digger dogger
08-12-2009, 12:38 PM
On july 29th my oldest son and i hopped in the truck to head for tattoga lk.
lil dave was so exited to leave he fell asleep in the first hour of the drive, we stopped in cache crk for a burger with a huntin buddy. we shot the shit for a for an hour or so, as we left my buddy asks lil dave if he was ready to work "HARD" he said yes, but we both knew what he was in for,we grinned at each other, shook hands and off we went.
we arrived at tattoga around 4:00 pm on the 30th, had a bite to eat we introduced ourselves to the new owner (teena wright) she has change the lodge extensivley looks great and huge proportions of good food. She called the pilot,(dale) he came down and we took care of the paper work.
see ya at the dock in a 1\2 hour or so he said, total exitment hit me, we're almost there, i said to lil dave, we loaded our stuff onto the plane and off we went. no phone calls to the family that we were there and headed for the bush, i thought of this about 100' off the lk, then i thought no problem i have my buddies globalstar sat phone i'll phone from the bush. (OOPS) big mistake.
do not rely on a globalstar phone at all. i didn't make one call in 8 days. (we were high up at times, with no signal) p.o.s.. after realizing the phone doesn't work at all, all the things that can go wrong out there hit the brain, it's kinda scary the things you think of when hunting with kids (young man) and no emergency communication ( a spot or a irridium phone is comin for x-mas) 2 days later the plane brought in a couple of hunters, we talked for awhile and told them what i knew of the area.
lil d and i headed out to make a spike camp for a few nights. about an hour into our walk dave says "how long is this gonna take dad" i laughed and said " that depends on how fast you can walk, but about 5 hours or so." he gave me a confuzed look and shrugged his shoulders, after 3 hours give or take, he says "dad i don't think i like goat hunting to much." i kept telling him if he wants a goat this is part of the deal.
after 6 hours he was so exhausted and frustrated i told him it's ok to cry, it helps sometimes. he broke down, so i hugged him with a firm squeeze and told him we're almost there. i gave him 2 options, we could go to the valley floor which i didn't recommend.( a tight valley with a loud crick and big bears) or a saddle about an hour away diagonally up hill. after 5 mins of rest he chose the uphill option.( one of the proudest moments as a father i have had..)
when we got to the saddle i set up the tent,and while i cooked dinner he got into his sleeping bag, ate and 10 mins later he was snoring. i ate, had a cigarette and thought what a tough kid i'm raising.
the next day we spotted a billie later in the day, but i didn't want to turn my son off mountain hunting so i stayed quiet till it was late. the next day we climbed the mountain to try to come down on the billie but the ridge got really bad and i was not gonna bring my son across some of the ugly angles the mountain offered. so he had his first alpine sleep.
after he woke i said we've gone this far lets go to the top at least, he gave me that confuzed look again and said "alright".
after we climbed to the top we ate lunch( sardines,chocolate,fruit cup, no water as i found out lil dave is one thirsty bugger.
the following day was so smokey we could not see anything on the mountains around us so i glassed the closest slopes with nothing to see.
to make it fun for him we rolled rocks down the mountain to see who could roll one the farthest.(he won) what a great feeling i had seeing the fun he was having.(still a little boy to me)
the following day the smoke cleared and i glassed for a couple hours. i saw 3 ewes and a lamb, no goats, and i was out of cigs so i said lets go back to the lk, we packed up camp and put every thing into my pack but his sleepingbag, off we went, i said i've got almost everything in my pack so we're gonna do this quick, he agreed ( he won't disagree with dad when i don't have smokes) he's a smart kid he knows, even when i'm wrong, he can't win. (smoking is horrible) the only words he said on the way back is are you ok. i got a branch of buckbrush so far up my nose i swear it almost scratched my brain. pain, blood and watery eyes. i was ok and the bleeding stopped pretty quickly.
the only words i said after that was c'mon god can we please have a trail to follow( maybe not the words i used) two seconds later the floor plate of my rifle magazine opened and my bullets took a dive in the willows, i got one bullet back. a few more step, and like i asked for, there was the trail.
