elkrchr
Well-known member
What a trip! 3000 miles round trip and while I departed Portland, OR by myself, at least I had a traveling companion for the ride home, albeit he was not very talkative! Not to get ahead of myself, the 21 hour drive to CO was uneventful. I spent the night in SLC on the way and stopped near Moab, UT to see dinosaur tracks, rock art, etc. After arriving in South Fork, CO and getting settled into my rented cabin the scouting began. I had two full days to scout prior to the Wednesday opener. The weather conditions were more appropriate for sun tanning than hunting. Here it was mid November and the highs were in the low 60's with clear skies and a nearly full moon. Needless to say, deer movement was limited to about the first hour and half of the morning and then right at dark which made for difficult scouting. I only saw one small buck exhibiting any kind of rutting activity which made finding the bucks all that more difficult. After finding an area which held a fair amount of does, I concentrated my efforts there for the Wednesday opener. At 06:45 on opening morning, I spotted the buck in the photos below (all by himself) about 500 yards away. I cut the distance to 225 yards and let the 130 grain Berger VLD do the rest. One shot and I had some bone to wrap my CO tag around. I had him packed out to the truck by around 11 A.M. As I was nearing the truck, a group of four cow elk hunters stopped and helped me. Thanks guys! I'll start the points process again in CO in hopes of drawing this tag again in the future. I would love to hunt this unit on a "normal" year when there is some snow up high to push the big bucks down and the high temperatures are in the 40's. I'm not complaining as I'm very happy with my new traveling companion. Enjoy the photos and good luck to all those with tags left to punch!
