Harper mountain for Harper almost done

[chucko]

Yeah here we go again 9pm fog and rain I pick out the route I believe we took down and we all start up and it becomes obviously clear that I chose wrong because once again we are in boulders and rocks .We keep climbing now with headlamps and overshoot the tents but Will checks his GPS and looks downhill and yeah there they are . It is now past midnight and Harper is now a little upset as she is sure she will end up with dreadlocks. DAY-6 We get up have a long breakfast and begin to break camp for the long trek out . Will has contacted the pilot and they found us a new strip only 3 valleys away and 5 or so miles . Will brushes Harpers hair and we begin our descent back down the valley . When we reach the valley floor with camp we continue downstream through the willows till where will begin our ascent ,we all drop our gear and go back up the valley to the meat drop point. Harper is now commenting on all the horse poop she is now seeing and Will and I both know what it is but let her believe its horses anyways . After gathering up the meat and cape/horns we continue to the gear drop and begin our ascent .The ascent is steep but no boulders and rocks so not too bad . We spot some caribou bulls on the way up and Harper points at each of them wanting to know their age, diet, weight and where they are going . We reach the top I drop the meat for Will to make trips across the valley and head back down for a gear load . When I make it down I see what was making the horse poop and decide I better carry all the gear in 1 load . I make it to top with roughly 110lbs of gear, luckily Will and Harper have returned to help me with the load and we head to our new camp on wet lumpy tundra which is slightly better then the previous one .FINAL DAY 7-Will gets up early and makes a meat trip to the top of the ridge to where he can see the new strip while I hang with Harper so she can get a little more rest. When Will returns I pack up about 1/2 of camp and the cape/horns and head up when I reach the meat drop I switch out the cape/horns for meat and continue to the strip . I MADE IT ! I drop my load just in time to get a frantic call from Will that he needs help please . I now head back up to Will and he has got everything on his back and I try not to laugh as it looks like he is trying to carry a Volkswagon van sideways . We finally all make it to the strip and after a expert takeoff we make it back .Harper is now a instant celebrity , lots of photos and now time for pizza as well as a shower . My final say after it has all sunk in what a epic trip I got to go on .I learned a ton and have realized it is once in a lifetime . Harper was a great hunting partner and Will was not too bad either except that he made me cry . This is the second hunt I have been on with Harper and would not hesitate to do it again she is trully what we need in the hunting world , that little girl walked over 50 miles with her only complaint being about impending doom by dreadlocks . So I guess if someone tells me I hunt like a 10 year old girl I will forever take it as a compliment . I think you will be hearing more from this girl in the future . HAPPY HUNTING

 

[ReddingArcher]

So awesome, congratulations!

 

[fatbacks]

Thanks for sharing! Great story, great ram, and a tough little girl!

 

[Wildwillalaska]

Whatever Chuckles—I didn’t make you cry. You started crying as you walked up, which made me start crying and still laugh at how confused and amused Harper was at us two old guys crying.

Thank you for taking the time to write this all out, and journaling each evening other than the one night you decided to take us on the scenic post-midnight Boulder tour by headlamp in the fog. I’m still at such a loss of words that can even come close to how proud I am of Harper, and you, on how this trip went, which honestly have nothing remotely to do with her harvesting a ram, let alone one a beautiful as she did—it isnsolely based upon her attitude, unending drive, good heart, and for lack of better descriptor her gritty badassery. Yes she cried three times herself, once when I accidentally whacked her in the nose with the spotter/tripod, once when she almost fell off a large boulder in a steep steep section we were descending side hill mid-stalk to her ram and third I cannot recall why—but all seemed well earned at the time and incredibly brief before she returned right back to her normal upbeat inquisitive self. On camp/meat moving day we drug her up and down several steep sections (her packing her own personal gear) for more than 13 miles and she never complained. She never complained once, about anything.

I told her going in and often through the hunt how proud I was of her, and it didn’t matter if she did or did not kill a ram, even if we didn’t get another shot. Being there in the field with her and one of the best men I know is what mattered. Time in the rugged country sheep live is time well earned and spent. That’s what I love, and what I wanted her to love and focus on. The country, the wild and things that thrive there, the hide and seek and chase. The time spent with the best of friends and family that you love and can’t ever be replaced. Those are the things that matter the most. Those are the things I wanted her to focus on especially on this hunt as going in I knew it was known for open, rugged country with low density population, and that was even before the past couple winters, the last of which it wasn’t surveyed since. This was certainly far from a high success rate hunt from any angle. We got really lucky a few times with several things going Harper’s way the day she scored her ram, but had that day not unfolded as it did—so long as she focused on what really mattered, it would still have proven a more than successful hunt for her and the chance for Harper to hunt Mt. Harper on her very first sheep hunt made it even more special. That gorgeous ram she brought out was icing on the cake.

Id like to think she earned some of her good fortune even last year when her Kotz moose hunt never even got off the ground from Chuckles‘ caribou camp. We ended up weathered in with Chuckles and Kurt for over a week and never even landed on the strip of my moose spot. Through that entire trip Harper was also upbeat, inquisitive, and simply had a ball helping part out caribou and asking what kind and age of any animal or animal dropping she could find. Her only complaint was that damned sow grizz with her similarly sized cubs that charged us. My first actual bear charge and of course I have my then 9Yo daughter right behind me. Luckily she stopped well short and we backed out of there, but it did leave a little bit of a negative I,pressi0n for her and brown bears, so when she sees griz scat and thinks it horse, we did let her continue with that conclusion until we were well clear of the area.

