# My 2017 Alaskan Dall Ram Hunt



## LumberJ

Well it has taken forever for me to finally get around to writing this, but after reading about Huntmaster143's adventures, I figured I too should share the story of my trip to Alaska this past August. I've always enjoyed the suspense of the live-update style threads, so I'll treat this one the same way and give you a post each day of the trip.

For those that haven't seen some of my previous posts, I have a brother that lives in Fairbanks, Alaska, and for the past 10 years I've been fortunate enough to join him for a week or 2 each fall for various hunting adventures. I accompanied him on an unguided sheep hunt back in 2007 and helped haul gear and meat off the mountains after he harvested his first ram. A few hunts later and he took his 2nd in 2013. On both of those hunts I was just going as an observer and had no tag to fill but was just as happy to help him with his dreams. Finally in 2014 I tried to fill my first tag only to get hit with a blizzard and 14" of snow on the first day! Pretty much spent that trip in the tent due to weather. In 2015, we gave it another shot and this time had Rams everywhere! The only problem was finding one big enough to be legal. Eventually the weather turned south on us once again but we still kept looking. It wasn't until late afternoon of our last day that we finally located a legal one.







Here's a view from him (bottom left of the 4) at about 1000 yards. We crawled within 600 yards of the ram and had 0 wind so decided to take the shot. The problem was that we miscalculated the drop at that distance/slope and I ended up putting it 16" under his chest. No follow-up was presented as he walked off with a sub-legal right at his side. At the time we said we were putting it in God's hands and after the ram disappeared, we figured God just didn't mean for us to have one that year. Turns out, that evening we got another 6" of snow, the river was swelled up and conditions getting out of the mountain were miserable to say the least. I can only imagine how much worse it would have been to try and get out with an extra 130 lbs of meat, horns and skull. We agreed that God was looking out for us with that shot 


So fast forward to the spring of this year. A whole lot of days have passed since that missed shot. Daydreaming about what could have been and the adventures that we hope to be. I missed the 2016 season there due to the birth of my first child, but my wife was gracious enough to let me give it one more go (knowing that I'll likely not be going up for several more years after this). Weekly talks and planning with my brother transitioned to daily calls expressing excitement. We both trained harder than we've ever trained before: running, biking, lifting, and constantly checking in with each other for accountability. Pack contents were frequently examined and evaluated. Food planning, weighing of gear, and of course back and forth pictures of monster rams from the internet to keep building the excitement for my arrival on August 7th...


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## LumberJ

*Aug 7*
Travel day -
Fairly well organized for this trip, but I still always find a way to feel rushed and worried that I forgot something. I have a 5pm flight out of Detroit, but I'm burning up all of my vacation days for this trip so I need to still make it into the office in the morning. On top of that my wife was out of town all weekend so I was running solo with my toddler...not really an issue except for me trying to get one last fishing trip in for the season and making a run with her to Ludington for salmon. "When mom's away...." hahaha
So instead of getting all of my gear together I was busy filleting & freezing fish, but I suppose that's a good problem to have. After dipping out of work, I ran home to finish loading & organizing the luggage and it was off to the airport.

With just 1 connecting flight to Fairbanks, the travel was relatively quick and uneventful in a good way. Plus after a couple free in-flight movies I felt all caught up with the world.
By 11:30pm AST I touched down in Fairbanks and was met at the airport by my brother who was as equally fired up as I was. Not sure how I was even able to sleep that night but perhaps the significantly cooler temps were enough to settle me down.

...


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## roo

I swear one day I'll love to Alaska. Just to hunt for a year or two. My wife said she's fine with it. I can't really tell if she's being serious or not. I figure the money I'd save on grizzly sheep and caribou would be worth it as a resident.


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## Huntmaster143

Bring it on!! Can't wait for the rest...


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## QDMAMAN

What's the hold up?


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## LumberJ

QDMAMAN said:


> What's the hold up?