when we hit the trail i was moving fast for a butt, so i said we're almost at camp. i looked back and his stumpy short legs were not far behind me. when we got to camp a bear had gone through our camp but didn't get to our food i think we interupted his investigation of our camp but he wrecked my 175.00 rubber dingy. and took out all my clothes from a bag. havin a bear in our camp was a little unnerving. once at camp and settled in, i started to glass again, and within a few mins a few cuss words spilled out of my mouth. "what's up paps" dave askes "i've got a billie in the spotting scope and there is not much mountain above him, if he's there in the morning i'm gonna try to get him", "i wanna come too" he said ( my turn to give the confuzed look)
we fished for a few hours and caught 4 bull trout, then when for a paddle in the kayak. (glad i brought 2 inflatable boats)as we paddled the lk shore i said holy s**t dave there is a huge moose skull and antlers on shore lets check it out. they were the biggest rack i've seen in the field 56 3\4 across and 11x11, 4 on one brow, and a bullet hole on his rt paddle. grizzlies cleaned up on it really good. i assume someone had wounded it last fall and he never got to retreive the animal. (i would be devestated to have that moose in my scope and not be able to put it down) so off to camp to get our rifles and walked back to the spot to drag the rack back. ( a bit of a stinky journey) that night we watched the billie walk to the right , the wrong way i wanted him to go. in the morning he was in shear cliffs when i found him in the binox. your not going up there i said to dave and neither was i. he never came back to our side, but a nanny and kid did, i've never seen a nanny on that particular mountain before. it gave us something to look at at least, so we milled about camp for the day fishing, glassing, boating and eating.
the next morning i heard a plane coming " a little early i hope he's not in a rush" i said. at the beach dale's door opened and he asked, "are you guy's alright" yea, we're good i said . ok then you have two women calling my phone and tattoga's phone. one women wants to know how both of you are and one wants to know how the young fella is. i laughed and said yea that sounds about right. i'll be back later to get ya dale said. he was dropping off a park employee to deal with a problem bear that was bugging the local outfitter. " see ya in a few hours then". and off they went. we packed up camp, we had so much food left over we could have lasted a week or more. i knew the other hunters would probably enjoy some different food, so we left them a whack of food for the our fold up chairs and my phone# when they got home i got a call from one of the hunters, they were so greatful for the food and chairs, he said his partner was so happy when they saw i left the good food he screamed across the lk "dave is the man, YAHOO".
my son and i fished till the plane returned, when we got to the lodge teena asked " have you phoned home yet? no our sat phone sucks, she handed me her phone and said your in big trouble MR. use my phone. so no answer at any phone i called. ( how worried were these women?)..
all in all we didn't get our goats but i had one of my favorite hunts to date and with my boy.(young man)...
SORRY FOR THE GRAMMER AND THE SPELLING MISTAKES, I HOPE YOU ENJOY THE STORY. IF SOMEONE WANTS TO PUT SOME OF THE PICS WITH THE STORY THEY ARE IN THE GALLERY. TNX DAVE
lil dave was so exited to leave he fell asleep in the first hour of the drive, we stopped in cache crk for a burger with a huntin buddy. we shot the shit for a for an hour or so, as we left my buddy asks lil dave if he was ready to work "HARD" he said yes, but we both knew what he was in for,we grinned at each other, shook hands and off we went.
we arrived at tattoga around 4:00 pm on the 30th, had a bite to eat we introduced ourselves to the new owner (teena wright) she has change the lodge extensivley looks great and huge proportions of good food. She called the pilot,(dale) he came down and we took care of the paper work.
see ya at the dock in a 1\2 hour or so he said, total exitment hit me, we're almost there, i said to lil dave, we loaded our stuff onto the plane and off we went. no phone calls to the family that we were there and headed for the bush, i thought of this about 100' off the lk, then i thought no problem i have my buddies globalstar sat phone i'll phone from the bush. (OOPS) big mistake.
do not rely on a globalstar phone at all. i didn't make one call in 8 days. (we were high up at times, with no signal) p.o.s.. after realizing the phone doesn't work at all, all the things that can go wrong out there hit the brain, it's kinda scary the things you think of when hunting with kids (young man) and no emergency communication ( a spot or a irridium phone is comin for x-mas) 2 days later the plane brought in a couple of hunters, we talked for awhile and told them what i knew of the area.
lil d and i headed out to make a spike camp for a few nights. about an hour into our walk dave says "how long is this gonna take dad" i laughed and said " that depends on how fast you can walk, but about 5 hours or so." he gave me a confuzed look and shrugged his shoulders, after 3 hours give or take, he says "dad i don't think i like goat hunting to much." i kept telling him if he wants a goat this is part of the deal.
after 6 hours he was so exhausted and frustrated i told him it's ok to cry, it helps sometimes. he broke down, so i hugged him with a firm squeeze and told him we're almost there. i gave him 2 options, we could go to the valley floor which i didn't recommend.( a tight valley with a loud crick and big bears) or a saddle about an hour away diagonally up hill. after 5 mins of rest he chose the uphill option.( one of the proudest moments as a father i have had..)
when we got to the saddle i set up the tent,and while i cooked dinner he got into his sleeping bag, ate and 10 mins later he was snoring. i ate, had a cigarette and thought what a tough kid i'm raising.
