Best can cover a lot of ground from hunting with family and friends to an outstanding trophy to a magical time in the field. Culling through years of hunts from shooting quail over my springer, sitting on deer stands with my grandfathers or under a fir in the Rockies waiting for daylight and hearing elk bugle close by, the one that stands out to me as the high point is a safari in the Selous.
A close second was a red stag horseback hunt in Patagonia.
I've only done a handful of guided hunts in my life and those are the only ones where my wife has been with me and that has made them particularly special.
Details of the trips.
http://forums.accuratereloading.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/6321043/m/753109247?r=753109247#753109247
http://forums.accuratereloading.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/8321043/m/685104264?r=685104264#685104264

The day granddaughter killed her first buck. She was 9.

When my son Chad "High Brass" got his first deer. First time deer hunting.

What a great photo Dave.

Second best when granddaughter got a good buck.
She was 11

Solo mountain goat

When my father was getting ready to retire I took him to Africa for a 9 day plains game hunt. He sacrificed a lot for me and my brother over the years and he had always said he wished he could do Africa but he had more important things to spend his $$$ on. So I treated him. I cherish the days I got to spend hunting with him. Cancer took him in 2013 so those memories are precious.

Horseback dry ground lion hunt over hounds in Northwestern AZ. I didn't get a lion, but my son was with me. He was 17 at the time and we had an amazing time riding through the desert. The hounds cold trailed a lion for a few hours on the last day. Amazing scenery. He always talked about moving west but I think the trip sealed the deal. He is in college in Wyoming now.

the last time i went

Thank you sir. I came across this picture just a couple of days ago.

All the hunts with my sons. But there was one day, a friend and I shot our limit of bobwhites over my pointer and caught our limit of rainbow trout that afternoon. That will be hard to forget.

2009 season, was with my wife first & then our 12 year old son, when they both took their first deer on the same weekend !!

My best hunt hasn't happened yet. They've all been incredible so far but for different reasons.

Some of the most memorable include a guided elk hunt, a five-day solo handgun hunt for deer on an island off the coast of Washington, several feral cattle hunts in Hawaii, and hunting whitetails on family ranches in Texas in the 70's before everything got leased up.


Okie John

The one I’m doing this year!

Details guys, we like details. Not many of us will go after a cape buffalo with a .375 like Blacktrailer, but a memorable hunt is great reading for lots of us in the off season. When I’d get my Outdoor Life magazine, the first thing I’d read was always the This happened to me page.

Last year solo Sitka Blacktail hunt. About as peaceful as it gets sitting in the sun on a mountain in silence with a that buck before the long hike back.

My favorite successful hunt was the time I'd watched a herd all week and memorized its movements morning and evening. Finally i got up early and put myself in position for an easy shot when the buck walked past me. They changed their routine that day! I ended up crawling (no higher than my hands and knees but mostly on my belly) for 6 hours to get a 380 yard shot on a desert muley. Not my biggest but a fun and memorable hunt.

My absolute favorite hunting memories are the two years I got to go elk hunting with my (at the time) 89/90 year old grandpa. We didnt get any elk that year but he had a great time trying and I enjoyed the time spent together.

2006 Pa deer season ranks right up there. Not for any great success or huge buck but simply because I was able to get out and hunt. I had fallen through a roof hatch and tore up my right shoulder earlier in the year. I had rotator cuff surgery about 30 days before the regular gun season opened on the Monday after Thanksgiving. When I asked the Dr. about going hunting, his response was "Are you nuts?". While that is still open to debate, I knew I was going to do my darndest to be in the woods.

I'm right handed but figured I could practice enough with the Redhawk in my left hand before the season. After all, I was off work, what else was there to do but go to the range? Anyhow, my wife drove me to the range several times and after a few sessions, i could keep all the rounds in an acceptable size group. Yes, i was shooting off a bench and only 50 yds. but I knew a spot on a sidehill above a flat spot where I could sit down and use a shooting stick setup.

The big concern was if I fell in the woods, would I tear out the Doc's handiwork? So we rigged up a sling and swath to bind my arm to my body, then dropped a 3X orange vest over my head and off to the woods I went. My Dad and my son would both be available for gutting and dragging duties if I needed them.

Opening day, I saw mostly does (only bucks were legal) in the area I was watching. I did see one buck but he was off to my right in the brush, I couldn't get scrunched around enough to get the sights on him. Headed home the next day for PT etc. but was back out on the first Saturday. Saw deer but again, not the right location for me to take a shot I was comfortable with.

The last Saturday, a buddy came out to see if he could stir up some deer. I was watching a pipeline and had a tree limb at the right height to use for a rest. He put 2 deer out of the brush but they stopped right at the edge of the pipeline and I knew Dean was somewhere in the brush behind them so again, no shot. Darn deer, had they crossed the pipeline and then stopped, it would have been a safe shot.

So no deer that year but a hell of a lot of fun and good times with family and friends.

Dale

This one. Booked with an outfit that had a heavily hunted concession, where game was scarce.got my shot in the last 20 minutes of the last day of a 14 day hunt. The hard hunted buffalo were harder to sneak up on than a whitetail buck in the open. Collectively we ( myself and the PHs and trackers) used everything we ever learned about hunting anything to get it done. Throw in some literal last minute drama with a PH injured, and two lions who felt they should have possession of the buffalo, and there you have it...

Awesome! What caliber?

.375 H&H

Shooting 300 gr Swift A-frames and 300 GR.A-Square Monolithic solids.