Gotta wait for tomorrow.... I’m “sleeping”


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## LumberJ

*Aug 8*
Heading into the field-
For the first time ever, my brother actually had 90% of his stuff together. Just a couple last minute food items to grab and a quick run to town for a replacement quad battery then we would be all set to load the truck. This is a float-in, float-out style hunt and we only use the quad for ferrying gear to the creek. The plan was to drive a few hours and pick up a friend-of-a-friend who we were hiring to drop us off and pick us up downstream. When we called to confirm everything he told us that we wouldn't need the quad after all: the trail was too washed out but we could just put in 5 miles further upstream where the road crossed. While it was nice to know we wouldn't have to trailer the quad all that way, it was curious that he knew the trail was washed out because it was a several hour drive down the end of a dirt road. So when we asked him to clarify how he knew, he stated that he had just dropped off 2 other groups of hunters.  As it turns out, after we hired him 2 years back, he started advertising the spot and his services on FB. It's not totally a secret location, but added internet pressure is obviously never ideal.
While disappointed about this, we still had to keep our cool due to a need of transportation and a desire to get the truck back in 1 piece!

After a long day of driving we finally made it to the creek. Almost instantly we had a nice little swarm of gnats and mosquitoes following us around as we inflated the raft. This is the first trip where we planned to hunt the opener on Aug 10th. In the previous years we went a couple weeks into the season and by then the bugs were already starting to settle down. The trade-off of course was that we got hammered with snow on those later hunts. Thankfully, the temps were already starting to dip as the sun got low and it wasn't long before the bugs were at bay. 

The added 5 miles of floating that we had to do put us a little behind schedule, but we still managed to get a few hours of floating in that evening before darkness set. The one plus-side of having those other hunting parties ahead of us was that they cut out all the log jams/sweepers for us. So I suppose there was still a silver lining. Eventually we found a decent gravel bar along the way and stopped to make camp. A crisp & clear evening made for beautiful views of the stars and a great night's rest in preparation for the rest of our float the next day.

_(pics to follow later this evening)_


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## LumberJ

Raft is loaded and my brother and I are ready to float!









Heading towards sheep country


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## LumberJ

*Aug 9*
The float in-

We woke up at daybreak and crushed some butter-laden coffee and a big breakfast before hitting the river. Having around 15-20 miles to float still, we knew it was going to be a long day. Ideally, we hoped to get our float done and then hike up into sheep country before dark. In the perfect world we would put a ram to bed that night and get up at 3am opening morning to get above him and wait for daybreak. As the float progressed, we started to realize that this wouldn't be possible. The extra 5 miles we had to float added just enough time to make it unlikely to reach our destination by dark. 

So now that we didn't feel rushed to get into the back country, we took our time a little more on the float. One thing that we noticed this year that we hadn't noticed in years past was the abundance of Grayling in this creek. Having not considered the possibility of fishing, we didn't pack a rod. But where there's a will, there's a way! I found 18' of fishing line in my "emergency" kit and my brother produced 2 jigs from a pocket in his life vest. After a few minutes of searching for the perfect willow branch, my brother was in business:

















Since we were stopped we decided to grab lunch and figured it would be a good idea to double check the rifle. He hadn't shot it in a few months and I hadn't felt it's recoil in a couple years so we set up a target at 100 yards and each took a few shots. For weight savings, we planned to share his Savage Arms 25.06 (sorry, can't remember the model). He has it calibrated to 1" high @ 100 yards and dead-even @ 200. Well after a few shots each I have a tight group about 3.5" high and he's right at his 1" mark. We have slightly different shooting styles so I figure it's not worth changing anything and I'll just compensate the hold-over if needed. 

Most of our day consisted of floating this creek. It had sufficient water flow but I still had to hop out and drag the raft from time to time as my brother manned the oars. On one of these occasions while dragging, my footing gave and with all of my weight behind it, I fell down making a _*hard* _impact with my knee on a river rock. Absolutely rallied my knee cap. It's amazing nothing broke, but the swelling was immediate. Not a great thing to happen when you are about to start a long and heavy hike . "Thankfully" we still had a few more hours of floating where I could rest it (but that floating still included more 1-legged raft dragging from time-to-time.

...


