Well guys buck down! This is definitely one of my favorite hunts I've been on. This year my cousin drew a good tag, that is known for having monsters in the zone. A few weeks ago we decided we wanted to a backpack hunt into an area he has been wanting to check out for awhile. After going over the plan and getting all our gear ready, we headed out Thursday around 3:30, we arrived to our spot around 7:30-8ish, unloaded the Rhino and headed up the mountain following a super beat up UTV trail. Got to camp around 9-9:30 set up camp etc. We woke up Friday morning and decided to glass an area we knew had held good bucks on past trips. After glossing for hours and seeing roughly 25 does and 5 or 6 small forkies, we decided to load camp and head to the backpack destination. We got to the spot, readied our packs and took off for the steep 2 mile hike to a campsite that was planned to be home for a couple days. Eventually we made it, set up camp and just hung out til it got later to glass. At 4:30 we headed to a nice shady rock we wanted to glass from, after about an hour I spotted 3 deer around 2000 yards across the "bowl" from us. When I finally was able to see the bottom buck lift his head, I instantly knew he was a shooter, so my cousin head off to get a better look. My anticipation grew as my cousin put the stalk on the buck. I watched the buck he shot and a younger 20" forky get into it a couple times, but the forky knew who was boss and kept his distance from the doe. At about 6'o'clock I watched the buck fall over while looking through my spotting scope 2000 yards away, 5 seconds later hearing the shot. The buck was down! I went back to camp and got water and the gear I needed to help pack the buck out. After a good walk over to my cousin, he claimed that the buck was a 5x4. After a few good pics we got to work on quartering him up. With a solid 2 hour hike back to camp we unloaded the buck and got some sleep. We slept in Saturday morning and loaded up camp and all our gear into our Kuiu Icon Pro's and headed off to the rhino. The trip was a success, we had found a new seemingly untouched area of a great zone, and had a great time no matter what. Now it's time to work on the euro mount!