Man, I have hundreds of thrilling hunts but when I was 22 I went on a one month solo backpack hunt into Stone's Sheep country, I had not been before.
At that age I was a machine. I had to walk back to the Alaska highway to resupply at one point.
I saw no one, lots of rams and missed a dandy.
Sometimes we miss- the trip was great.

That's just awesome all the way around. Fantastic pic.

Here is a link to the details of what is probably my best hunt. I spent many days in this particular area after a big bear (as noted in the original post I figured there was a big one based on all the piles of big bear poo) hunting solo with my 45 Colt Ruger Bisley and called in the bear and was able to shoot my oldest bear to date. He was 17 years old so he was born the year I moved to Walla Walla which was also kind of cool.

https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbt...07/tagged-my-10th-bear-today#Post3307307

Mountain goat with pack goats last year was pretty cool.

https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php/topics/14162316/7-in-8-out#Post14162316

Thanks Johnny!

been on a lot of great big game hunts , but when i am with my son in the mountains out west these are always great !

It's hard to choose a 'best'. One memorable one was when a friend from the east came out to try for his 1st mule deer. We packed in several miles with my llamas, his 1st trip using pack animals. On about the 3d day without seeing anything, we took a long high trail that made a loop. At the far end of the loop, I looked back behind us and spotted a medium sized mulie on a side ridge. We were able to work our way back and he shot it...except 'it' wasn't 'it'. It was a smaller one that we hadn't seen before. We got it down to the trail and came back up the next morning with a couple llamas to pack it back to camp. The size didn't matter. He was more than proud of it and we had a ball getting it done.

That looks really cool.

Best one was when my buddy shot a muley in NDak. He had moved out there a couple years prior for work. I flew out and pheasant hunted for a week with him then went with him deer hunting. I didnt have a deer tag but got to see him make a hell of a shot on a really decent muley at 300 yds. Was my first experience being on a hunt out west (im a flatlander from Michigan). Didnt realize how much bigger a big muley is than the little does I shoot here until I grabbed an antler and tried to drag it.

It was about 33 degrees and spitting rain, pellets, and snow. By the time we got that deer back to the truck I was down to a t-shirt. What was even better was we got to back track and try to find his binoculars that had somehow got left halfway to the truck.

My first Moose. Shot it in Vermont in 2003.

I moved to a new home where a crow was every morning eating song bird chicks on the roof top.
I put a pile of bird seed in my driveway and set up a blind in my car port.
I was in a chair, the a rifle in a rifle rest, with the pellet gun already pointed at the seed pile.
I sat there reading a book for an hour.
Two crows landed on the seed pile and started eating.
I waited for them to get lined up and shot a hole through both of their chests with one shot.
The song bird chick eating stopped.

Amen. I've got so many good ones. Some of the best, I didn't even fill a tag.

Best deer?


The Savage Speaks Again

Best turkey?


Turkey Camp 2002

Probably be my first elk hunt out in Colorado. My buddy had a bunch of frequent flyer miles, so we flew into Denver on those tickets and met up with some SD and WY buddies out there. The airline cancelled our flight out of Minneapolis to a later one and we got out there just in time to buy our otc licences. We got the last rental vehicle available which was a robins egg blue Delta 88, not a perfect mountain car for where we were going. The camp was set up "lower" at about 8,500 when we got there and the next morning a WY. friend with the horses told me which horse was mine. Well, all I knew about horses was from watching westerns on TV. The horse knew that I didn't know the first thing about driving one so we pretty much just fed our way up the mountain together. I was coming down in the saddle when he was coming up and after two days of that, I'd had enough. I tried walking him like a dog on a leash, but he went weeeee and pbbbbb all the time and I was never going to see an elk that way, at least not the front half of one. I borrowed one of the trucks and walked up into the mountains after that. It snowed and moved in some elk later in the week. The other guys had cow tags and were filled up. Later in the week tired and going through the motions again I was walking a horse trail about mid day when I saw a drop of blood in the snow among the horse tracks. Must have creased himself with a stick I figured. Twenty yards farther was another drop then wait a minute, that "horse" has a cloven foot print! That isn't a horse! I took the track because it was going where I was when it left the trail and went down into some black timber they call it out there. Fresh snow with a big fresh track and just me. Elk hunting nirvana. Long trail back and forth and a brush pile up ahead turned into antlers on an elk bedded and looking in the other direction. Even a blind squirrel finds an acorn now and then. 7mm RM and a 160 Nosler Partition with a high neck shot. At the shot the elk leaps to his feet and runs off to my right and I'm thinking these elk are way tougher than I thought to take a hit like that. A second shot broadside and he stops and splays out his legs as if to say is that all you got? A third shot and he is down for the count. Holy smokes are those animals ever big. He has five on one side and six on the other. Then I see that my "neck" shot had hit him squarely in the right antler. That must have rung his bell some. Some other hunter had just grazed him under the leg earlier. My rancher buddy packed him out on two horses and I had a new appreciation for one horse power especially up in that thin air altitude. Come to find out that Delta Airlines does not take elk heads with antlers as packed or carry on luggage. My western buddies were nice enough to eat my elk for me and the antlers got back here eventually. Long winded post, but what else is there to do on a rainy Sunday afternoon for a guy my age?

Good story. Thanks for sharing.