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## LumberJ

*Aug 9*
The float in- _continued
_
Finally we reached the main glacial river and she was flowing cold and fast









The river constantly braided and rejoined. There was enough flow that I never had to get out and drag and I'm very thankful for that. It's never fun wading in that stuff because it's so swift and you can't see where you're stepping. You can be floating along and all of a sudden an entire spruce tree will just pop up out of no where and continue it's journey towards the ocean. After a couple hours of floating this, we finally reached the creek bottom of where we would be hunting. Greeting us there were 5 other rafts including those our driver had dropped off. Disappointing, but we were still optimistic because we usually hike further than everyone anyway.

We stashed our raft in the bushes and started to sort out our gear between what was going and what was staying. It was late afternoon at this point and we knew we couldn't make it to our destination, but even a couple hours of hiking would cut down our travel time opening morning. Once we were all set (or so we thought) we tried on the packs to see if we loaded them right. They felt heavier than we wanted. We were guessing around 60-65lbs. when ideally we would have been in the 55lb range. Back at the house just before we left we decided to grab a small handheld luggage scale; this became the perfect opportunity to double check our weights. Turns out my brother was at 74lbs and I was at 78! Time for another gear evaluation...we had both planned to bring our pack rafts up and float back out. That was out of the question now (since he hadn't even added his to the pack yet), so we decided to stick with just mine. The plus side for me was that once we got up-steam I would drop my raft, paddles, and waders which totaled around 11lbs. And we had a combined 30-33lbs of calorie dense food that we wouldn't need to hike back either. So essentially our packs would get a lot lighter after we hiked a few miles. We managed to each find a couple things that we didn't need in the packs and reduced our weight by a few pounds but still were forced to hike up heavy. Once we started hiking it was obvious that our training paid off though as neither of us really felt the weight on our backs. Prior to this trip I had been hiking the stairs at a local park with 90lbs and did a 6 mile walk to work with over 100lbs. We pressed on as darkness feel and covered about 2 miles of our 6 mile hike up into the mountains.

Opening morning would soon be upon us so we set up the tent and caught a short night's rest with unparalleled excitement for what tomorrow could hold.


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## brushbuster

LumberJ said:


> *Aug 9*
> The float in- _continued
> _
> Finally we reached the main glacial river and she was flowing cold and fast
> View attachment 278760
> 
> 
> The river constantly braided and rejoined. There was enough flow that I never had to get out and drag and I'm very thankful for that. It's never fun wading in that stuff because it's so swift and you can't see where you're stepping. You can be floating along and all of a sudden an entire spruce tree will just pop up out of no where and continue it's journey towards the ocean. After a couple hours of floating this, we finally reached the creek bottom of where we would be hunting. Greeting us there were 5 other rafts including those our driver had dropped off. Disappointing, but we were still optimistic because we usually hike further than everyone anyway.
> 
> We stashed our raft in the bushes and started to sort out our gear between what was going and what was staying. It was late afternoon at this point and we knew we couldn't make it to our destination, but even a couple hours of hiking would cut down our travel time opening morning. Once we were all set (or so we thought) we tried on the packs to see if we loaded them right. They felt heavier than we wanted. We were guessing around 60-65lbs. when ideally we would have been in the 55lb range. Back at the house just before we left we decided to grab a small handheld luggage scale; this became the perfect opportunity to double check our weights. Turns out my brother was at 74lbs and I was at 78! Time for another gear evaluation...we had both planned to bring our pack rafts up and float back out. That was out of the question now (since he hadn't even added his to the pack yet), so we decided to stick with just mine. The plus side for me was that once we got up-steam I would drop my raft, paddles, and waders which totaled around 11lbs. And we had a combined 30-33lbs of calorie dense food that we wouldn't need to hike back either. So essentially our packs would get a lot lighter after we hiked a few miles. We managed to each find a couple things that we didn't need in the packs and reduced our weight by a few pounds but still were forced to hike up heavy. Once we started hiking it was obvious that our training paid off though as neither of us really felt the weight on our backs. Prior to this trip I had been hiking the stairs at a local park with 90lbs and did a 6 mile walk to work with over 100lbs. We pressed on as darkness feel and covered about 2 miles of our 6 mile hike up into the mountains.
> 
> Opening morning would soon be upon us so we set up the tent and caught a short night's rest with unparalleled excitement for what tomorrow could hold.


