That's one tough pack out!

For a true outdoorsman, moose hunting in Alaska is usually on the top of the bucket list. Unfortunately, once you have had a taste, you can't stop thinking about coming back! Not a bad problem to have, except maybe a little tough on the old pocketbook.

If you grab a cold beer and start shooting the breeze with anyone who's done it, at some point during the conversation you're going to talk about the bad parts of the hunt. Why wouldn't you? Sometimes they make for the best part of the story. For me, the most difficult part of any hunt is the packout after a successful harvest. Although I will say it is the most rewarding feeling when you are done, when you're in the thick of it, sometimes you ask yourself, "Why the hell do I do this to myself?" I usually have a strategy every time I do my packouts. The first thing I do is find the path I am going to take to get to the hanging tree, meat pole, or wherever my stash is going to be. Most of the time one would think the shortest distance is the correct path, and once you get going and get stuck in a muskeg for the first time, you quickly realize that some better planning needs to take place. I will go so far as to trim branches, bushes, or whatever I need to do to make my life a little bit easier. Oftentimes, once I find my path, I will mark it by breaking some branches and making the fresh, white wood easily visible, or I will hang tufts of grass in the branches overhead. It's an old trick I learned from a Native friend. Once I have my trail marked, I start packing.

Everyone has their own style when it comes to packout. Some start with the burger bags and work their way up. Others with the front shoulders. Some the backstrap and tenderloin bag. Me, I start with the hardest, most punishing pack first—the hind quarters. My thought process is, I want to carry the heaviest stuff first because I am going to lose energy after each load, and if each load is going to get lighter and lighter until the end, then I can deal with that, both physically and psychologically. Honestly, most of this is a mind game anyways. Mind over matter. If you don't mind it, it doesn't matter. Anyways, I knock out those hinds first. If you have never packed out a hind quarter on a mature Yukon bull moose, we are talking about 140-175 lbs apiece. I weigh 155 lbs, so pretty much every time I am carrying my body weight. So once the hinds are done, I of course switch to the fronts, then the burger bags, followed by the backstraps and tenderloins, ribs, and then the absolute worst part—the antlers. I am a fan of the European mounts, and of course it is usually late in the evening and I just want to get back to camp for some hot grub and a glass of whiskey, so I usually don't take the time to remove the lower jaw, tongue, and the hide. That of course means the head weighs an extra 10-15 lbs, which by that point in the day feels more like 30 lbs. The antlers usually weigh around 100 lbs at that point, sometimes more, which is really not that much considering the hind and front quarters from before. But, what you don't take into consideration is the awkwardness and the center of gravity of the antlers. Because you cannot keep the weight close to your core, those antlers feel like they weigh twice as much. Not to mention you're hitting every single branch and bush during the packout. You better pray you don't have to climb a hill!

Now I mentioned this before, so pay attention because this is an important part. When you get done with your packout, it is one of the best feelings you can have when you're hunting. The feeling of accomplishment. The feeling of beating a challenge that was not only physically demanding, but mentally demanding as well. You just packed an animal the size of a Clydesdale 400 yards on your back! That means you were successful, which means you get the most amazing, organic, as-clean-as-you-can-get-it meat. At the end of the day, it is way more expensive than any beef you'll buy at the supermarket, but man, it doesn't get any healthier. The feeling of accomplishment will set you on a high that you will try to chase time and time again.

I was recently out with my hunting partner last fall chasing some bruisers in the mountains. We were successful on day 2 with a beautiful 63-inch bull. It was a sweet 250-yard packout. Slightly uphill and in some hard-to-walk tundra (when is tundra ever easy to walk on?). It took us about 4 hours to cut everything up and pack it out to the meat pole. Honestly not too bad at all, but when you didn't work out all summer and sat at a computer desk answering emails and phone calls, it can kick your butt! Of course everything was sore. My back was giving me fits, and my sciatica was starting to flare up just enough to be annoying.

It was my turn to hunt for the next few days. We put in the time glassing and calling. Despite seeing good shooter bulls, I was holding out for something either monster-sized, or an easy packout. Each day went the same. See a decent bull and it was too far away, or have a bull real close but it was not what we were looking for.

Day 7, we had just gotten done with lunch and decided to take the mandatory midday siesta. The weather was decent but windy. Always windy in the hills that time of year. I couldn't sleep, so I decided to go up to the glassing point and see what was cooking. I looked down the valley—nothing. I looked up the valley and about 800 yards in the alders was a pretty decent bull that I had remembered seeing earlier in the hunt and had pictures of him from last year as well. He was a pretty decent bull this year, and I had no problem harvesting him, but I wasn't going to break myself doing it.

I quickly ran down to the tent and woke up my hunting partner and told him, "Game on." When we got to the top, the bull was within 400 yards and closing. He was on the opposite side of the river and working his way down the valley. I told my hunting partner, "No way I'm shooting this thing unless he makes this an easy pack." We were both pretty whipped from chasing bears the past 3 days, so he was ok with that decision. As this moose was steadily making his way towards us, I decided to refrain from calling and just see what he was going to do. As we sat there watching him, we couldn't believe our eyes. He randomly decided he wanted to cross the river. Now being on our side of the river, I most certainly thought he would follow the bank just as he had done on the other side. Well, I was wrong again. He turned away from the bank and started to come up our hill. At this point, we could no longer see him as he was in an area in the middle of the hill, so we had no idea if he was going to pop out on top, or sidehill it. We sat there waiting, slightly anxious to see if this was really going to happen. My money was on him sidehilling parallel to the river, as that would make sense, judging by watching other moose. As I got my rifle ready, scope covers off, zoom set to 6x and looking on the side of the hill, my hunting partner whispered, "Antlers!" They were on top of the hill, of course. I had to quickly readjust for the shot but got it off no problem. The first shot went through the heart. I of course didn't know it at the time. I have never seen a moose gallop until right then. That thing took off like a bat out of hell, and I followed up with another shot in the shoulder, and that bull did a somersault, ass over teakettle. It was like he was in moose gymnastics. Never seen anything like it.

Remember how I said I wasn't shooting him unless he made it real easy? Well, I shot him on the runway and he died 15 feet from the edge of the runway. The next day I literally pulled the airplane up next to him and threw him in. The packout was "zero" yards! The only thing that would have made it better is if he had crawled into the airplane himself. I will never have a packout easier than that!

All the glory to God!

Yeehaw!