2013 British Columbia Mountain Goat Hunt Pt.2

[warnniklz]

Well to start... here's a link to part 1

http://onyourownadventures.com/hunt...2013-British-Columbia-Mountain-Goat-Hunt-Pt-1

THE SCOUT

With what I would call a successful trip with someone I just met, it was time to get back to my area. I was still seeing goats on my drive to and from work. So the weekend after my trip out with QK , I loaded up with flagging tape, my machete and hatchet.

 

[duckhunt]

Patiently waiting

 

[warnniklz]

A recurring them was it was always blue bird sky at my place, but when I got into my goat hunting area... clouds

Anyways, I got to my parking spot. A spot we call The Back Channel. I figured it'd be a short hike through the timber, then maybe an hour, two tops to get up to the hunting spot. Not the case. I've experienced stinging nettle and devil's club before... but this was much more dense and a lot larger in size. The nettle and club seemed to grow wherever the alders decided they didn't wan't to live. I got to work that weekend clearing a trail. When I finally broke into the meadow at the base of the mountain, I felt the charge of adrenaline.

Looking back over the river valley

This was where I could feel the surge coming on, knowing I was almost there.

 

[warnniklz]

The next weekend I made my way back out. Before I got to trail clearing, I set up the spotter. I was picking out goats all over the mountain top.

Not only was I clearing a trail for myself, but my buddy from back home was going to be joining me at the end of September. He also had the same draw as me. So when I was looking at goats, I spotted this guy. There was no doubt he was studly...

 

[warnniklz]

I was right about the trek through the timber. After I got my trail cut, it was only a 20 minute jaunt. However, everything basically went straight up.

I strated my way just following the creeks and waterfalls. I was doing alright for a bit. Then I got cliffed out.

Pictures don't do this justice. This fall was 30' high. I tried a couple of times to use the vegetation to pull myself up. But it kept coming loose from the rocks. The one time I slid down and got 'the tap'. You know when something just lightly flicks your scrotum and it feels like your testicles are partying with your tonsils... yeah, that happened.

Winded and defeated, I had to carefully make my way back down. Pulling yourself up using vegetation is a hell of a lot easier than letting yourself down.

 

[warnniklz]

The next few weeks was more cutting trail and a lot of being fogged or rained out.

There be mountains there

Little sleep aid

 

[Reeltime]

This is better than a movie!!

 

[warnniklz]

With getting up The Back Channel being a bit of a bitch and taking longer than intended, to top it off... my buddy Tranquilizer was making a 9 hour drive at the end of September to come up and try to fill his goat tag. Another spot that had caught my eye on google earth was a little lake. I had a map with the lake on it, there was also a hiking trail marked.

That weekend I took a break from my usual spot and went to check out the trail to the lake. I was told to drive down a road and watch for flagging tape taking off to the left. It took me a little bit, but I finally spotted some orange flagging tape leading up the hill. It was thick with alders, but I doubt anyone had been up there in years. So I started following the flagging tape.

It was a battle to follow the trail. But the trail was headed up the mountain, but then it hooked to the left. I wanted to go right. This wasn't my trail at all. I was sitting in a middle of a thick ass blueberry patch. I've seen the calibre of bears in the area... but I parked my ass and started to pick away at the blueberries while I contemplated my options.

 

[warnniklz]

As I was sitting there, getting my daily intake of fibre... I started to think about the lay of the land. I was sitting at the base of a bluff, to the south was the main road, while to the north was a creek that went up to the lake. So the trail must be between myself and the creek. So I started trekking straight through the blueberry patch towards the creek.

After a short while of crashing through the berries and scarring every critter that may or may not have been in there, I came across what was no doubt the trail I had been looking for.

I continued following the trail upwards. The trail kind of ended at huge clearing of deadfall cedar.

 

[warnniklz]

I made it to the waterfall. It was starting to get dark and colder than usual. So I figured I'd hike out and come back up tomorrow. Except the trail hadn't been marked since the deadfall, and being a stupid dummy... I didn't really pay enough attention to getting back. Abandoning common sense, I hiked straight up the bluff and down the backside. Going up was a battle. But going down the back side was quite the treat. It was old growth with no vegetation to get caught up in. The only shitty part about coming down the backside was the swamp. I had to wade through nipple deep stagnant water to get back onto the main road, then hike back to my vehicle. I changed my clothes and went and set up camp at the Back Channel

some deadfall pictures

I ended up meeting a couple other guys scouting out The Back Channel as well.

 

[warnniklz]

I got to talking to the two guys (JF & JD). They both had goat draws as well. JF's Grandfather had pulled a goat out of The Back Channel a few years back. Neither of them really knew how to get up the mountain though.

The next morning I managed to find the trail head I was looking for. It was quite an easy trail. When I got to the deadfall, I spent the day cutting a trail around it. I also marked it very well. The trail from the spot to park to the waterfall was only a 45 minute jaunt. It would be ready for when Tranquilizer showed up.

 

[warnniklz]

The Tranquilizer

So let me give you a little background on my friend Alex Tranq. We've been best friends since grade 8. However, he didn't get into hunting until he was 20. However, we had him out shooting plenty and he's quite the experienced mountaineer. His kill count to date had been one grouse and one 2x2 mule deer.

So Tranq arrived at my place Saturday afternoon.

He brought his rifle, but had mentioned he was lacking range time since I had put a new scope on it for him.

 

[warnniklz]

I grabbed him Selina, then I tossed my pack in his truck and we were off. I showed him some of the spots I'd been keeping an eye on. I took him to the Back Channel to at least show him goats. He asked me "where do I look for goats?" I told him "Look where you'd go then not there." Right away he started picking out goats. So knowing he could spot goats, we burned down to our insertion point to head up to the lake.

Tranq asked how long the hike was. I told him it was half hour - forty five minutes to the waterfall then should only be another hour to the lake. It was a late start, but we were enjoying the easy part of the hike too much.

 

[warnniklz]

We had started down the trail at 3pm... we reached the waterfall at 5. It really shouldn't have taken that long.

 

[warnniklz]

We had two hours or so of daylight left and I hadn't been past the waterfall. The map I had showed the hiking trail ran north of the waterfall. So me and Tranq crossed. The trail was thick, steep and un-marked.

We faught our way up the hill. We would get bluffed out, work our way over and then go up some more. We ran out of daylight and had to dig in to the side of a bluff. Tranq asked about bears during the night. I told him "bears are smarter than us... they wouldn't come this way."

 

[warnniklz]

We woke with the sun. Our gear was wet and we had frost on our boots. We got camp packed up and continued on.

 

[warnniklz]

From camp it was another two hours of smashing alders and climbing bluffs. There was one point on the bluff where we had this view.

We knew we were close. Adrenaline kicked in and we started barrelling through anything that stood in our way like a pissed off moose.

 

[warnniklz]

When we finally broke out of the timber, we both had to stop for a moment and just take in the view. This was our type of beach vacation.

 

[warnniklz]

After taking in the sights, we got camp set up. We picked the spot just next to the trees seen in the right of the picture above. We had skipped breakfast and by now were both getting a little hangry.
So we started up some lunch. I set up my siltarp so we could keep out of the rain and have glassing session.

 

[warnniklz]

While I was finishing up camp, Tranq said "there's some goats". I couldn't seem to see them, turns out I was looking too high. It was early afternoon. So I grabbed my pack and we started our way down the lake shore.