 What pack raft do you guys have. I am seriously thinking about the pr 49, It weighs more than the alpackas but its a little more serious boat. Just curious what you all are using


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## LumberJ

brushbuster said:


> What pack raft do you guys have. I am seriously thinking about the pr 49, It weighs more than the alpackas but its a little more serious boat. Just curious what you all are using


My brother has an NRS pack raft that is ok, but a little on the heavy side. I have an Alpacka (Denali Llama) that my wife got for me as a wedding present.

That PR 49 looks pretty sweet! It can hold a lot heavier load than the Alpacka and looks more sturdy. But obviously the trade-off is weight. The owner of that company (Larry Bartlett) is a heck of a good float hunter so I would imagine that raft's design is more focused on the float-hunt vs. the multi-purpose of the Alpacka. If I was doing a fly-in float out hunt I would be all about the PR49.


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## LumberJ

*Aug 10*
The hike in-

It's Opening Day! The sun rises early still and we are up and ready to continue our hike. We boil up a hearty breakfast and cache a few more items in the bushes to pick up on the way out (namely our trash and the clothes that we wore up to this point). It's only a few ounces, but every bit helps. We then break down camp, re-load the packs and head on our way.









We have about 4 more miles to hike to our destination. It consists of dozens upon dozens of creek crossings as the water winds its way through the canyons. Most of which aren't too deep, but enough of them are that it's more practical to carry the boots and wear waders for this part of the trip. As we proceed upstream the creek begins to fork from in-flowing drainages. We occasionally catch a glimpse of previous foot traffic and take relief when we see the tracks head up splits that we don't intend to take. Once we reach our fork in the river we see at least 3 sets of tracks heading up. We still aren't too worried yet as eventually we find where those tracks turn around and head back down.
The reason for this is a good one: up this particular drainage there are a few nasty obstacles. The creek finds its way through some tight canyons that are too deep to wade through, and too steep to climb around with your gear. It's turned back many hunters for years, but over time we have figured out how to deal with them:








The pack raft! I have some experience rock climbing, so I can actually get around the canyons with my gear on, but my brother isn't quite as nimble. To address this, we decided that it would be easiest for me to climb around with nothing but a rope, then lower it down-steam and pull him and the gear up thru the canyon. While time consuming, it worked perfectly.

There are normally 2 such obstacles (with the 2nd being _much much_ harder to get around), but this year due to a little bit lower water level, we only had to do this with the first, and managed to wade through the 2nd one.

Usually after these 2 obstacles it's an easy walk the last half mile or so to where the canyons open back up and you are in hunting territory. This year we had another surprise in store. The ice hadn't fully melted from the winter and there was an ice wall between 10-15 feet high that blocked our egress. Our only option was to climb on top and carefully traverse the edge of the canyon wall. This felt very uncomfortable as the middle section was beginning to rot away and the the edges were also deteriorating due to the heat from adjacent rocks.

We slowly poked and prodded our way along the 60 yard mini-glacier eventually finding a spot where we could crawl back down. Further up-steam there were 2 more large sections of ice that formed a bridge spanning the canyon. There was enough headroom to walk under but we moved very quickly as it felt quite eerie being under them.

I didn't think to take a picture of the ice bridges, but I did take one of the very last ice shelf to give you an idea of how thick this was










...


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## LumberJ

*Aug 10*
The hike in- _continued_

Finally, we made it to our base camp!








It's now mid-afternoon so we unload the packs, pop up the tent, and prepare lunch. If feels good to be out of those leaky waders finally. We take our time eating and drying our feet off while occasionally glassing the hillside looking for sheep. None in view, but no problem, there's another 2 miles of country between here and the headwaters for us to explore this evening. Eventually, we decide to strap the boots on and take the unloaded packs for a short evening hike. But........ no sooner did we have our laces tied, we glanced downstream and saw 3 other hunters making their way up through the canyon we just traveled. 

This is the first time we've ever seen anyone else back here. A quick discussion ensued as they slowly made their way towards us. While the idea of running them out of there sounded tempting, we both agreed that friendly was the best policy and that was definitely the right choice. They ended up being 3 buddies exploring new country and they really reminded us of ourselves when we first started sheep hunting. What's funny is that my brother used to work with one kid's dad. haha. Small world. Turns out they couldn't make it through the obstacles, but instead hiked up, over, and around which took them nearly 2 days of bush-whacking and elevation changes. Been there, done that, no fun at all.

