Along the Timberline: Go North the Rush is On!

The land of the last frontier. The land of the Midnight Sun. ALASKA. The land that has beckoned and beckoned for me to come visit since I was a child. Finances have always held me back from this dream-and they still do, but recently I got my chance. It's not that I've gotten richer, I have learned how to stretch a dollar and found as cheap as a Alaskan trip as possible on a workin' man's wage.

Hunter and new friend waiting to board

Besides, Hunter graduating from high school and ready to move on to college was the perfect excuse to "bite the bullet" and lock down some dates and spend some time with Hunter and close friends. We chose the week before he was to leave to Laramie (University of Wyoming) which was mid-August to make this Alaskan dream come true.

It wasn't too hard to talk some friends into being a part of the experience and help chip-in on expenses to help keep all our costs down. We reserved a pickup rental, called dibs on a cabin rental, and bought plane tickets. For 10 days, the truck was 1,000$ and the cabin, a three bedroom remote home, was 50$/night.

The excuse for going to Alaska was for Sitka Blacktail deer. The Sitka Blacktail is only found in Alaska and is a smaller cousin to the Columbian Blacktail of the Northwest, It happens to be the last deer species I need to have taken all the deer subspecies in North America. But the real reason we were going to Alaska was the raw adventure.

This forecast would've been nice, but it worsened as the trip unfolded

The trip included Airport,to airport, to airport, to airport, to ferry, to taxi, to ferry, to pickup...and that was just to get there, it was a full-day of travel. When hunting the rain forests of southeast Alaska, you need one major element on your side: the weather. Sitka bucks love to migrate to the tops of the upper alpine to spend the summer months. These high elevations are beautiful but are usually covered by a veil of fog and clouds. During your trip, the hope is you have several windows of good visibility and some sun to climb high and find deer. If you can't see, you can't hunt. With that, sounds a bit weird to go to the wettest place on earth hoping for sun.

Brady, Tyler, Jared, and Hunter on Ferry to Ketchican

Second Ferry Towards Prince of Wales

We weren't going to let the weather dampen our moods as forecasts showed everyday fog and .50" -2.25" of rain daily. That would be more rain than we get in Wyoming on an annual basis. As we piled into the pickup for the adventure, I pulled over on the bridge of the first river we crossed where we could see the water. With our faces smeared against the pick up windows, we could see it was loaded with salmon jumping and swimming all directions. I knew the trip was going to be a success.

That might be an impressive coho Jared is holding. Even more impressive is all those fish.! Look closely into the shadows over the river....yup, those are all salmon.

Toast! The first morning behind the cabin and in front of a bear

See the cabin? Picture taken at low-tide

From there, the trip really is just a blur. The darkness set in around 9:30 and faded to light around 4:30. That would've left 7 hrs of sleep a night if we slept with the darkness, but of course we would just get off the mountain or river at last light, leaving 1-2 hours of travel (picking up 5 different guys from multiple locations), and hour or two of gorging on fresh food...then preparing for the next day. Our sleep time averaged around 2-3 hours a night.

Tyler and I in the Crab Barge

We ate, and ate, and ate crab

Our one and only pot produced keeper crab every check

Each day was full of adventures. We found a nearby river that was loaded to the banks with pink and chum salmon, and an occasional coho. We spent hours hauling them to the banks and admiring their colors. If we weren't floating jigs across schools of salmon, we were on our 50$ inflatable raft checking our crab pots in front of our cabin on the inlet. The Dungeness were HUGE and full of the most delectable meat ever. Maybe it was that we were in Alaska in a remote cabin, but the crab and salmon seemed to eat better than in Oregon.

Hunter and I found a honey hole where we pulled salmon out nearly every cast.

How are you supposed to go trout fishing ever again?

Fresh salmon, crab, and venison. Can you beat it?

The bear watching was one of the highlights of the trip. We ended up stumbling across 61 bears on the trip...not really even looking for bears. You just stumbled on them everywhere. I thought that as pretty impressive. Some of them were in the alpine, but most of them were attracted to the smells and sounds of salmon in all the rivers.

Some bear's were patient, sitting and waiting on their rock for a salmon to jump in their mouth, others weren't so patient chasing every salmon that would make a splash. all in all, all tactics seemed to work fine and the bears were fat and happy. I will be looking into a fall bear hunt as creeping along the bear trails riverside with a bow would be incredibly intense.

Tyler, Hunter, and I arriving to the alpine for the first time!

The most beautiful part of the island, for me, is the alpine strata and although it was foggy it called to each of us enough were we all made the steep hikes through the brush and timber to "get high" multiple times. The walls of vegetation seemed sometimes impenetrable, but somehow there was always an opening, a small passage through the maze, almost like it was a sick joke that all the Alaskan vegetation-and God- were in on, watching a poor, soaked, soul battling his way through the maze cursing and tripping with every step looking for the one-way to the end.

