Partner bailed, now what?

[bourbon]

Some good info and advise!!!! READ POST #3 then read it again!!! Rather than go home , slow down, enjoy the mountains, and learn as much as u can for next year!! You will want to return next year so why not learn everything you can. If you don't want to risk meat loss to find out if you can do it solo, load up some rocks and pretend you just killed an elk. Pack 3-4 loads out to the truck. You can always stop the test, if you succeed then you can roll in there next year with a plan and the confidence to get it done or a plan B.

Solid advice!!!

 

[dotman]

It's not just that they quit hunting but they completely bail on their partners. WTF ! Not , I'm done hunting but I'll stay in camp and support you best I can. I'll go to town and get ice and at least try to help pack. Nothing ! I quit and screw you ! Wow ! These trips are a year in the making with a big investment of time , money , and sacrifice. You can't just walk away if you have another man depending on you. Not everyone can do it but it doesn't have to be all or nothing.

Yeah I don't get it either, especially the guys that drove 20 hours to do it.

 

[striker3]

Slow down, enjoy the wilderness. Personally, I hunt as motivation to get out and see places many others won't. If I bag game, that's a bonus, but not my goal. After 15 years in the military, I decided I would rather enjoy life instead of hating it.

 

[CrzyTrekker]

Agree post #3 is good advice, assuming you acclimate. I was solo this year and used the backcountry cooler (creek).

 

[xziang]

Maybe I'm a wimp but 30 miles in 2 days with a lot of it bushwhacking would zap me too, especially through deadfall. *yuck* I agree with the sleep in one day or two. I did that on the 2 day I was at altitude on my 2nd trip and I think that helped me NOT get headaches.

Good luck to your hunt.

 

[danarnold]

Last year I went to Montana with three guys, two of them spiked out and one of them killed a nice bull within a couple of days, after we all packed out his animal all three of the guys went back and spiked out there and left me hunting unexpectedly solo for the next eight days, it was a gut check for sure and after a few days you find yourself questioning everything you do but the end result was success on the last day which you can't replace for anything. In a nutshell go for it, it's a lot easier to do now then wish you would have done it when you're back in the comforts of home

 

[7stw]

My dad always said if you wanted to know what someone was truly made of share a backcountry hunting camp with them. That said it would have to be a major emergency for me to bail on someone (went on a trip once with a total ass and didn't bail) but some guys don't realize how mentally and physically challenging these types of hunts can be. Sucks for sure. As others said stay and learn the unit tough it out then head back next year with knowledge ! Good luck on and stay safe for the rest of your trip whatever you decide.

 

[Finch]

Sorry to hear about your partner. Hope you stick with it. If you do, good luck! Make your ex-partner jealous by killing a nice bull.

 

[Poser]

Is the gear in your "camp for 2"all yours or some of it his as well? I wouldn't necessarily feel obligated to pack his gear out for him.

 

[William Hanson (live2hunt)]

15 miles a day would have about killed me but you don't give up on a partner. Leaving a partner hanging in the back country is a punk move if there ever is one. I'm slower than my partner but I get there and don't quit.

 

[Where's Bruce?]

Hunting is only as enjoyable as you make it. For me the trick is to love every moment, soak it in and appreciate the entire experience, even when that experience taxes your mind, body and spirit to the limit. You gotta know when to stop and say, tomorrow's another day. And sometimes you just need to take a day off and rest. You'd be surprised what can happen when you stop moving and quiet down...opportunities can find you. That said, I would never abandon a partner in the backcountry...never! I signed on for the tour and while we may disagree with the gameplan at times, I stick to my hunting partners like glue. Look at that poor bastard in ID that spent days crawling out of ID with a double leg fracture.

 

[Dos Perros]

You never leave your wingman.

 

[blicero]

First, I want to thank everybody who responded to this thread. I didn't get a chance to read all the replies while I was out there, but the ones I did definitely helped lift my morale and get me re-focused. I've always felt like smartphones and wilderness shouldn't really go together, but when you're sitting by yourself in the middle of nowhere, all the comments (both the encouraging ones, and the "what the F%$k are you thinking" variety) were really appreciated.