So we figured it would be fine to hunt in the same area and gave them a few pointers. 2 miles might sound like a lot, but it isn't really that large of an area to share with another group, especially when there weren't any sheep in the section we setup camp. But these guys only had 3-4 days to hunt and we planned to hike over a pass into a different drainage anyway, so it wasn't really a big deal.

We hiked upstream with them until they picked a spot then we climbed a hillside to get a better view of the valley. A couple hours of evening glassing finally produced the first views of sheep, but it was only groups of lambs and ewes. This cemented our agreement that it would be fine to leave this valley to these guys and continue on our journey in the morning.

We grabbed a few handfuls of blueberries (or as we call them "supplements") on the hillside and headed back to camp for the evening knowing that we now had to get an early start on the day.


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## Stubee

Quite the hunt! Looking forward to the installments.


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## LumberJ

*Aug 11*
Moving Camp -

With our new guests planning to hunt the headwaters of our current creek, we got an early start to the day and leap-frogged them. Our goal is to make it over the saddle to the next drainage and spend a few days there. But the last thing we want is for them to not know we headed that way and follow us over by accident. We figure the best bet is to pitch a tent halfway up the hillside to act as a visual indicator for them of where not to go . No sooner did we get the tent setup and breakfast finished we spotted our first ram!










He was about 1/4 mile up towards the saddle we were heading towards. At first and second glance he looked like a legal ram, but the view from below can be very deceiving and make many sub-legal rams appear full-curl. We spent around an hour looking at him from various angles, before deciding that he was just too marginal to waste much more time on. If he was there again in a couple days and we were still empty handed we would try to take a closer look, but for now we were wasting time in not looking for a more definitive ram. So we pressed onward










SIDE NOTE: I have not yet described what we are looking for in a "legal" ram. For a ram to be eligible to harvest it must meet at least 1 of the following criteria:

Have at least 1 of its horns complete a 360 degree rotation from it's starting point (full-curl)
Have both of it's lamb tips broken off (often the lamb tips become brittle as the rams age and tend to break off. Because of this, they might not reach full-curl even though they should have)
Be at least 8 years old (this can be determined by counting annual rings on the horns, but it is quite the difficult feat at 100+ yards)

So we pressed onward to the top of the saddle with anticipation of what we would find on the other side. Unfortunately, as we drew near the crest, it became apparent that the weather was beginning to turn. We were greeted on the other side with a steady cold wind, barely unfrozen rain, and enough fog to make glassing impossible. We spent a couple hours at the top seeking cover from the wind while making a late lunch and hoping the fog would clear up. Eventually we had to concede defeat for the day and head back to the tent while planning tomorrow's agenda. By the time we made it back to the tent it was raining fairly steadily and it didn't take us long to realize we should have spent more time picking a better tent location. Horribly uneven ground and terrain that was funneling water towards us. Oh well, not really much we could do about it at this point other than to hunker down for the evening, crush a big dinner, and make the best of it.


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## LumberJ

*Aug 12*
The next drainage -

We wake up to scattered fog but otherwise mild weather. Still no other rams to be seen in our original valley. The only thing we can see is the other guys' tents still in the same spot. Figuring that they would have seen our tent too by now, it's a safe bet to break down camp and move everything over to the next drainage. We are a little lighter than our starting pack weight because we had cached the raft, waders, some food, and a few pieces of gear near our first camp site at the bottom. We are making pretty good time to the top when all of a sudden I look up to see my brother quickly dropping low and giving me the "stop" hand signal. He was 20 yards in front of me and 60 yards in front of him stood 3 rams! I dropped down too while working my rifle free from the backpack. Our presence did not go undetected however. The rams quickly ran to about 120 yards before stopping to look back at us. 2 were clearly sub-legal, but one appeared much closer to full curl. They stood for several minutes giving us plenty of time to determine that he too was short. Eventually they continued on their way but not before I was able to get a few more pictures. 








He will likely be a shooter next season. Once they disappeared we pressed onward to the summit and were greeted with a beautiful view of our new valley.









