now the times in the late 1970s and Al, mike, jack and I have driven out to the eagle/gypsum Colorado area of the white river national forest to see if we can get yourself a few ELK, licenses filled.
We drove for 46 hours strait thru taking shifts of about 4-5 hours each from Florida in my ford f350 dually crew cab truck, the roads seem to be under construction a great deal that trip as the trip normally took about 43-44 hours to cover the 2200 miles from my house to that area of Colorado.if you use the main interstate highway system.
we arrived in Denver a few hours early on Thursday before the season, to find we had to wait till the fish & game department opened so we drove thru to eagle and purchased our licenses in EAGLE later in the day,and spent the night at the best western motel where we could get a hot shower and a warm bed for the night,then went into the local hardware store (they still sold over the counter elk and deer licenses back then, at semi-reasonable prices) later that day we drove up to coffee pot camp ground and slept in the truck until about 5 am on opening day(Saturday)
we drove about 8 miles to the area we normally hunt and Al and I teamed up and mike and jack got together , we planed to still hunt into a series of canyons from two points about 3 mikes apart, that were miles up from the more traveled logging roads and most hunting pressure,so mike and jack dropped us off and headed out to a known location to drop off the truck and we planned to meet at about 4-6pm back at the truck. the temps were surprisingly mild at about 50 degrees that first day,but at about 10am both AL and I started feeling like crap from altitude sickness ,but because that happened EVERY year we were expecting it, and were traveling slowly and filling our canteens from springs and adding TANG to kill some of the taste of the damn IODINE and drops of CHLORINE you add to water to prevent gardia problems.
as we sat on this one ridge glassing the area we noticed several cow elk and one bull ELK bedded on the far talus slope , in some aspen,at about 1200 yards, the place was ideal for the elk because every approach from below them required you to expose yourself for at least 100-150 yards as you crossed the semi open meadow patches on the canyon lower areas, before you got into the 300-350 yard range that we were comfortable shooting from, and the wind while not overly strong precluded any approach from down canyon on their slope.
glassing the area above the elk showed mostly rim-rock cliffs that made that route out of the question.
but the upper and mid canyon slope on that far canyon wall was a patch work of minor rock slides and aspen patches, so we decided to slowly move up canyon on our side until we were well out of site of the bedded elk, cross where we found cover and work our way back on their side of the canyon wall/slope hoping they would remain in the area, until we got close enough for a decent precise rifle shot range.
It took us over an hour to cross the canyon and start sneaking back, from up canyon on their side of the canyon on that slope, travel was slow because we could not be sure where the elk were exactly as your perspective changes a great deal, and the elk may have moved plus we tried hard not to make noise. after about 2.5 hours we were where we thought we needed to be, but saw no elk., we continued to still hunt slowly until we saw antler tips moving in the young conifer brush and aspen , the range was about 180 yards and AL sat down with his 7mm Remington mag , loaded with 175 grain hornady bullets, and got ready to shoot, extending his 27" harris bi-pod and wrapping into the sling, looking thru his 3x9x red-field scope,the elk were not cooperating and we had to move several times very carefully to try and get the correct angle and stay within range as they occasionally moved, but at about 1pm Al whispered he had a decent shot at a reasonable 4x4 bull but that he had seen a larger bull at one point but could not now locate it, it was the first day of the season so I told him that he would be foolish to let a legal bull on public land get away, but since it was early in the season he might want to gamble on seeing a larger bull.(it would be ALS first bull elk so he was very excited)
he decided to take the bull, when he got a decent shot he squeezed off a shot and the place erupted with, running and trotting elk of several descriptions, from the aspen., most seemed to follow a large cow elk, the elk he had fired at gave no indication it was hit so I told him to keep shooting, after the third shot he still saw no results and asked me to shoot also, I didn,t because Id been watching and saw the bull was hit high in the lungs and a bit far back , after the third shot, but since he was headed down slope toward the creek in the meadow I felt any more hits would just waste meat,and he was bleeding out rapidly and within about 45 seconds the bull folded nose over , doing an impressive summer-sault and skidding down the talus slope he was crossing. it took us about 15 minutes to reach ALs elk and two full days to pack out the meat.,(luckily all four of us made the last trip so it only took a few trips packing out the meat)
I,m not sure when AL hit the ELK but he only hit it once out of those three shots, but the liver and one lung was destroyed by which ever shot connected,and the elk only ran about 100 yards, before falling. I was very pleased that Al got his ELK as it was one of the true high points in his elk hunting career, which ended about 15 years later when he had a massive heart attack, and the doctors told him any serious exercise at high altitudes in the future was out of the question.
