DIY hunt, Ok sounds good, let's go for it, new plans, quick acting, but expectations are lowered, cow tag is returned for refund. So what was at one time 5 persons hunt shrinks to 2 at the very end.
On to the hunt.

claybreaker
aka Wally

Great job! Enjoying the story as well.

Thanks.


ddj

The Hunt:
The forecast for the first days are not good, "warm"..might I add hot. Bwinters loves to hike and climb. So Friday (last minute scout day) the day before opening we wait until late morning/midday and take a scouting trip or maybe it was a test to see what kind of condition I was in.... I'm still not sure which. So after 6 miles yes 6, (on a goat trail i might add) were back at the truck. One thing I do know this country we live has some beautiful places to see and I get to hunt in some of this coming week.






Day I, Saturday - up and out early, hike in take a spot. After about 30 minutes I see game it's a doe picking her way through, she hangs out 45 minutes browsing and she moves on, but it's the first mule deer I've ever seen in the field. After a while its time to move, then move again, finally get to a place to spend the last light of the day. I see more deer, then more deer. Then about sunset another racket has my attention up on the hill about 200 yds away. It's elk, there's elk here (Wee!), those things are big. There were two, one cow for sure didn't get a good look at the other. Total deer for the day either 15 or 16, with maybe 5 of those that are duplicates.

Day II Sunday - same as yesterday up early, out late.... I go back to where I seen elk the evening before and spent all day there. See plenty more deer all does (8) plus 1 yote dog, but no elk.
Day III Monday - let's try a new place, and it's higher... More climbing,a plus more people. But I see more elk, 5 today and 4 are bulls. Two spikes, one bigger spike that might have forks, but I didn't look at it long because the one following has some points for sure. But it is running I see three to a side for sure (need at least 4 on one side to be legal), looking, looking, I think I see four, not sure, yea maybe, yes I think so, and the elk turns it back to me slips off into the dark woods. More deer, totals for the day deer=8, elk=5. Plus a lot of hunters.
Here a photo is of the meadow I hunted and where I seen the elk.

Day IV Tuesday - rest day, get a shower....... No hunting, well we do hunt but it was for a shower. With big weather changes coming. Snow starts falling in the evening. I needed the rest day, this is the hardest hunting that I have ever did, I have never walked so much, hunted so hard, carried so much while hunting, and climbed so much while hunting in my life. But I was happy to find that i had my muscles in fair condition because they were not sore, but I couldn't get enough air, as we live at about 1000 feet ASL. And I had to rest much more than bwinters as he has a motor when it comes to hunting and climbing.
Day V Wednesday - wake up to about 3 inches of snow at camp. Hike back to the place where I seen the 5 elk, get there and find about 6 inches of snow and it is beautiful, the morning was so quiet it was erie. Unfortunately this time no elk, and no others hunters in the area. Camp is thinning out some also, the weather forecast for our area was much worst than what came, plus some people not seeing more elk I think sent some people packing. The temps are dropping and it is suppose to get much colder.
Same place as Monday but with snow (notice tall tree in center of both photo's).

Day VI Thursday - it's cold, nothing seems to work, the CO detector in the camper is chirping, it not working because the batteries are bad but because the batteries just barely work at these temps. My eye contact solution has ice in it. All on the water is now it the hard form. There is frost all over the inside of the camper. We have to thaw the water to get something to drink for breakfast, the eggs yokes have turned to a stiff gel. Start the generator and get some heat going.

The thermometer in the truck indicated 5 degrees F. We hang around camp and get stuff functional, lose the morning hunt and have thoughts of pulling out early, bwinters has only seen 2 elk. And the sign that we would have hoped to see it the snow on Day 5 wasn't there.

Bill tells me that if I want to go we can go, if I want to stay we'll stay. The original plan was to stay until Saturday. But its Thursday and the elk have appeared to moved out.
There was one place that we wanted to look at earlier but we didn't because there was a group camping at the trail that told us that they were staying all week and were hunting deep back. But we had noticed they had pulled out early along with others. So I suggested that we go there this afternoon and check it out, with the snow from Tuesday night and Wed. morning we should see if there are elk in the area fairly quickly. If nothing was there we could pull out in the morning (Fri). So that was the plan.