KUGURUROK

In 2007, Bill and I went to hunt Caribou on the Kugururok River, which is a tributary of the Noatak River, north of Kotzebue. Most people call it the Kugurok or just the Kug. The Noatak River is a world class river, at times half a mile wide, and a thousand miles long. But most people have never heard of it because it’s so remote. At the time, the Northwest Alaska Caribou Herd was 400,000 strong.
We arranged for a one-way bush plane flight and for rental of a raft, then flew on Alaska Airlines into Kotzebue. The next leg of the trip was a bush plane flight onto the upper Kugururok River. The pilot landed on a gravel bar and when that plane left, we realized just how remote we were, 150 miles north of the Arctic Circle and over seventy miles from the nearest people.
We were on a side braid of the river and we wanted to get in to the main stream that evening. So, we inflated the raft and floated down the side braid. In Alaska it’s illegal to hunt on the same day that you fly. While we were negotiating the side braid a herd of a couple hundred caribou crossed the river in front of us and another herd about the same size crossed the river behind us. We had to accomplish a short portage to get into the main flow and we set up camp ½ mile down-river from there.
We camped in the river bottom and while we were setting up camp, we saw lots of ‘bou and some big bulls strolling along the rim, less than a hundred yards away. There’s a lot of vegetation, willows and alders, in the river bottom. But above the rim it’s all open country; muskeg, marsh mounds and in the distance, we could see low hills. We decided to try our luck tomorrow morning, from that location.
At first light, we climbed the rim and looked out onto that open country and we saw thousands of caribou. Not one big herd, rather many smaller herds; a hundred here, a couple of hundred there, smaller groups everywhere. But there was no cover for us to hide in and they were all out of rifle range. The animals were generally moving to the west and the river was flowing south. We hiked along the rim until we came to a small gully that the caribou were crossing. Bill and I sneaked up that gully on our hands and knees, until we were about a hundred yards out into the open country. We peeked over the edge of the gully and watched as hundreds of critters were generally meandered in our direction.
I saw a nice big bull that was going to cross the gully a hundred and fifty yards east of us and I told Bill “that’s the one I want.” He said “OK. I’ll wait for a bigger one.” When the bull crossed the gully, he was just east of us and the morning sun was shining behind him. I carefully placed my first shot in his lungs and the spray from the exit wound sparkled in the sunlight. It was visible for just a few seconds but, I’ll never forget the site of that spray glistening in the sun. My bull was resting in the bottom of the gully and the approaching animals couldn’t see us in the gully. As I was field dressing the kill, Bill removed the cape and antlers. When everything was butchered and bagged and ready to be carried back to camp, Bill started hunting again. He saw a bull, bigger than mine and decided to take him. The bull was not approaching the gully as close as Bill wanted so he crawled on his hands and knees then slithered his way, on an intercept angle, toward the bull. He shot him at about 100 yards. So, we had two bulls down before noon on the first day that we could hunt.
We were only about a mile from camp but, there was a field of marsh mounds between us and camp. I was reminded just how much I dislike hiking across them. It took two trips to get the animals back to camp. The arctic twilight lasts so long that we still had enough light to negotiate our way through the swampy ground when we finally got the second load to camp at 9:30pm.
The next morning, we packed up camp and began the long float trip back to civilization. We weren’t going all the way to Kotzebue, because that would require us to weave our way through the myriad channels of the Noatak Delta and then to row our way across the open ocean and Kotzebue Sound. But we still had 70 miles of river between us and the little bush community of Noatak Village. We spent nine hours on the river and traveled 23 miles on the first day. Bill’s GPS said we were traveling at 3 miles/hour. That seemed reasonable because we were close to the river banks on each side and could see the territory passing beside us. We passed Kayak Lake and Trail Creek at about 1,000 feet elevation. Fall had already appeared where we were hunting because there had been a hard freeze at that higher elevation. But when we passed through 1,000’ elevation, summer returned along with lots of insects, and the caribou disappeared. We traveled 23 miles that day and camped just a couple of miles north of the Noatak River.
It would probably take two more days of floating to make it to Noatak Village. So, we started the second day of floating as soon as we could get ourselves going. Bill caught a big silver salmon and hung it on his stringer in the river. After only a short time, we arrived at the Noatak River and stopped for some more fishing, then moved out onto the wide Noatak. The River seemed about half a mile wide at this point and even though we could read the GPS unit that said we were still going about 3 miles per hour, it didn’t seem like we were traveling at all because we were a long way from the shore. We passed the mouth of the Kelly River and saw a cabin on the bank of the Kelly. We hadn’t seen any other people since the bush plane left. Bill said to me “If a boat were to come along, how much would pay to have them tow us into Noatak?” I said “I would pay $25.00,” and Bill Said “What a cheapskate.” No more than ten minutes later a motor boat passed us and I yelled “Would you tow us into Noatak for $100.00?” They made a quick “U” turn in our direction. They first tried to hook on with a rope but the raft kept fishtailing so, they beached the boat, had lunch of caribou soup, and put our now deflated raft, us and all our cargo into their boat.
There were five people in the boat in addition to Bill and Myself. The owner was of European decent and a teacher in Kotzebue. Whittier and his wife and another lady are Inupiak Eskimos. There was even an Ainu who told me that he was a whaler by profession. The boat was traveling slow because the owner had failed to fill up with gas at Noatak Village and they were afraid that they would run out. Still, we arrived at an island across from Noatak Village in about six hours. They dropped us there, but via UHF radio, Whittier called one of his sons to meet us with ATVs for the ride into the village. They noticed the fish that Bill had caught and Whittier said that his mother would cook that up for all of us to enjoy. We never saw that fish again.
Whittier and his wife (each was on their second marriage), had nine children between them, ranging in age from young children to sons in their twenties. They invited us to eat dinner of caribou stew, with them and to spend the night in their BIA cottage.
We had arrived in Noatak Village a day earlier than we had expected so we had a day to explore. There are about 450 residence and that makes Noatak one of the largest bush communities. The town includes an airport, a post office, an ACC store (Alaska Commercial Corp.), a native store, and 40 or 50 BIA cottages all exactly the same. There is a building that houses the National Guard 1st Scout Battalion, 297 Infantry. Lots of motor boats, snowmobiles and ATVs, everywhere you that you look. There were even some full-size SUVs and pickups. We were told that the vehicles are delivered to the boat ramp via a ferry and everyone in the community helps pull them up the ramp.
There still remained one of the original buildings, at the time about 80 years old, which is a remnant from the community that the BIA built in the 1920s, as part of their effort to convince the Noatak People to give up their seminomadic ways. There were also some museum quality relics just lying beside the road; a wooden dog sled and a wooden fishing boat. Lots caribou and moose antlers were just laying around. The people were all friendly and we thoroughly enjoyed our visit. Finally, we had to leave and fly back to Kotzebue on the mail plane.
I’ve hunted and toured in Alaska five times since then and although all of those visits have been good, none was quite the adventure as our hunt on the Kug.