With such clear views we took the time to use the spotting scope and scan the area from our high vantage point. We saw several sheep - most of which were rams - scattered along the hillsides. It was like paradise! However, our paradise got hit by a hurricane when we spotted the charcoal & orange rain fly of a KUIU tent tucked into the bushes 2.5 miles away. Totally deflating to see someone else back here. They must have flown in to the mouth of this creek and hiked up. We decided to just make the best of it anyway. From what we could see, they were set up under a band of rams already and there were several forks between us and them that we could take (and another saddle we could go over if needed).


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## LumberJ

*Aug 12*
The next drainage - _continued_

Eventually we repacked the spotting scope and headed down to setup our tent on the valley floor. As we worked our way down, some more light rain and fog began to make its way in. Half way down the hill between two patches of fog we spotted our best ram yet. A group of 4 rams bedded down in a gravel bowl. They were still 3/4 of a mile away so we couldn't be certain that 1 was full curl, but from that distance he sure looked close. They were on the opposing hillside so we would still need to get to the valley floor anyway if we wanted to pursue them.
Here is a picture with the group encircled









The on and off fog made for great concealment of our movement while still giving us opportunities to keep an eye on them. Once reaching the valley floor, our view of the rams was obscured by the rolling terrain. This allowed us to get the tent set back up and reorganize the gear in perpetration for an ultra-light stalk. Once ready, we headed up the hillside towards where they were last seen. A very light rain had begun and the fog was still patchy. The wind was almost non-existent, but the little bit that we could feel was at our front. Perfect stalking conditions!
We made our way to the top of the first roll of the terrain and were able to determine the sheep were no longer bedded (had they still been bedded where we saw them last we would have a 150 yard shot). We impatiently waited for them to show themselves again and when they did, they were feeding about 300 yards away at the bottom of a small crag. When the opportunity was right, we again advanced using the terrain to our advantage. We had eyes on 3 of them but were unsure were the 4th went so we tried to be extremely careful in our movements. Apparently, however, we weren't careful enough. As my brother crawled over another crest he was busted by the smallest of the rams (a little half-curl) at approximately 15 yards!! I don't know if he realized what we were though as he did run, but not very far and eventually calmed back down. Thankfully the other rams didn't really take notice and continued to feed. We are now roughly 150 yards from the group and we've got eyes on the biggest. I'm watching him through the rifle scope with a beautiful broadside opportunity while my brother watches through the spotting scope to confirm that he's legal. He's close. I mean, really really close. I can't make the call from what I see so I'm relying on my brother at this point. After a few minutes of watching him from various angles he gives me the OK. I've had enough time to calm my breathing and get a good shooting position. I flip the safety off and begin to aim small. 









Just then my brother urgently whispers "WAIT WAIT WAIT...I'm not sure now, I just saw another angle." Safety back on. Seconds begin to feel like minutes and minutes begin to feel like hours as I continue to watch this ram feed while broadside. I even watched him headbutt another ram in the group while waiting. My brother still can't make the call from this distance and decides he needs a closer look. He works himself another 30 yards closer but not without getting spotted. Now the rams were all on alert looking our way trying to catch another movement. My brother manged to get the spotter setup again and took another look. After a short moment he says "yeah, legal" Awesome! Safety back off, but this time the ram is facing me directly. All of a sudden he bugs out with the group and takes off running. They stopped for one more look at us @300 yards, but I just didn't like the shot opportunity there and watched them leave. Evening was now approaching and we headed back to the tent crestfallen.


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## Joel/AK

Deleted to save location privacy


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## bounty hunter

Awesome 


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## WMU05

Man is that beautiful!


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## Joel/AK

That is nice


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## Blaze

Wow, impressive! Congratulations!


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## steelyspeed

Wow!!!


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## QDMAMAN

Beautiful!!! Did you relive the hunt.....again?


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## Ranger Ray

Very nice.


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## LumberJ

QDMAMAN said:


> Beautiful!!! Did you relive the hunt.....again?


Absolutely! I had to go back and look at all my old pics and videos again.


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## Bomba

Awesome mount! Congrats.


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## hbibicoffvii

That is absolutely amazing. Congrats. Cant not have a huge smile on your face every time you see that!


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## AKhunter

That looks great. Was a great story also. Thank you.


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