 

[Wildwillalaska]

What’s really funny is I don’t think Chuck was ever called Frosty before last year’s Kotz trip. After Harper scared him half to death when they were both trying to tend to bathroom issues roughly 75-100yrds apart and Chuck just saw bright blond hair moving between the willows, he came back shaken and his hair rapidly turned white thereafter—leading to his trail name bestowed upon him during a training hike this summer. Hence forward, his -lace on Team Harper was known as Frosty.

Truly Chuck, thank you again for everything as always. Even the best of friends don’t show up packing a solid variety of skittles, minimum of a bag a day, to help brighten the tougher moments. When we originally planned this trip, the hope was always that Chuck would be able to come along and help, but originally Harper’s grandad was also going to come along. He‘s a retired guide and just a gem of a man as well. Sadly he had a heart attack in the early summer. While it excluded him from her hunt, he pulled through everything well and if we can find the right situation, the hopes are he’ll make another of her sheep hunts in the future. Harper enduring it all and with style, and scoring certainly meant a ton to her grandad too.

For me, this was simply the hands down hardest hunt from the open, but severely rugged terrain to the logistics of extra pack weights and pacing to not hike her into the ground—but at the same time, it is and may always remain, the very best and clear favorite hunt of my life.

 

[Wildwillalaska]

 

[Wildwillalaska]

You’ll notice here Harper appears to be sighting down the rifle, but the scope cap is closed. Some observant internet sleuth will note the irony of the cap being closed while thensafety is off—also normal for how her rifle is carried and set out prior to her actually readying to shoot. It is uncocked, and no round in the chamber. Chuck was simply talking her through the set up and checking height before we moved down and out about another 5 yards placing her between some nice cover and putting the rams into clear view, which were still bedded at this point. Once she reached her final shooting spot, she chambered a round, put on safe while we waited for the ram to rise, Chuck helped coach her through the repeated steps for the shot, and I was set up a few yards below the two of them in case she needed a follow up. this was the last photo before she tagged out.

 

[Wildwillalaska]

I was sitting there in complete awe as to what all had just unfolded, looking at Harper with such a huge level of happiness, and and essentially an overwhelmed proud father. Chatting with Harper, she had my phone and I didn’t even know she took this last photo as we talked and looked around the valley. I love it so much as it takes me right back to that moment.

The scratches on his horn appears to be from the sparring he did just before he passed. When we slipped into position, they were all bedded, but as luck would shine on us again, the big guy and next largest, another legal ram, got up within 5min of us reaching the spot. They sparred, butted and locked horns for about 5-7min before separating and giving Harps her window of opportunity.

 

[Wildwillalaska]

 

[Wildwillalaska]

And just random few shots from her Kotz moose hunt that turned into a camping trip at Chuckles’ fav little caribou camp, and Harps’ and Chuckles’ first shared camp, which looked more like an Old Maid tourney than a hunt, from idle time in town, weathered in, until we flew out, there were multiple old maid games daily.

 

[Ibex]

Very well done! Cannot wait to get my daughters into the sheep mountains.

 

[Bighorn80]

That is what its all about! Great writeup- thank you! Reading this brings back all those emotions of my son's first sheep hunt when he was 12. Congratulations, young lady (and dad)!!! Something you will never forget.

 

[JColony]

Thanks for sharing this experience with all of us! Hoping to one day get this experience with my kids. Question for you...

@chucko What pack is your daughter running?? My daughter is 8 and wanting to venture further out into the woods than a day hike allows these days.

 

[sdcowboy]

congratulations on a beautiful sheep and an awesome hunt. There is no better hunt than with children and to see the excitement on their faces on things we have forgotten to take the time to look at. Thanks for sharing this awesome story and look forward for many more to come

 

[Wildwillalaska]

Thanks for sharing this experience with all of us! Hoping to one day get this experience with my kids. Question for you...

@chucko What pack is your daughter running?? My daughter is 8 and wanting to venture further out into the woods than a day hike allows these days.

It’s made by ULA, their CDT Model and had it made in Xpac material so waterproof without a cover. It’s also super light. https://www.ula-equipment.com/product/cdt/

 

[Movi]

What an experience to share with your daughter! Well done! I was wondering as I’ve seen a ton of photos of this ram lately, is the other side deformed/broke off? It seems like all the pics are just of the one side? Not that there’s anything wrong with that! Dream ram!

 

[Wildwillalaska]

What an experience to share with your daughter! Well done! I was wondering as I’ve seen a ton of photos of this ram lately, is the other side deformed/broke off? It seems like all the pics are just of the one side? Not that there’s anything wrong with that! Dream ram!

It’s left horn is about 2” shorter, but not broke off. The base of the left horn goes down his forehead and back further than the other side, and it’s last several annuli are pretty offset, so certainly not perfectly symmetrical. Had one of our long-time biologists that’s now retired from F&G and our local B&C official scorer look at it Friday. Put him at 10.5yo, grosses 163 7/8, but loses almost 2” in net. Will have to see how much it shrinks over the next 40sh days.

Here’s a few pics that show the other side some, her sitting in Barney’s on our trip home, her ram dwarfing mine from my early season solo hunt

 

[Movi]

Niiice!!!