A day in the life of...

The Hardwood Harridans

Eagle Cap Wilderness, OR

View from Glacier Lake Basin base camp

 

Baaaaa......

• Yes, my dad had described me to his co-workers as "The Pacifist" when he first found out I drew a tag for Big Horn Sheep earlier this year.
• Yes, I have never been hunting before until drawing this once-in-a-lifetime tag.
• Yes, I had no clue what I was up against when I decided I wanted to do this.

BUT, HELL YES, I WENT TO HELL AND CAME BACK WITH MY FIRST BIG GAME: ROCKY MOUNTAIN BIG HORN!!!

If you know me well, one of the things you know is that I am deathly afraid of heights. I mean, I will not go above the 4th rung on a step ladder, and gondola rides are not my idea of a fun time. But I enjoy hiking, so what is the big deal about running around the mountains looking for a sheep? I was so damned wrong...so damned wrong.

Day One began at 3am with us waking up and a short drive to Greg's place. Greg is D's cousin and an experience packer whose horses and mules will be taking our heavier equipment up to Glacier Lake Basin, where we will set up base camp. By 7:30am, we were at the E. Lostine Creek Trailhead beginning our 3,000+ feet ascent to Glacier Pass. If you have ever been to NE Oregon and hiked around the Eagle Cap Wilderness area, you know how beautiful that area is. Deep, aqua-colored alpine lakes dot a landscape of massive granite peaks and glaciers. Fast flowing creeks and crisp cold streams run along the bottoms of the deep ravines. Meadows go on forever. Not enough words can describe this area and my dinky camera fall far short of capturing its scenic beauty. I was speechless many times as each geographical feature came into view and my eyes feasted. It was simply a magical place. Eight hours, 10.5 miles, and some very steep switchbacks later, D and I were at Glacier Lake to meet up with the Shane, D's bro-in-law, who had already been up in the area for a week scouting for sheep. S had found a group of 8 animals in this basin and had been "babysitting" them a few days before another hunter (the only other one with a tag in this area, I might add) came and took one of the rams on opening day so the rest of the group had ran off and were nowhere in sight. S trekked over to the next basin that evening and returned with news that he had spotted a small group in the other basin. We decided then that we would head over the next morning at daylight and begin there.

Day Two began at 5am. After a warm oatmeal breakfast to fend off the morning chill, we were on our way by 6:30am with our bigger packs. I was having some trouble managing my rifle, pack, and trekking poles, all at once, so S volunteered to help me carry my rifle until we had spotted the animals. As S put it, I am the one with the tag. If I was too tired to get to the sheep, it didn't make any sense for anyone else to be there. (S had a good point there.) To get to Prospect Lake basin, we had to trek around to the other side of Glacier Lake and make the ascent over the steep pass. After checking out the surrounding peaks with the binoculars and spotting some sheep in the rocks above some icefields, it was decided that we would attempt to creep up on the sheep from above and behind. It would give me a better angle at the shot and hopefully not spook the sheep. What we didn't know then was that this decision would mean an arduous trek that nearly sent me over the edge of a cliff, literally!!! As we made our way over to other side of the basin, we realized that the animals were farther away than it seemed at first. To get to the ridge where the sheep were hanging out at, we had to cross several icefields and around some boulder debris fields. Then a steep ascent up a slippery scree slope should get us to an advantageous position. Little did I know, that was the easiest part of the day. After getting up on said ridge, the sheep were still farther away than we had originally thought, not to mention that the backside of this lovely ridge we were on had a steep ravine on the other side - a long ways down if we ever lost our footing. The three of us slowly made our way back and forth along the ravine, stopping at each rock outcropping to check our position. Althought we knew were were getting closer, we still could not see the sheep. There was not really a trail on the ravine side either, so we had to pick our way across rock and tree hazards. At around 12:30pm, S came back from scouting ahead with some bad news. The only way to get to the sheep was A) take a long detour down and around the ravine side to get around a cliff hazard, or B) go the shorter route down the even steeper cliff face side, which has a large icefield to cross and take our chances there. Mind you, we didn't have crampons with us. By this time, we were all pretty tired and I was ready to call it a day. So I must have been delirious because I chose option B. As we began our descent down the much steeper cliff side, I realized how slippery the slope was and a wrong step could easily send me over the edge. Less than 5 minutes later, I slipped and landed in a precarious position facing the cliff edge. One of my trekking poles had also slipped and I was barely hanging on the side of this cliff. Not only was I in an awkward position, not being able to get up without fear of falling to my death, I didn't know how D or S was going to get me out of this mess, if that was even possible! As the 3 of us were trying to figure out how to get out of this jam, 2 of the sought after big horns appears on the rocks above, a mere 25 yards away. Go figure! Given the awkward position that I was in, I could see them by tilting my head back and looking up to see them upside-down, but there was no way that I could pick up my rifle, much less take a shot without falling off the cliff. Damn those sheep! By the time S & D finally got me to a safe spot on the slope, the sheep had started headed further along the ridge. As I leaned one shoulder against a large boulder to steady myself, S held out one of his trekking poles to steady the barrel of my rifle. I saw one of the big horns through the crosshairs of my scope, about 65 yards away, and pulled the trigger. At first, I thought I had missed because it looked like the ram took off running down the backside of the ridge we were on. Upon further investigation, I didn't miss at all. In fact, the round had got him through the gut, and he was down less than 8 feet from where I had saw him stood less than 5 minutes before. I didn't realize how big this ram was until I got up close to it to examine him. He must have weighed between 300-350 lbs. Even though he wasn't the oldest or had the largest horns, this ram was almost perfectly symmetrical. It was a beauty, mate (as the crocodile hunter would have said)!

The photo session took nearly 45 minutes before D & S began gutting the ram. It was after 6pm by the time we were repacked with the ram head/cape and meat and headed back to camp. Mind you, the sun sets around 7pm and it is dark around 8pm or so. Then we realized that neither D nor I had our headlamps with us so we will have to share S's headlamp all the way back to camp. It probably wouldn't have been so insane if S & D's packs didn't weigh 85 lbs each, and the terrain hadn't been so rough and steep, and if we all had headlamps. By the time the darkness set in, we were less than half way back to camp. Although there was a full moon the night before, it was nowhere to be found that night. Trekking down steep, slippery embankments in the dark with super heavy packs definitely was not what we had in mind when the day began. At certain steep spots, we'd slip and fall and had to pick ourselves back up. The trek back to camp became long and arduous, but gave me a new appreciation for S & D. It was pure will power that kept them going because everything else was going against them. I've never been around people who demonstrated this any better than these two guys I was with that night. Our hike back to camp ended at 11:15pm that night, which made it a nearly 18hr hunting day - much longer than what we had anticipated. To our surprise, Greg and the mules were still at camp. As it turns out, Greg and the pack were at the top of the pass when they heard my rifle shot and decided to turn back in case we scored a ram that day. We were so exhausted and dehydrated from that day's events, we all plopped down on the ground as soon as we reached camp. Too tired to even eat dinner, we had a few brews to celebrate and then hit the hay shortly thereafter since we had to hike out the very next morning.

To make a long story short, we packed up camp and got back on the trail by 8:15am, with our heavy backpacks since the mules packed the meat and head/cape on their backs. Uphill climbs were almost as exhausting as downhills because our legs were simply worn out from the day before. We stopped for rest breaks every so often and finally made it back to the trailhead 8 hrs later. I almost cried when I saw our truck parked at the trailhead. A happy cry though from simple exhaustion, but also one of great satisfaction from what I had accomplished over the last 72 hours. It was amazing!!!