That’s more like it KC. Just like being there vicariously. Being the gun loonies that we are, what did you and Bill use to drop those caribou?

My “Best Hunt” was my first hunt to Namibia in 2012, at the age of 65. The first morning, I zeroed my Winchester Model 70 in .300 WSM, and we headed out to the bush on a 30,000 acre no fence ranch. At about 11:00 AM, as we sat in an elevated blind, a 40” Gemsbok bull appeared in the distance. When he got to 224 yards, I told my Professional Hunter Jan that I could make that shot. I held steady straight up his front leg and squeezed off a perfect shot. He ran perhaps 50 yards and dropped. Approaching him, I was overcome with how beautiful he was and how big his body was. We ate his backstraps that night, cooked over a mopane fire, and it tasted like the best Filet Mignon I’ve ever tasted. Later that same trip, I shot a 54” Kudu bull, a Trophy Warthog, 2 Baboons, a Jackal, and a trophy Springbok. I ate like a king, smoked a few Cuban cigars I bought in Frankfort on the way over, and drank a few Tafel Lager Beers. Since that trip, I’ve gone on four more trips to Namibia, and the hunting has gotten better every trip.

About 15 years ago, i realized that i was forgetting the dates of some of my more memorable hunts. So, i started a word doc that recounted the stories of my hunting and inserted pictures from the hunts. I update every year and read through the now 54 page 70 MB document. As it turns out, i have had a great time hunting...go figure. One story almost always gives me goose bumps.

Short version: My 13yr old shot a bear that measured 18 4/8 with a 9.3X62.

Longer version: He's a little competitive with his older brother and thought he had to have a bear since his brother didnt have one. But, bear hunting can be a low percentage hunt so keeping him motivated for days took all the calmness and patience i could muster. 3 days into the hunt, a bow hunter (a very kind bow hunter) gave us a tip that a bear was hitting a gut pile about an hour drive from where we were. In fact, there were two and all he asked is that we didn't shoot the blonde as he had a bear licenses. We broke camp and headed out.
We didn't arrive until late afternoon. We met the bow hunter at his camp who showed us basically where to go...just below timberline. Being late and looking at a climb, i dumped everything out of the pack except the absolute necessities and off we went. It took a while to climb and get into a good prone supported position below the pile. Once there, it started to rain and of course, we didn't have any rain gear. Laying there now with cold rain soaking us, my son began to shiver and finally said "dad, im cold, can we go". I convinced him that the bear would come, we just had to wait. This happened two more times and after a total of 40 min, he had enough. I had to do something to get him to stick it out till dark. So, i decided to climb above the gut pile which would take 20 min but would warm us up.
From the new spot, best we could do was a sitting position. After only 15 min of waiting, the bear showed up 200yds below us...almost where we were before. He was using a Savage 99 in 308 Win that i downloaded a little to reduce recoil for him. It was zeroed at 100 (the only distance we shot it before the season) which was also our self imposed max range. I had the 9.3 which was zeroed at 200 (I had a bear license as well). He asked if he could shoot and i said "no, it's too far". Then he asked if he could use mine and i said, "no, the recoil is too heavy, it's likely to really hurt you". While we are talking, the bear moved back into the woods and the disappointment fell over my son like a coup-de-gras to the cold rain. I again had to convince him to be patient, that bear really wants to get at that gut pile which was only 40 yds below us.
After thinking about the past 3 days, the last 2 hours, and knowing that this was as good a chance at a bear as you could get, i decided (convinced myself) to let him use the 9.3...hoping that from a sitting position over crossed sticks, he would roll with the recoil. Yeah, what dad gets it right every time...i immediately started working the story i was going to tell his mom. Anyway, with light quickly fading i myself began to doubt if the bear would show up in time and knew what a bitter, cold, wet, defeated and long drive home it would be as this was our last day.
Then i saw the bear step back out at the same place 200yds away. As i pointed it out to my son, he asked if he could shoot it. I said only if it stops and is broadside and i continued to coach him in being very, very certain the crosshairs were steady and exactly where he wanted the bullet to go and to be very "BOOM!!!", he apparently didn't need to hear the rest of the story. I looked to see the bear spinning in circles and rolling and knew it was a good shot then I realized I needed to see how much damage he incurred. When I looked at him, it almost brought tears to my eyes, in fact even as I write this im getting "misty". He had the biggest smile conveying the most excitement i have ever seen on him and no blood. He said he never felt the gun but his ears were ringing a little and then proceeded to thank me profusely for talking him into waiting. I doubt he will ever thank me like that again. We didn't get home until 4:30 AM and of course, i didn't have a camera with me on the side of the hill; it didn't make the weight cut. The picture is after it was skinned and everything packed back to the Jeep. Like i said, a long story but one that gets me every time.

