So I prepped my gear for the next morning since we were going to be leaving camp in full dark. I had the coffee in the percolator and the breakfast burrito wrapped in foil to go on the propane grill. When the alarm went off at 4:30 I fired up the Coleman, the Buddy Heater in the tent and the propane grill on the tailgate and got dressed. By 4:45 I had my coffee, warm burrito, rifle and pack loaded in the pickup headed to the trailhead.
Nights were getting down to 38 degrees and warming up into the 70's by midday. This meant Elk were out for 30 minutes in the morning and evening but headed to the dark timber as soon as the sun hit them. When we parked at the trailhead, there were 2 trucks there all ready and another pulled in behind us. Wordlessly we shouldered our packs and hit the trail, determined to not be outrun to our perch to unleash death from afar....
A mile and a half in we were nearing the clearing on the hill that we had planned to be to watch the hillside across where we had spotted the bull 2 days before. Out of the darkness a beam of light hit us, then switched on and off right from where we wanted to be. We shrugged and headed further up the valley to the next open finger. The folks behind us had not caught up to us, and I was steaming with the early morning exertion at 9000 feet.
As my breathing slowed we heard a bugle from up the valley to our left. Eli and I looked at each other, both pointing to the south. Five minutes later the bugle was repeated and we lost no time grabbing up our packs and heading through the next finger of trees cautiously until we saw the light shadowy figures of elk in the meadow. I didn't count but it seemed to be a portion of the dozen or so cows we knew the big bull tended. They were 400 to 450 yards away and I couldn't make out antlers through my binos. Eli whispered that he saw the bull. I looked further to the right of the clearing and saw a mud caked black beast emerge from the trees with white tips gleaming in the half light four feet above his back. Eli hand signalled me "FOUR-ONE -FIVE" as I tried to read the yardage chart and then the scope dial in the low light. We fumbled with the phone screen to shine just enough light to dial the correct MOA without alerting the herd to our presence. Then I got prone over my pack on a low rock to try to steady my cross hairs. Problem was the rise in the ground and the low sagebrush made it tough to see the bull. After a couple moves and standing my pack up, I finally could see my crosshairs and the bull.
Glancing over at Eli he said, "Yeah I think he's good enough..."
I hissed "How is our time?" meaning shooting time 30 minutes before official sunrise
He gave me the thumbs up, and as I settled into the scope, I saw the bull suddenly on the left side of the cows and cows began trotting across the meadow from left to right, angling in our direction.
Eli hissed "He's on the move!" as the cows went from a trot to loping into the trees on the edge of the steep ridge.
The bull was behind them and kicked up a gear following his harem. I swung through and pulled the trigger as the crosshairs approached the shoulder. Shortly after the BOOM, I saw the bulls hind end go down and heard the solid "SMACK!" of the bullet. I jacked in another shell as the bull wheeled to quartering away and fired another round, heard the distinctive SMACK, and the bull dropped to the ground. He never got up.
Eli and I looked at each other and acted like a couple of kids who had just found a stash of nudie magazines and illegal fireworks. our celebration was interrupted as Eli began making strange sounds "EEEERRRRPPPPP----ERRRRPP"
In all the excitement, my seasoned guide had swallowed the fresh wad of Copenhagen he had uploaded when we had stopped a few minutes earlier. When I determined he wasn't going to die, I began walking towards my downed bull who blended in quite well to the dark sage and wet dirt, except for a massive white tipped beam arcing out of the sage like a snow stripped fir tree...