(btw it was a total fluke that he even hit the elk, TESTING HIS RIFLE WHEN HE GOT BACK FROM THE TRIP AT THE RANGE SHOWED HE MUST HAVE SLIPPED AND LANDED ON THE RIFLE AT SOME POINT IN THE HUNT BECAUSE THE SCOPE WAS BENT SLIGHTLY, AND THE RIFLE HIT 8" HIGH AT 100 YARDS, ...he never noticed the damage until we checked at the range, and later admitted dropping the rifle and falling with it on his shoulder several times )
redfield repaired the scope at a minimal charge which was great as it was obviously subjected to ABUSE
We drove for 46 hours strait thru taking shifts of about 4-5 hours each from Florida in my ford f350 dually crew cab truck, the roads seem to be under construction a great deal that trip as the trip normally took about 43-44 hours to cover the 2200 miles from my house to that area of Colorado.if you use the main interstate highway system.
we arrived in Denver a few hours early on Thursday before the season, to find we had to wait till the fish & game department opened so we drove thru to eagle and purchased our licenses in EAGLE later in the day,and spent the night at the best western motel where we could get a hot shower and a warm bed for the night,then went into the local hardware store (they still sold over the counter elk and deer licenses back then, at semi-reasonable prices) later that day we drove up to coffee pot camp ground and slept in the truck until about 5 am on opening day(Saturday)
we drove about 8 miles to the area we normally hunt and Al and I teamed up and mike and jack got together , we planed to still hunt into a series of canyons from two points about 3 mikes apart, that were miles up from the more traveled logging roads and most hunting pressure,so mike and jack dropped us off and headed out to a known location to drop off the truck and we planned to meet at about 4-6pm back at the truck. the temps were surprisingly mild at about 50 degrees that first day,but at about 10am both AL and I started feeling like crap from altitude sickness ,but because that happened EVERY year we were expecting it, and were traveling slowly and filling our canteens from springs and adding TANG to kill some of the taste of the damn IODINE and drops of CHLORINE you add to water to prevent gardia problems.
as we sat on this one ridge glassing the area we noticed several cow elk and one bull ELK bedded on the far talus slope , in some aspen,at about 1200 yards, the place was ideal for the elk because every approach from below them required you to expose yourself for at least 100-150 yards as you crossed the semi open meadow patches on the canyon lower areas, before you got into the 300-350 yard range that we were comfortable shooting from, and the wind while not overly strong precluded any approach from down canyon on their slope.
glassing the area above the elk showed mostly rim-rock cliffs that made that route out of the question.
but the upper and mid canyon slope on that far canyon wall was a patch work of minor rock slides and aspen patches, so we decided to slowly move up canyon on our side until we were well out of site of the bedded elk, cross where we found cover and work our way back on their side of the canyon wall/slope hoping they would remain in the area, until we got close enough for a decent precise rifle shot range.
It took us over an hour to cross the canyon and start sneaking back, from up canyon on their side of the canyon on that slope, travel was slow because we could not be sure where the elk were exactly as your perspective changes a great deal, and the elk may have moved plus we tried hard not to make noise. after about 2.5 hours we were where we thought we needed to be, but saw no elk., we continued to still hunt slowly until we saw antler tips moving in the young conifer brush and aspen , the range was about 180 yards and AL sat down with his 7mm Remington mag , loaded with 175 grain hornady bullets, and got ready to shoot, extending his 27" harris bi-pod and wrapping into the sling, looking thru his 3x9x red-field scope,the elk were not cooperating and we had to move several times very carefully to try and get the correct angle and stay within range as they occasionally moved, but at about 1pm Al whispered he had a decent shot at a reasonable 4x4 bull but that he had seen a larger bull at one point but could not now locate it, it was the first day of the season so I told him that he would be foolish to let a legal bull on public land get away, but since it was early in the season he might want to gamble on seeing a larger bull.(it would be ALS first bull elk so he was very excited)
he decided to take the bull, when he got a decent shot he squeezed off a shot and the place erupted with, running and trotting elk of several descriptions, from the aspen., most seemed to follow a large cow elk, the elk he had fired at gave no indication it was hit so I told him to keep shooting, after the third shot he still saw no results and asked me to shoot also, I didn,t because Id been watching and saw the bull was hit high in the lungs and a bit far back , after the third shot, but since he was headed down slope toward the creek in the meadow I felt any more hits would just waste meat,and he was bleeding out rapidly and within about 45 seconds the bull folded nose over , doing an impressive summer-sault and skidding down the talus slope he was crossing. it took us about 15 minutes to reach ALs elk and two full days to pack out the meat.,(luckily all four of us made the last trip so it only took a few trips packing out the meat)
I,m not sure when AL hit the ELK but he only hit it once out of those three shots, but the liver and one lung was destroyed by which ever shot connected,and the elk only ran about 100 yards, before falling. I was very pleased that Al got his ELK as it was one of the true high points in his elk hunting career, which ended about 15 years later when he had a massive heart attack, and the doctors told him any serious exercise at high altitudes in the future was out of the question.
(btw it was a total fluke that he even hit the elk, TESTING HIS RIFLE WHEN HE GOT BACK FROM THE TRIP AT THE RANGE SHOWED HE MUST HAVE SLIPPED AND LANDED ON THE RIFLE AT SOME POINT IN THE HUNT BECAUSE THE SCOPE WAS BENT SLIGHTLY, AND THE RIFLE HIT 8" HIGH AT 100 YARDS, ...he never noticed the damage until we checked at the range, and later admitted dropping the rifle and falling with it on his shoulder several times )
redfield repaired the scope at a minimal charge which was great as it was obviously subjected to ABUSE