Awesome stories gentlemen.
Centennial, I have kept diaries on our hunts that my wife has accompanied me on. It's amazing the little oddities and blown stalks that you forget over the years and how fresh the whole experience is when you revisit your writing.
Thanks!

Hard to choose, for me.

My 2018 Afognak Island elk hunt is up there for the mental and somewhat less physical aspect of it.
My 2010 Shiras moose hunt is up there too. Solo on horseback 8 miles in.

Often though I think my "best" hunts are bird hunts. Chukar and especially snowcock will drive a guy insane.

I think you’re the first I’ve ever heard of to go after snowcock

I've been after them 5 times. Got shots (albeit, long shots) each time. Hit one in 2018 but he got into a 500-1000 foot cliff and I never could find him.

The guy I go with has killed 5-6.

They're my kryptonite and they're tougher to hunt, physically and mentally, than anything I have ever been around. One day it'll all come together.

Got to take my Father deer hunting at the property that my wife's mother owns in Parker county.

It was the last time he got to hunt and it was a hoot.

Did not shoot anything but some bull.

Wished he could have gotten to go more.

He has tumors in his lungs that went active after that November and stayed sick till he passed.

Most memorable and best usually involved the most work, often several years of trying to fill a tag or get a particular caliber of critter. My first archery bighorn was taken on my 5th CO tag and was the culmination of years of dreaming and finally going sheep hunting and over 60 days in the field over the 5 years to get the first one.

Another is a big CO archery 6x6 elk that grossed B&C taken in a NW drawing unit was taken on the 24th hunting day plus 6 scouting days that season. I still consider him my top critter.

An archery mountain grizzly in BC took me 5 seasons as well. It was about as exciting as it could get when he ran by at 2 steps after a 13 yard shot! Not charging, just escaping...too exciting none-the-less!

An archery Brirtish Columbia Stone ram took me 6 season and 8 backpack hunts, again about 60-some hunting days and a great feeling and fond memories from that hunt.

There are others but the four listed above are all so good that I can't chose which is my favorite.

It was my 73rd, this past 12/14. I already had an 8 point from November. Rain for days, and now 6am clear, with a 30° drop from midnight... I had to go out. I was a mile in, several hills and draws away from my Grand Caravan. After all the years, I knew how promising the day would be. I was sitting in a lawn chair next a dirt mound, from a long gone uprooted tree. 7: 30, a gorgeous buck walked out at 50 yards. He went down from the shot .....50 Cal muzzleloader. I hang and butcher all deer on the spot of kill... Took my time getting him into my backpack. Later, 9am, at home, with a second cup of joe.... I thought of all the deer... since 1959. No shower necessary, as I hadn't broken a sweat. I thought of my recent 4th anniversary, of getting a new aortic heart valve... A birth defect that was causing serious problems at 69. 5 hours of complex, cow valve transplant, open heart.
Having someone hold your heart in his hands changes things. I thought is this my last deer? I really am pretty much on top of my game still... I dunno.. sure seems like a good time to stop. So, if this wasn't my best hunt, it certainly was close.... The land I hunt, has been sold to developers.

Probably when my dad visited me in AK and he shot his first and only black bear. Good times

Bill and I both used 30-06. His is a pump, mine was a Remington 700. I sold that and now I use a T/C Icon Weatthershield 30-06. Shoots MOA out-of-the-box.

Drew Nevada Nelson permit first time I applied. Got a great ram. Made the best shot ever on a running animal at about 265. Everything went perfectly. At night I could see the lights of Vegas. I loved the country, was just North of LV.

Other great hunt was for a doe pronghorn in the Pahsimeroi valley in central Idaho. Camped at base of Mt Borah. Cold clear early October morning. Was accompanied by my old beagle. After the antelope was in the cooler spent the day shooting jackrabbits. Perfect.

Really hard for me to choose as well, guess I’ve been spoiled with good hunts with my old man and pards, and some damn nice critters. Huntin with my kiddos rates right up there. Family aside, Alberts rates right up there, the folks that live there, the vastness of the country and animal quality is hard to top. Montana never disappoints, neither does Hawai’i.

Arizona coues with with Greg and Bama last year was a top 5’er, stupid awesome country, sign of illegal immigrants, great company, awesome food, nice weather, and probably the coolest of all deer species, cagey little buggers!! Add that up and it’s a hellava good time.

...there were about forty of them, moving in and out of the thick jesse. We could occasionally see legs, and hear grumbles, but were unable to discern which were bulls, or cows. Nothing for it, but to continue dogging them, frequently stopping to check the ash bag to be sure of remaining downwind of them. We knew at some point, we would have an opening adequate for a shot. But, not today. We returned to camp, and planned our strategy for the morrow.

We departed camp before the sparrows awakened. Our early departure was necessitated because the distance to the hunting area, Gunguwe. The drive would be about an 1 1/2 hours. We wanted to arrive in the cool of the morning, just as the sun was rising. By late morning the temp in this valley would reach upwards 100F and hunting in the thick jesse was virtually without any appreciable breeze. Our PH Dudley was confident we would be successful before the heat got to us.

