2015 Season in the Rearview Pic Heavy

[Craig Van Arsdale]

2015 Season in the Rearview AK/CA/ID/AZ Pic Heavy

First hunt of the year was over a year in the making. The plan was to hunt Caribou in the Brooks Range Alaska. DIY float hunt organized by Larry Bartlett. Flying in and then floating about 100 miles back to our take out on the Haul Rd. 5 of us total.

We all flew into Fairbanks from different parts of the country and met at the airport. Jon and I's flight arrived late and we decided to make "Camp" in the airport.

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

The next morning we went and picked up our two U-Haul trucks, met everyone for breakfast, picked up the rafts from Larry and hit the road headed North.

The plan was to make it to Happy Valley that night and make camp there. If the weather permitted we would fly out in the morning.





The drive was amazing the whole way!

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

We made it to Happy Valley that night as planned and made camp. The next morning we learned that our air taxi was quite a bit behind trying to get all of his sheep hunters out of the mountains from the storm that had just came through. Several guys were 2-3 days beyond there scheduled pickup date.



Not knowing if we were going to be able to make it out that day we decided to relax and do a little fishing.

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

Late in the day our pilot came buzzing into the airstrip hopped out and told us he could make two trips before nightfall and get three of us in. We quickly loaded our gear into the plane with Jon on the first flight and off they went!


About and hour later he came back and Eli and myself got in with all our gear and took off for the last flight of the night. Jeremy and Kenny would get a flight in the next morning.

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

The next morning Jeremy and Kenny came in on the next flight.

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

That night a weather system moved in on us and kept us huddled up in the tents for the next two days with high winds snow and sleet. The Sawtooth immediately became the "Place to be" so we all crammed into the Sawtooth and played cards and BS'ed until the storm broke.

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

Once the storm broke we decided to hunt around the airstrip for a day before pumping up the rafts and heading down river.

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

After hiking all of the nearest drainages by the airstrip we all had seen no sign of Caribou so we decided we wold pack up camp and hit the river in the AM.

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

We were all pretty rusty at first but after the first 5 or so river miles we were starting to get the hang of it...

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

The weather really cleared up and the fishing was amazing!

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

We floated about 10 river miles total and set up camp for the next couple days.







Fresh Arctic Char cooked on hot rocks in the fire was one of the highlights of our trip! And we did it often!

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

Caribou sightings or sign was non existent so we continued down river.

 

[mtnwrunner]

Very nice tale and photos---keep em coming.

Randy

 

[Brock A]

Purely badass!

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

At our Third camp we got to experience the Nothern Lights in full force! If I would have known more about night photos I could have got some amazing shots but I still got lucky on a couple.

 

[Arrowslinger]

Great post xmas thread! Keep posting.

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

At this point we still hadn't seen any Bou nor any sign of them passing through! We were really getting after it at this point and hiking miles and miles into each drainage and up on top of peaks to get better vantage points. Still no Bou to be found.

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

The views were epic though and the weather was treating us well! We were just all in awe of the country!

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

That afternoon we all met back at camp. All the sudden I look over and there is giant Muskox bull standing there on the other side of the river!

 

[Craig Van Arsdale]

Jon and I decide we want some close up photos of this beast so we cross the river after him!