After calling and observing on Friday, another mostly sleepless night at altitude Friday night (definitely bringing melatonin next year), and waiting for the winds to shift on Saturday, I realized I needed to let it go. For me, it was like taking an 80 yard shot; maybe everything would've worked out perfectly, but there was too much risk of either injuring myself in a steep drainage with no cell, or risking losing meat to spoilage given the heat and amount of time it would take me to pack out solo (hard to believe I could sit comfortably in a t-shirt on a ridge at 11,000 ft in Colorado in late September).

Overall, had a good trip, disappointed in the outcome, will probably second-guess myself for the next 340 days, but I'll be back there to seal the deal next season.

A few key lessons I learned, or maybe refreshed my memory on:

1. Not all miles are created equal. I do a lot of backcountry fishing in the summers, and hiking up 8 miles to fish cutthroats at 10 or 11K, then hiking 8 down at the end of the day, is not out of the norm. But doing a mile on an established trail at elevation is a whole other animal than a mile of this:



2. Regardless of reasons, the possibility of partner bailing (getting hurt, getting sick, getting bad news from home) is something that can happen, and needs to be planned for just like a thunderstorm or dumping of snow. I should've had, and will have in the future, a set of gear that I could've run with solo.

3. Once my partner left, I really should have taken an hour to reset my expectations, thought through which gear I could offload, and run as light as possible. I ended up carrying a lot of weight I no longer needed after he bailed, mostly because my mindset was "let's just get going and get this done".

Thanks again for listening. I'll be back.

 

[zman]

Sitting on a ridge at 11,000 ft. Partner bailed this morning due to exhaustion (mental and physical), leaving me to press on solo. It took 30 miles of intense deadfall treebashing over the past 2 days to find them, but found the drainage with the bugling bulls, and called one in to about 25 yards yesterday before he spotted my moving partner and bolted.

If I go up and over into there again and put something down, I'm looking at a solo pack out of 4.5 miles or so, times however many trips it takes, plus taking out a camp for 2 by myself. Right now I feel a little like puking everytime the pack goes on, but maybe a night's sleep will do the trick.

What do you say Rokslide? Give it a try or better luck next year?

Stick it out. My partner got hurt on day three this year... I changed locations to make it easier on him physically... Should have just stayed where I was. Gonna be a long 11 months subsisting on tag soup.

 

[Where's Bruce?]

I feel for ya and completely understand your decision. I was knocked outta the game after day 2 of a nine day hunt due to injury (http://www.rokslide.com/forums/showthread.php?34517-From-the-Rockies) and it still bugs me. But things happen that we are unprepared for and sometimes retreat is the better part of valor. Every education cost something. The important thing is apply that knowledge and get back out there again. Most bow hunters eat their tags...it's what we take away from the hunt that determines its value. You'll get em next time.

 

[striker3]

blicero, 30 miles in 2 days over dead falls like that is no joke. Hats off to you for sure. You're right, we need to have a seperate gear list for contingencies, and the ability to cache the extra. Makes me kind of rethink my own packing list.

 

[Jason Snyder]

Me thinks that if you walked 30 miles in two days, you walked by some elk along the way. If I have to cover more than 7-8 miles in a day, including my hike in, then I need to pick a different spot.

 

[blicero]

Me thinks that if you walked 30 miles in two days, you walked by some elk along the way. If I have to cover more than 7-8 miles in a day, including my hike in, then I need to pick a different spot.

Usually I'd agree, but I think we were snakebit by sheep herding. There was a sign posted at one of the major trailheads (which I didn't see until I was on my way out) in the area about how there are sheep operation through there June 1st through Sept 20, which was 2 days before we arrived. We saw tons of old sign, like elk had been in every spot in that drainage, but almost nothing fresher than at least a week.

Between that and the two large, vacant, semi-permanent wall tents in the middle of the valley, and the random swathes of trampled down vegetation, I'm pretty confident that the elk had gotten run off and were just slowly starting to trickle back in while we were winding down.