We enjoyed a fun time with Scott & Pauline, Ryan, ReVon & Elva; hunting on the back side of the Manti Lasal Mountain range. Scott had turned his dedicated hunting license back in last year that was not filled. It went into a drawing and he won the drawing for a hunt of a life time. He called Doug several months ago while we were on our mission and asked him if we would be home for the hunt. He had never hunted Elk before and had no idea how or where to go. Of course Doug agreed to go and got very trunky the last couple of months.
Doug's parents came and went with us and Ryan, Scott & Pauline's son went with them. This hunt is in the San Jaun valley just outside of Blanding. Do you know how far away that is from St. George. 8 loooooooooong hours. But what a beautiful mountain.
We arrived friday afternoon and set up camp, then went for a ride on the wheelers to see the country side. Ryan spotted some elk up on the top of Blue Mountain. We all took turns looking thru the spotting scope at 'em. They were huge. The Plan was set in motion for the next day. I got up early with the guys and headed out on our wheelers at 5:30 the next morning. We parked the wheelers and then started hiking. It was quite a trek. We couldn't find a road that would take us to that part of the mountain. (That is an obvious reason why the elk were way up there.No one bothers them way up there.) Just after daylight we took a break and glassed over the mountain side. Doug started bugleing. The elk started responding with their own bugleing. Pretty soon there were elk from all different directions bugleing. 360 degrees, we were surrounded with the call of the wild. That sure can get your blood pumping, especially when you can't really see them all, only hear them. Scott did manage to get off 5 rounds at a couple of them. One we thought he had hit for sure. Ryan and I treked over the avalanch of shell rock to where we last saw the elk, looking for blood or any sign where he went. We searched all over and never could find the animal. Hiking out of there was the hike from _ _ _ _. Doug, Scott and I went one direction and Ryan another. The "Mule" made it down a good 45 minutes before we did.
Monday we decided to hike up the canyon the way Ryan had come down, a different way following a creek bed that went right up where we were at. This time Pauline was with us. About a third of the way up, we all stopped for a break and Doug did some more bugeling. A few Bulls answered him. Onward we went, half way up, Ryan was in the lead,(he is quite the mountain goat, but being half our age does make a difference. We nick-named him the "Mule") He stopped for a second and then pointed down in some trees down by the water, just as Doug noticed the same thing. They had both smelled it at the same time. There lay a huge ELK. He and Doug approached it very carefully not wanting to have it rear up on them if it was just laying there wounded. To our great amazement, it seemed to be the very elk Scott had shot on Saturday. Scott's 5 shots were the only ones we had heard the whole time we have been up here. We were all stunned to think we had come across Scott's elk. Because of the steep terrain, we ended up gutting, de-boning, and taking off the horns and packing everything we could carry out. Ryan (the Mule packed out the heaviest load, made it down to the truck and then back up to meet us where we were at and packed the pack his parents were carrying out and then back down to the truck again. What a fluke, who would have ever thought we would find the Elk the very direction we decided to go.
Success!
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