This moment was worth the trip for me. One of my favorites

The hike was always worth it and when the fog would lift periodically the views were amazing, and the deer were plentiful. Each of us had plenty of opportunity to harvest our bucks, but most of us weren't shooting, for whatever reason. Maybe it was the thought of hauling it back to sea level on our backs. Or maybe it was we were looking for something bigger. Or maybe we weren't ready to wrap our tag around a buck and stop hiking into the alpine? I'm not sure.

Did I mention the trip was a blur. Before we knew it, we were down to our final days, and only one buck had been killed. The weather was really impeding good alpine camping and glassing in the high country, so most success came through hunting the fringes of alpine in the thermal protection of the timber. Everyone seemed really content with their trip so far but it was "go time" if a guy wanted to kill a buck. We all headed different directions back into the alpine.

We found a shelter at the edge of one of the alpines. Made for a comfortable sleep!

Hunter and I headed to a spot for an overnighter where I had seen 9 bucks the days before. The first evening brought 6 buck sightings, with one being a definite shooter. We closed the gap and guess what happened? Yup, FOG. We stumbled and tripped our way back to camp that night ready for the next day of finding lots of bucks. We woke up to 30 yard visibility...and it never quit ALL DAY LONG.

This was to be our last day of blacktail hunting and we were anxious but felt useless as wind and fog kept us from running into deer. We put on the miles before hesitantly deciding to slowly drag our soaked bodies back to camp, pack up, and hike back to the pick up spot. It was after dark when Tyler picked us up. His success was better and he was able to fill his tag earlier that day. His story was more than I can take. I was good going home without a buck, but deep inside I wanted to climb one more steep mountain and soak in the experience of Alaska alpine and blacktails.

Tyler and Brady with their second to last day bucks

The following day was supposed to be our clean-up day, getting all our gear cleaned up, the house cleaned up, the pick-up cleaned up, luggage packed, etc. "What would you guys think if I just ran up one last time into the alpine in the morning." I posed. My friends are bright dudes and they knew you didn't just "run up into the alpine". I wasn't fooling anyone, but they're good friends and we understand each other, that is why we hunt together. "I'll go with you" said Brady. Jared looked at the ceiling and said "we could probably be back at the truck by 1 or 2 if we leave early". Tyler was more than willing to pick up and drop off.

The plans were set and we took off from the gravel road into the wet jungle of a million greens. Our boots never dried from the days before, but it didn't matter because within 10 minutes of hiking everything on you is soaking wet from rain or sweat. It's an uncomfortable feeling but you get used to it. The forecast was for 2.25" of rain that day and so far the forecast seemed accurate. Fortunately the walls of rain lifted the clouds enough were our visibility was out to 100-200 yards.

After 3 hours or so of hiking quickly into where we wanted to be, we hit the steep leeway side of the strong winds and rain. The timber was old and created barriers from the elements-and the deer knew that. Jared split up from me and Brady and we began our hunt. Brady and I crept along slowly picking up deer here and there. The sitka blacktail is fairly docile so creeping within 20-30 yards didn't seem to difficult.

Twenty minutes into our still-hunting, we noticed a doe straight ahead in an opening. She whipped her head behind her divulging her secret that she wasn't alone. I gained a little elevation and found a bedded doe and solid buck just 150 yards away. I quickly anchored my rifle on the shoulder of the buck. He was clad in velvet and a beautiful red coat. I don't know why I didn't pull the trigger. I have never rifle hunted deer in the velvet and I wondered if I struggled with the idea?

The buck walked over the ridge. Brady whacked my leg with his trek pole "Why didn't you shoot?" I fumbled for an answer. I didn't have one. We continued hiking and began to regret not shooting. I knew we had to turn back to our pick up spot soon and my hunt was officially over. I was focused on where I thought the buck had gone when Brady whacked me with his pole again. "Look between those trees!" 200 yards away, in a small window among the spruce limbs I could see face of a hard-antlered buck looking our direction!

My poor rifle had been waiting so long for this moment. I tried to level the crosshairs off of Brady's left shoulder. I could see a double throat patch but the body was covered by brush. I aimed at the lower neck patch and squeezed the trigger. The 139 grain Barnes LRX did it's job as the buck was anchored.

Jared found his way and met me and Brady next to the buck. It was one of those moments where I found myself next to two special people in my life, who didn't even know each other before this trip, in the middle of nowhere, in the middle of an island, in the middle of Alaska. Around then, the moon eclipsed the sun somewhere above us but it went unnoticed.

We were still able to get all of our stuff packed and cleaned up before our morning departure, although we didn't get to sleep until minutes before it was time to wake up. Like I said, the trip was a blur. No regrets. We packed the trip with as much adventure as we could. Now that I'm home, without a cloud in the sky, that land once again is beckoning and beckoning for me to come stand in her rivers and climb her mountains. I will be back.