We picked apart the valley below us, and every inch of the mountain face across from us, until our eyes went numb trying to find a grizzly bear. We watched at least 15 different marmots in the wide open come and go from their holes in an area that looked like a minefield from grizzlies digging them up. After a while you could tell the bears hadn’t messed with them lately – the marmots seemed to have no fear of moving around in the open.
We got pounded by a cold wet wind in our face all day. With about two hours of light left we hopped back on the horses and started to hunt our way back to camp. We’d seen plenty of bear sign, so we were hoping to get lucky and ride up on one. We rode about an hour and came over a ridge that dropped into a meadow. Even though the weather was getting worse by the minute, something just felt right – I could literally feel something was about to happen.
As soon as we dropped into the meadow we saw a grizzly bear coming right at us off the mountain about 150 yards away. We were in the wide open and the grizz had no idea we were there. . . yet.
We jumped off our horses and I grabbed the gun from my scabbard while looking for a tree to tie my horse to . . . no trees. I dropped my lead rope, put one in the chamber and shot. The bear rolled then quickly stood up on two feet ready to fight, looking for who caused the pain. I put another shot on the bear as it finally saw us, but it quickly disappeared into the timber, still coming our way. Both shots felt great, but these bears are tough, especially when they’re filled with adrenaline. As soon as the bear came back out in the open I let a third shot go. That ended it.
During all the chaos, our horses bailed. We were still hours from camp so we were in a bit of a bind. Luckily Leif held onto his horse so at least we had one horse to act as our map to get us back to camp in the dark. With one horse and three guys, obviously two had to walk. With the grizz cape in my pack I got to ride.
It’s never easy in the north country, every good thing that happens seems to bring a challenge with it. We killed our grizz but lost our horses. Luckily this string knew the area and were waiting for us when we made it to camp a few hours later.
I set a goal for this trip and after cutting my grizz tag yesterday, that goal has been met. We’ve got ten days left to hunt – ten days to focus on moose hunting.