Choice, our tracker, climbed a convenient tree which was above the valley floor in an effort to get a visual. We watched for an indication, and shortly Choice was smiling. Game on!

With Choice in the lead, we fell in step behind Dudley. Behind us came the local game scout with his ubiquitous AK 47. Expectations were high as we began our descent into the valley floor. In less than an hour, we were wet with sweat as we moved thru the jesse. We located the herd, but continually stymied in our effort to determine which was legal to shoot. We closed within twenty yards of them, only to have them move silently away. The good news...they were not alarmed. So far, they had not detected our presence. We pressed on. We now had been in the valley, and thick jesse for more than two hours. We stopped for a bit of water, and a short break. And..we got a break. In a matter of minutes after we began moving, we discovered the herd had located shade beneath some acacia trees. We moved ahead only twenty, or thirty yards in the direction of the trees, There they were!

If you've read this far, you've figured out we're hunting elephant. The elephant hunter is my wife, Donna. On to the finale.

Dudley made the approach with Donna close at his side. He knelt down behind a wait-a-bit thorn bush, and beckoned Donna to do the same. There were five elephant standing in the shade, totally relaxed. Dudley examined each one, and finally Dudley asked Donna: "Do you see the one looking right at us?" Donna replied, "There are two looking at us, which one?" Response: "On your right...shoot him right between the eyes." Donna took a deep breath, slowly stood up, moved the safety OFF as she raised the rifle, and shot the elephant right between the eyes. As the elephant was collapsing, the remaining elephant decamped in a cloud of dust, literally.

That, my friends, was my most memorable hunt.

This hunt took place in Zimbabwe in Oct, 1992.

Thank you! Great story.

Awesome story. Tagging just to come back and reread this from time to time.

here is a short story: son and myself have bowhunted alot over the years many great times together hunting,target archery and fishing. one year we bowhunted the great state of Montana in the mountains for elk,where i knew the elk moved thru alot during other bowhunts in past years.so during this bowhunt about the 4th day i had just tag a real nice cow elk at 8 a.m. and my son motioned for me to hide and start meowing some more so i did. over the hill came this real nice bull elk that stopped 30 yards from my hidden son, i had no ideal what was up above there on the flat ground which was a herd of about 50 elk. i watch son`s arrow go perfectly thru this big bull`s chest and watch the bull bleed, run back up the hill ,then this big bull was gone from my sight. next thing a heard was my son yell he`s down and dead. then we went up there to see his bull and as we walked up there that bull got much bigger than we thought.that was my son`s 4th bull with a bow and arrow over a few years and this bull elk had a huge body and horns.we estimated 800 lbs. live weight. we never have had this bull elk scored to us its not that important but i have one that scored 374 B.C. and this bull my son shot with his bow has bigger horns than my
B.C. 370 bull i shot with a bow .now at 8:30 A.M.that day 2 elk down both with a bow and arrow,there was a lot of work to do skin`n,quartering, haul`n elk meat and horns off that mountain with a cart . my son did all the hard work too. my friend the butcher said we should get a couple of horses to haul the elk meat out but my son said he could do it himself and he did with our cart and made a few trips out to the truck.when my friend the butcher seen the horns of that bull,he said gets those horns hidden before someone sees or steals those horns ,he also said that was the biggest bull elk he ever seen shot with a bow,butcher also said he only ever seen 1 bull elk bigger ever and that was shot with a rifle years ago. also when we went to town to the butcher shop with all the meat and that set of horns, the horns stuck out the back with topper back window open,it was a real site to see! my son had a huge smile all day long !

Similar to the OP, the one that stands out for me was my first elk hunt in 2006 that my wife accompanied me on. It was a guided hunt in the Flat tops of Colorado during muzzleloader season. This was the first time my wife was with me when I harvested an animal. She had helped me get a few deer out and took pics for me occasionally but she never went with me until this trip. I called quite a few outfitters prior to booking and finally signed on with an outfitter that assured me he didn't tolerate any drinking in camp.

We flew into Denver and drove to camp the next day after stopping at Outdoor World to pick up a pound of powder. It was a nice clear day and the scenery along the way was awesome. A young guy in a side by side picked us up at the trailhead and drove us into camp. We got settled into our wall tent with a queen size mattress and wood stove after meeting everyone. There were 11 other hunters in camp and one of them also brought his wife but she wasn’t going out hunting with him. By dinnertime it was down to around 30 degrees. After dinner the outfitter announced the guide assignments. It was supposed to be a 2x1 situation but the outfitter assigned a guide for me and my wife and also sent Jerry the young guy who picked us up to come along to assist since he was learning the ropes from Jason our guide.

The four of us rode out on horseback the next morning in the dark. A few miles out of camp we heard an elk bugling. As we got closer the bull started coming toward us until he was only about 40 yards away across a stream. We couldn’t see him in the darkness but he sounded huge. Finally, Jason pulled up next to me and said we were going to keep going since it was still an hour before I could shoot and the bull wasn’t going to hang around that long with us sitting there. I couldn’t stop thinking about that bull as we rode along then 3 or 4 bulls started bugling off in the distance. It was just starting to get light when we pulled up at the edge of a meadow close to the bulls and dismounted. I could see 8 or 9 cows at the far edge of the meadow moving up into the trees and Jason said we were going to hook around the base of the ridge to try and get in front of them. As we moved along the bulls kept bugling but sounded like they were getting further away. We stopped for a few minutes and Jason tried cow calling. I heard something coming from behind us and a cow and a spike ran into about 10 yards as we stood there before splitting off. A few minutes later we got to the edge of another meadow and there was a 5x5 feeding along the ridge across from us. Once he got in the woods we crossed as fast as we could and slipped into the woods where he entered. I was following Jason and my wife was with Jerry above us. It was pretty thick and we had gone a couple hundred yards when Jason pointed uphill and waved me in. The bull was feeding away from us at about 80 yards but all I could see was his rump. There was a lot of brush between us as well so I motioned that I was going to try moving to the right. I had my gun up as I side stepped and kept my eyes on the bull. I think he saw me moving and turned to see what I was as I got to a little opening. I put the bead on the point of his shoulder and fired. He took off running down the ridge to our left and I thought I saw him stumbling.

