It is day 5 of our second Rifle Elk Hunting season here in Colorado. As a newbie to elk hunting I wanted to share the experience to those who might be interested. I grew up hunting for Whitetail Deer back east but never got the chance to pursue an Elk. This year my fireinds and I each Drew a Cow tag for the same unit and bought over the counter Bull tags for good measure. Here is how it has been going down.

Day One: Little Hope

Nick and I hiked into a spot we had scouted prior to opening day. An hour and a half hike up hill at 5 am will get the prior nights antics out through your pores quite quickly. Once skirting the scrub oak and quakey we got to our morning sitting loactions and settled in. It had been raining all night and contuined to do so for the rest of the day. We sat in soggy ground over looking an aspen grove anixously waiting sun rise. After sitting for a couple hours Nick and I met up to discuss other oprions. He informed me that he had a 5×5 Bull infront of him but it was too Dark to shoot. That was good news. There were elk in the area. We started to hike further into the back country and as wel did we saw 2 more bulls. One of them was absolutely Giant. We think it was a 7×7 but are still not sure. Behing him was a younger spike bull. We scurried back into position and watched the drainage that led into the Aspens. We both saw the small Bull Elk hiding in the Apsen Trees and Scrub Oak but never again saw the Bigger Bull. They Just vanished. Hard to belive and animal that size can just dissapear. We hikied further into the back country seeing a great deal of sign but no other animals.

Day Two: High Hopes

Much Like day on but my cousin Andrew (the Heeb) joined us for the day. Now the Heeb chose not to hunt with us on opening day because he had access to some public land through private property. He was so excited and thought he was going to get an Elk for sure. But, Heeb never even saw one. So Nick and I told him about our 1st day and he was in for the second day. After our hike in early in the AM we once again found our sitting location and got to it. Only to be spoiled but a couple late commers that walked right into our viewing area. These 2 other hunters actually almost walked right over Nick (he was wearing hunter orange). So, with our morning sit ruined Nick and I decided to hike up a ridge with hope of the other hunters spooking an animal or two towards us. The Heeb being a strong willed napoleon decided to sit in the valley. About 200 yards after leaving Andrew(the heeb) we saw 6 Big Bulls on the hill side to our East. We tried tracking them for the remainder of the day but again, they vanised….So again we saw Elk and the Heeb..did not. From this day on we decided to call Andrew, Andy (which he hates) until he saw an Elk.

Day Three: It gets better

We all had to work in the morning but decided to head out in the afternoon to sit in a big aspen grove further to the south of where we had been hunting. We also chose to rent a yurt in a state park for the night so we would be closer to our hunting area the following morning. Well around 7 am we got hit with a big front that dumped about 8 inches of snow and brought high winds and alot of cold. We stuck to our plan and headed west to our pre planned hunting location. We our trucks loaded with gear we found our way through mud and snow to our Aspen Grove. We hiked for about an hour and saw no sign at all in the area. At 6:30pm we threw in the towel and headed to the yurt.

Now those of you who do not know what a yurt is, it is a circular structure that is made out of wood and canvas. This particular model had, 2 futons, a bunk bed, a propane stove and a table. Perfect.
We cooked out in the 20 degree weather and enjoyed quite a few blue cans.

After eating brats, bacon and doritos for dinner we played cards for way too long still enjoying blue cans. The Heeb, Andy as we were then calling him took us for about $100.00 playing hold em, cribbage and back alley. All of which he was new to. Bastard.

Eleven Thirty rolled around and I fell into the futon with big plans of waking up at 4:30am to got back to our little hunting haven. Well that sound came at 4:30 and nobody moved. The cold blowing snow was whipping the exterior of the Yurt and the asprin hadn’t yet kicked in. So we all eased out way in and out of conscioucsness until 6:30.

Day Four: Success

I could smell the beer coming off of Nick as we made yet another hour and a half hike up hill to our hunting haven. Andy was going slow behind us trying not to sweat “if you sweat you die” he kept saying.

Once arriving at the top of the hill we began to see Elk Tracks everywhere in the newly fallen snow. Good sign. We followed them slowly as we worked our way to our usual spots when I heard nick whisper. “Macomber theres and Elk on the hill to the right. I looked up and sure enough there was a cow laying down looking at us. It got up started walking west into some scrub oak. The Heeb ( its not Andy anymore becasue he saw an elk) hurried in the same direction to head it off. Just as he did a Bull stepped into sight and Nick yelled ” Hey theres the Bull” and cracked a shot at him. The first shot missed but the second one that followed laid the big animal to rest. ” He’s down baby ” yelled nick. The heeb ran back and after waiting for a while we walked through the scrub oak in search of the beast. Nick found his kill and called us over…”he’s a 6×6…(pause)… holy shit” we made it over and marveled over the big animal. Truly a great looking specimen. After a couple photos the work began. Cutting, skinning, sawing, yanking, pulling, gutting, quarting, swearing..the whole nine yards.

We quartered the animal, caped it and started hiking it out. Bob was nice enough to come help us pack it out. There was also another hunter who stumbled unpon us who offered to carry a quarter out. What a nice guy. the 5 of us where able to get the entire 700-750 pound animal back to the truck, well not the whole thing, we left the ribs.


With the animal back to the truck we loaded it up and Nick and I headed to the butcher while Bob and the Heeb went to the Saloon to save us a seat at the Bar.

It has been quite an experience thus far. Hunting Elk has been one of the most physically demanding activities I have done in a long time. I am thoroughly enjoying it. It is a great challenge. The Heeb and I have 5 days left to harvest our animals. Wish us luck. Thanks for Reading..Get outside