Alaska Reality Show

[newhouse114]

Alaska is a wonderful place.............and it can kill you in a heartbeat! I lost a lot of aquaintances (pilots and other guides) while I was guiding up there. Came close to losing a client on a sheep hunt but managed to get him down without mishap.

[BRITTMAN]

I can only dream    

[Cyclic-Rivers]

Good luck Kevin. Hope you get out of your tent this year.

[Steve O]

Sitka Blacktails again this fall and black bears again next spring; that will be trips 7 and 8. I've hunted caribou, deer, moose, black and brown bear up there. Alaska is kinda crowded IMO but I can't afford the Yukon. Do it while you can, if you keep putting it off it won't get any cheaper. I'd rather have the experience and memories and work a little longer than work forever and never go    

[Walt Francis]

Hunter and I are flying up for moose on the September 9th, flying into the bush on the 11th.  This is my third trip for moose, Hunters first.  I have also hunted black & brown bear in AK.  Steve says, quit putting it off, those are my exact thoughts.  

I spent nearly twenty years wishing I could go on an AK hunt, it never happened until Brother Bob and I said we are going and set the date.  The only way to make it happen is to make the commitment, then don't deviate from the commitment.  During the planning and preparation stages (usually two to three years) there have been numerous reasons to postpone or cancel every one of my AK trips. I never change my date; some potential hunting partners did.  I made every one of my trips, none of the others have made an Alaskan hunt yet.  Any Alaskan hunt (as does elk & most other hunts) comes down to rather you would “like” to do the hunt and hope it happens or you “will” do the hunt and make it happen.  The will doesn’t happen until the date is set and you refuse to deviated from it, regardless of life’s up and downs.

[wingnut]

Well said Walt!!

[Kevin Dill]

One thing about hunting Alaska...about the wilderness...and about airplanes, is that you learn not to count on anything going exactly the way you envision it. A phone call from my pilot last weekend changed my entire September.

Instead of going south and west toward the Alaska Range, I was offered an interesting alternative. There is a place which is known (to him) to hold good moose and it hasn't been hunted by anyone due to limited and difficult access. The only way in there is by plane. No evidence of old camps; no trees cut, and no sign of man. There is a 'tributary of a tributary' and it opens into a slender 2 mile valley of excellent habitat. Moose have been spotted in there (by him) for years but he apparently didn't believe he could ever find a place to land. That just changed a couple weeks ago, and somehow I received a very unexpected call describing the whole thing and offering me first chance to explore and hunt there.

Me: "So is this the first time you've had your plane in there?"

Him: "It will be." (Picture me with jaw hanging open).

Me: "I thought you said you've been in there and checked it out."

Him: "I have. I set the plane down in another place and then I hiked in to this drainage."

Me: "We're going to be landing there for the first time when I hunt?"

Him:  "Looks that way."


So I have the opportunity to hunt moose in a pristine valley, which is pretty darned rare. Good water. Moderate terrain. Looks to be a natural corridor for bulls leaving the higher hills and moving lower as the rut nears. It's an exploratory hunt, and I can only bring....me. That's partly because it's in an out-of-the-way region and the logistics are not easy. Man and gear have to go in with one flight. He wants a bowhunter. I told him that would be a requirement for me to hunt there. I can stay as long as I want...until the season ends...or get pulled out with a sat phone call. Should I pinch myself? This September just got a lot more interesting.

[Steve O]

Originally posted by Kevin Dill:
One thing about hunting Alaska...about the wilderness...and about airplanes is that you learn not to count on anything going exactly the way you envision it.

Amen. This is after an emergency landing on the Yukon River


   

[Steve O]

I just counted up the days of hunting I've lost in those first 6 trips due to airplanes and their fragility in and out of weather;


10    :rolleyes:

[Kevin Dill]

Originally posted by Steve O:
I just counted up the days of hunting I've lost in those first 6 trips due to airplanes and their fragility in and out of weather;


10     :rolleyes:  

It's more like the norm than the exception in Alaska. I've lost a bunch myself. I spent 8 days alone in the backcountry last year and I think my total hunting time amounted to less than 2-1/2 days...the weather was severe enough to keep me pinned close to my mountain camp. Not fun when you think you'll be hunting in glorious Alaska.

[rastaman]

Greg Campbell and I went a couple or so years ago on a drop camp for 8 days out of Kotzebue.  It was the hardest, most physical hunt I have ever done and one of the most satisfying..planning on a return trip next year.

[cacciatore]

Originally posted by ozy clint:
i would absolutely love to but i'm not allowed to DIY.

X2   :rolleyes:        

[eidsvolling]

Originally posted by ozy clint:
i would absolutely love to but i'm not allowed to DIY.

This (i.e., the requirement that a non-resident alien have a guide for any big game species) is one of the things that reek about the AK regulations.

Yeah, I understand that there have been issues occasionally and it's hard to prosecute such afterward. But there are PLENTY of examples of Lower 48 hunters who have flouted all kinds of regulations, ranging from post-dating a tag to unlicensed hunting to wanton waste of the grossest kind. And some of them are very familiar names (I'm not talking about Trad Gangers here.)

Scandinavians have been killing moose longer than anyone on the planet, with the exception of North American Natives/First Nation members and the residents of Siberia. Australians have been dealing with remoteness for a couple hundred years, and DIY runs through their veins like Foster's. They should all get a chance at Alces alces and Rangifer tarandus without having to subsidize the guide industry, IMO.

[eidsvolling]

Sorry, unintended duplicate post.

[cacciatore]

Originally posted by eidsvolling:
Sorry, unintended duplicate post.

You say like a printed book,ah