I got out my gear to reload but I was so excited I kept dropping things. It probably took me 5 minutes to calm down and get my gun reloaded. By then Jerry and my wife made it down to us and said they had a birds-eye view of the whole thing and the bull was definitely hit. At that point we heard a crash off to the left in the direction the bull ran. We worked our way along the ridge and found the bull propped up against a pine tree with his head still up. Jason said if he gets up shoot him again to keep him from falling down to the base of the ridge. The bull struggled to his feet and I shot him again through the ribs into the opposite shoulder and he was done. After some high fives and a hug from my wife I looked at my watch and it was less than an hour since we left the horses.

Jason called into base camp for the packers on the radio and I could hear the other guides congratulating us on the kill. It was so steep we had to tie off the bull to keep him from sliding down the hill. It took awhile but we had him quartered and ready to load about the time the packers showed up. A front was coming through and we got hit with a nasty sleet storm and wind for about 20 minutes before we could load up. Amazing how fast the weather changes in the mountains! Had an awesome ride back to camp in bright sunshine. I took about 15 lbs of meat and the tenderloins in to the camp cook and we all had a great stew and the tenderloins that night.

We spent the rest of the week hiking around the area and took a ride out to a spike camp with the packers to bring an elk back mid-week. I found a nice shed also. A week I’ll never forget!

Probably Red Deer hunting in the Brisbane valley. This was the only hunt I ever trained for and much tougher than the elk hunting I did when living in Colorado. I trained with long walks started 3 months before the hunt and increasing in length as the fitness level increased. Physically challenging, deep forest with up and down hills and through valleys all day with stags tuned into every foreign sound or smell. The guides spent around 40 plus weeks in the bush every year. Don't ask about the snakes, bastards longer than the roads coming in were wide and very scary to walk among at night. I mostly carried a 1912 John Rigby double chambered for 350-400 Number 2 but took a stag on the last evening, last light, last day with my John Rigby .275 Mauser. Either rifle was the right choice.

For a single animal, it was a fallow buck we saw as we entered the property gates. He had a very shootable subordinate buck with him and around 12-15 does but was across the river 200 or more yards away on the neighboring property. Our side of the river was small in land size at 8500 acres but covered great buck territory.

We looked around and picked out the highest and nastiest mountain, (which we called hills) and after dropping our camp gear off at the barn, drove the additional mile or so to that mountain and stalked it from the opposite side. It was a punt, simply an educated guess based on where we would go to hide from the world during the daylight hours and he was found at the very top, laying under a pine tree with a dense patch of dogwood which is a chest high seemingly dead all the time scrappy bush you cannot traverse without making noise, hence his location. The animal kingdoms equivalent of a trip wire with bells attached.

After quietly traversing an old wire fence and entering the dogbush as quietly as I can't, he stood up, took a step forward and pulled his head back with the expression of, "what they hell are you doing on my lawn" and my 180gn Failsafe slipped through his chest just behind the shoulder as he turned and faced left for his escape over the bare grassy hilltop barely visible from our lower position.

He is the oldest deer I have taken with only 4 stumps on the bottom jaw and no teeth on the top. The Taxidermist aged him at 11-12 which was possibly his last season if I didn't come along. His antlers are very grown back but quite long for a fallow.

I've shot two of the big five, which solidly occupy spots 2 & 3 of most memorable, but my most memorable and the trophy I am most proud of is my California blacktail deer. Hunted for 5 years before I was able to punch my tag on a nice forkie. We were up on a ridge before the sun came out watching a game trail. As the sun started to rise, a few bucks crested over the top of the ridge heading down the game trail we were watching. A quick evaluation confirmed buck number 3, the last in the group, was the biggest (which ain't saying much for California Blacktail). Gave a loud grunt to stop them and pulled the trigger - buck rolled all the way down the hill, a perfect shot. An Incredible moment and was great to be able to share the it with my father.

It hasn't happened yet, thankfully.

Never will....You don’t hunt. You’re broke. You can’t wander too far from the house with your fears.

Keep up the veneer that you’ll ever amount to anything.

😎

PS

Steelhead is back!

Typical liberal.

Wilderness horseback hunt for elk in WY east of Yellowstone.

Great guide, great hunt. I tagged on on Day 2 and the "real" cook had gotten hurt and had to go back to town. So we had a young kid who was doing his best, but was not up to the job so I volunteered to help out. There were 3 other hunters in camp and a two other guides, a wrangler, plus the "new" cook and he just wasn't up to feeding 9 people. The morning that were we saddling up at the end of the hunt for 9 hour ride back, the Outfitter/my guide says "Can you stay another week and cook for us?" It was great trip.

Great pic!!!

My best hunt....the two decades I spent finding my wife. It was full of adventure, danger, scary schit, huge expense, passing over many inferior specimens, lots of "rough riding", and one communicable disease, easily remedied.