We hit the trail late morn or so, about 1.5 miles later, we get to the area where the hunting starts. Bill goes one direction and I go another, we have radios for comm. and gps's after 2 or 3 hours we talk and both of us have tracks in the snow. Bill is going to sit over a meadow, I'm going into some dark timber and see if I can pick up some tracks.
Time passes and I'm not seeing much more, I haven't heard from bill. Also I have remember that I have left my petzl headlamp in camp (Grrrrr). So I don't want to be in the timber without a backup light so I start ezzzing my way ever slowly down off the mtn, at least out of the dark timber. I break out of the DT and get to an opening and stop and start hunting the Aspen.

I notice what looks like part of an animal off to my right about 200yds. Pull up the Minox (thank you Doug for the deal) and see that it is a beautiful 4x4 buck moving ever so quietly & slowly. I continue to watch him and the woods below for other movement. He moves on and I start moving on down again too.

Along about 5:45- 5:50 +/- I here a shot a good distance away, then another shot. Then my radio breaks it's silence an I hear Bill's voice, "I've shot a bull but I can't find it", "do you want me to come and help?", "no not yet, let me see if I can find it", delay, delay and I continue to go a little lower on the mtn. Radio again, "hey I found it, and I'm going to need your help", "ok, where are you? How big is it?", "it's a 6x6", "cool, give me GPS coords". "ok hang on". I've now started in the general direction that I believe him to be in. We try to relay the gps coords but the distance between us keeps the signal form being clear but I know the general direction and I am making my way. Time to rest so I stop for some air, try the gps coords again but no luck but something doesn't sound right, but I keeping moving.

I stop again to take a short break. As I'm standing there I hear something coming through the woods, and it sounds heavy. I look up and see elk coming across above me at about 100yds and running first I noticed a cow... nope, not the target next, then another, then a spike, nope,nope,nope, then they slow down and seem a little hesitant, the first group moves on then a second group right behinf them moves in. Hey there one that might be a shooter, put the 3.5x10 lupy up and start counting points from the top 1,2,3,4... that's as far as I got then moved the X the target area, squeezed and "nothing",.... Take the safety off dummy, second try is successful bullet is away. Felt good about the shot, the bull ran a short distance (7-10 yds) up a little hill and I have a new 165 gr Acubond in the tube and ready. But now I don't have a shot for the trees. Then I noticed another bull maybe better than the one I shot at, about that time, he crumples back down the hill and has expired.



Bill on radio, "hey I've got this down and I'm going need your help to get him out", "hey I've got one down too", "was that you that shot?, what is it", "yea, I don't know but it is legal", "go find out and tell me what it is", "Bill, it's a 5x5", "great, well tag it and come up here and help me then we'll go quarter yours, it going to be long night", "ok, give me those coords again"..... we had our GPSs setup to display the coords differently, got that straight and seen that he was 0.81 miles away. And of course it was up hill for me.

Both elk quartered, back strap out, all hung in the trees. On a clear moonless night you could see every star in the sky like i had never seen them before. We get back to the truck @ 11:30 and the thermometer reads 9F. It sure didn't seem that cold.

[img:center]http://www.tenntrap.com/otherpics/elkhunt11/pa300010.jpg[/img]

Fantastic gentlemen! Way to go.

I'll have some more to add tomorrow... this kid needs to hit the hay.

clay..

Very nice, thanks for sharing. Got me excited about elk again.

Corey

Congratulations men.

Excellent write-ups from both of you. Congrats on your success and thanks for the story and pics.

You don't mention where you were hunting - is it a secret?

I leave early Friday morning, probably around 3AM, for Meeker/Buford. Bags are packed, trailer is ready, just need to load the truck and get the food. It's like waiting for Christmas as a kid...

Congrats on your success!
I don't know where you're hunting but I live at the base of the mountain on left in your pic from I-70.

What a great hunt. Congratulations guys!

Sounds like you had a lotta fun! Nice job,B and Claybreaker.Nice elk!

Great write up Wally!

I need to go to work and will fill in a few more details as well. I knew the title of this thread should be Nosler related - both Wally and I used Noslers - Partitions for me, Accubonds for Wally. I used Accubonds last year on my bull and they are the real deal. And they didn't even bounce off!

A few rifle looney facts: Win M70 Extreme, 300 WSM, 180 Partition, 65 gr H4350, 2975 ft/sec, rifle is MOA with that load - as long as the nut behind the gun is up to it.

There are more than a few lessons, some old, some new that we should post to help others considering such a hunt.

Coyote: Buford, CO ain't that far away.

That is a hunt you will both remember for a long time! Congratulations on the bulls and for making the hunt happen.

Well done, congrats to both.