the next day we spotted a billie later in the day, but i didn't want to turn my son off mountain hunting so i stayed quiet till it was late. the next day we climbed the mountain to try to come down on the billie but the ridge got really bad and i was not gonna bring my son across some of the ugly angles the mountain offered. so he had his first alpine sleep.
after he woke i said we've gone this far lets go to the top at least, he gave me that confuzed look again and said "alright".
after we climbed to the top we ate lunch( sardines,chocolate,fruit cup, no water as i found out lil dave is one thirsty bugger.
the following day was so smokey we could not see anything on the mountains around us so i glassed the closest slopes with nothing to see.
to make it fun for him we rolled rocks down the mountain to see who could roll one the farthest.(he won) what a great feeling i had seeing the fun he was having.(still a little boy to me)
the following day the smoke cleared and i glassed for a couple hours. i saw 3 ewes and a lamb, no goats, and i was out of cigs so i said lets go back to the lk, we packed up camp and put every thing into my pack but his sleepingbag, off we went, i said i've got almost everything in my pack so we're gonna do this quick, he agreed ( he won't disagree with dad when i don't have smokes) he's a smart kid he knows, even when i'm wrong, he can't win. (smoking is horrible) the only words he said on the way back is are you ok. i got a branch of buckbrush so far up my nose i swear it almost scratched my brain. pain, blood and watery eyes. i was ok and the bleeding stopped pretty quickly.
the only words i said after that was c'mon god can we please have a trail to follow( maybe not the words i used) two seconds later the floor plate of my rifle magazine opened and my bullets took a dive in the willows, i got one bullet back. a few more step, and like i asked for, there was the trail.
when we hit the trail i was moving fast for a butt, so i said we're almost at camp. i looked back and his stumpy short legs were not far behind me. when we got to camp a bear had gone through our camp but didn't get to our food i think we interupted his investigation of our camp but he wrecked my 175.00 rubber dingy. and took out all my clothes from a bag. havin a bear in our camp was a little unnerving. once at camp and settled in, i started to glass again, and within a few mins a few cuss words spilled out of my mouth. "what's up paps" dave askes "i've got a billie in the spotting scope and there is not much mountain above him, if he's there in the morning i'm gonna try to get him", "i wanna come too" he said ( my turn to give the confuzed look)
we fished for a few hours and caught 4 bull trout, then when for a paddle in the kayak. (glad i brought 2 inflatable boats)as we paddled the lk shore i said holy s**t dave there is a huge moose skull and antlers on shore lets check it out. they were the biggest rack i've seen in the field 56 3\4 across and 11x11, 4 on one brow, and a bullet hole on his rt paddle. grizzlies cleaned up on it really good. i assume someone had wounded it last fall and he never got to retreive the animal. (i would be devestated to have that moose in my scope and not be able to put it down) so off to camp to get our rifles and walked back to the spot to drag the rack back. ( a bit of a stinky journey) that night we watched the billie walk to the right , the wrong way i wanted him to go. in the morning he was in shear cliffs when i found him in the binox. your not going up there i said to dave and neither was i. he never came back to our side, but a nanny and kid did, i've never seen a nanny on that particular mountain before. it gave us something to look at at least, so we milled about camp for the day fishing, glassing, boating and eating.
the next morning i heard a plane coming " a little early i hope he's not in a rush" i said. at the beach dale's door opened and he asked, "are you guy's alright" yea, we're good i said . ok then you have two women calling my phone and tattoga's phone. one women wants to know how both of you are and one wants to know how the young fella is. i laughed and said yea that sounds about right. i'll be back later to get ya dale said. he was dropping off a park employee to deal with a problem bear that was bugging the local outfitter. " see ya in a few hours then". and off they went. we packed up camp, we had so much food left over we could have lasted a week or more. i knew the other hunters would probably enjoy some different food, so we left them a whack of food for the our fold up chairs and my phone# when they got home i got a call from one of the hunters, they were so greatful for the food and chairs, he said his partner was so happy when they saw i left the good food he screamed across the lk "dave is the man, YAHOO".
my son and i fished till the plane returned, when we got to the lodge teena asked " have you phoned home yet? no our sat phone sucks, she handed me her phone and said your in big trouble MR. use my phone. so no answer at any phone i called. ( how worried were these women?)..
all in all we didn't get our goats but i had one of my favorite hunts to date and with my boy.(young man)...
SORRY FOR THE GRAMMER AND THE SPELLING MISTAKES, I HOPE YOU ENJOY THE STORY. IF SOMEONE WANTS TO PUT SOME OF THE PICS WITH THE STORY THEY ARE IN THE GALLERY. TNX DAVE