And she is quite a trophy. It was an amazing spot-and-stalk, requiring extreme patience, fortitude, and knowing when to finally pull the trigger. A true "failure leads to learning leads to success" story. My guides sure sucked ass though.

Ha! Awesome.

Skill wise, my best hunt was a mule deer hunt on my own in E. WA. I spotted a spindly antlered buck and couldn’t put enough points on him at that distance (about 600 yards). Normally I prefer to shoot rather than stalk, but I had no choice. I used the folds in the land and some sneaky to get within 35 yards of where he was bedded down. He was barely legal, but terribly thin in the headgear and appeared to be really young. That, and I was 3 miles and 1500 feet in elevation below camp. Went ahead and passed on him. But it was a thrill. Shot a spike blacktail later in the season instead! He was on flat ground, and 1/2 mile from the truck. Also a close shot at 50 yards.

As far as special hunts, my first elk hunt with my Dad takes the cake. I had already had the aforementioned deer hunt that year and decided I wanted to try an elk hunt. Dad dropped me off so I could find a place to take a dump. Told me to take my rifle just in case. I unwittingly walked into a small herd that had gone into the timber. Took a 4x5 out of the herd. Dad was pretty thrilled. I forgot I had to take a crap!

Likely a 4 state 3 week hunting and fishing trip a cousin and I went on in the early 80s. I got married shortly after. He was engaged to be married, but his intended died in an accident. We remained close yet distant.
He was killed while trying to help at an accident scene within a couple of miles from where his fiance died. I was executor for his estate, and made a stab at re-creating the best parts of the trip in 2016.

Beyond that, I'd say most of my best hunts involved calling coyotes...

Or hunting squirrels in farm woodlots...

Or chasing pheasant behind one of the dogs that owned me....

Have had a lot of memorable hunts. I keep a hunt log book with details and am on 4th book at this point. About 20 hunts in each book. This link is to a recap of a muzzleloader elk hunt from last fall: https://www.hunttalk.com/threads/bull-down-in-jarbidge-nv.292167/

This one...





Story is here...

https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php/topics/11882458/1

Fly in moose hunt in Alaska. 2nd would be a fly in caribou hunt, also in Alaska.

I've had many memorable hunts. In 1979 we went to Junction on an invite hunt. They put me in an outhouse looking ratty blind on a hill above the camp house. It was still dark when they put me at the blind. As it started getting light I could make out animals under the feeder. When it started getting light I could make out one with pretty big antlers. As it got light I could make out a nice buck. When it got to be legal shooting time I took aim with my .270 and shot him in the neck. He hit the ground DRT. It was a nice eight point and one of the nicest deer I ever shot.

As a guide, it was the hunt where we were riding up haystack creek , early. We see a small herd boogeyin to the north of us heading southwest. I had an idea where they were going . We hightailed it back to longdraw and up spring creek to the nob where I think the elk were going to rest. I sent the first hunter on foot up the nob. I took the other hunter back down hill and out of the way. An hour later we hear a shot and an hour after that I was caping out a beautiful 5by5. This dude did an incredible stalk on that nob! We got that elk out of the woods right in front of another outfitter. They were pissed! Then next morning I took my other hunter, a big Nebraska farmer, into a saddle and put him on stand while I birddogged on foot. An hour later he shot the bull I pushed towards him. The ugliest raghorn you ever saw and the elation of this farm kid brought tears to my eyes! Those were good days and those two dudes were a pleasure to guide!

I'm yet to have one I'd consider "bad." Most hunts are highlighted not by harvesting an animal but by who was there to celebrate/commiserate with at the end of the day. I've build (and strengthened) some incredible friendships hunting and around the campfire afterwards. It's become my best (favorite) reason to spend more time with aging family members.

Hands down - one on which I killed nothing.

One foggy morning I followed two barely seen bull moose back into the woods, one of which I thought might be legal. He wasn't, but I found myself in the midst- literally- of at least 7 cows and 4 bulls. Only a glimpse once of the herd bull, the other 3 sub-legal, two of which I had within 10 yards at times, For several hours I moved along within this group of animals , with them all around me, with at least one moose never more than 30 yards away. I joke that they were holding an orgy, but forgot who all they invited.... If anyone looked at me funny, I just held the shoulder blade of the last year's moose up to one side of my head, my walking staff to the other, and gave them a little recognition grunt.

There came a "WherethehellamI?" moment when I realized I was an hour over-due for meeting my partner back at the canoe. I followed my compass out toward the road, but located a known point when still half a mile in, then navigated back to the canoe, on which my partner was sitting, steam coming out of his ears.

Before he could say anything, I jumped him with "Where the hell you been? I've been everywhere looking for you !"

That cracked him up - he knew I'd been "a mite confused" for a time.

Late season Elk hunt in northwestern Wyoming with my late best friend. He took a 6 point bull. Mine was the biggest bull I have ever taken, a very heavy 6x7. Tied for the top spot was my last Moose hunt in Southern Wyoming with my son-in-law. It was a great week of looking over Moose before choosing the right one.

the one with my wife as the hunter/shooter. for moose. where do i shoot it? behind the shoulder! BANG, now what do i do ? shoot it again in the neck! BANG....Flop! took 4 hours to get in the truck and we beat snow storm by 5 minutes.

Over the years, I've killed a lot of deer and my share of elk. However, a trip about 5 or 6 years ago was the only time that I've ever got both on the same trip.

I've already commented on what was my best hunt but I really believe my best hunt is yet to happen.