Die with Memories, Not Dreams with Chris Atkins

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To the Hunt west podcast, here's your host, Jaden Bales. What's up, everybody? Welcome to another episode of the Hunt West Podcast. Today I have on a Hunt west client who's turned into a good friend and a cool guy to watch along his western hunting journey. And that is Chris Atkins. Like the Atkins diet. He just told me. Chris, how are you this morning?

I'm doing great. Thanks for.

This is.

I'm really looking forward to talking to you today.

Yeah, me too. And along the line, at some point, we're going to get to this Alaska doll sheep hunt that you just went on. But I just wanted to say, first off, congrats on that, man. This is. That is a. Every, a lot of people's dream hunt, you know, mine included. That's. That's a heck of an adventure you just went on.

I feel really fortunate. I'm really thankful to the. To the guides and to the outfitter and the help that I received from a lot of people along the way. It was. Once we were able to walk up onto the sheet, it definitely felt like our ram with. With my guys who were there, but all the people who helped me over the years as well, too.

Well, man, I want to dive into your background because I know that you're not a guy who lives with a bunch of mountains near you.

You have hills, but no mountains.

No mountains? Yeah. No big mountains. And from what I know, like, your western hunting experience really just got started in the last couple years. So what's your background? What do you do? Like, where are you from? All those things?

Sure. Yeah. So I'm a curator at the Sioux City Arts Center. My job and career trajectory has always been in museums. I've been a curator in Minnesota for 15 years, and my wife and I moved here to Sioux City. So my career has always been in nonprofits and specifically working with artists in museums, building collections, and presenting art exhibitions, which is something I've been thinking a lot about in relationship to my hunting career because it's quite a unique background. And I came to hunting, I guess the term that most people use is sort of like adult onset, where people who have come to hunting much later in their lives. I didn't grow up in a hunting family. I had an uncle who worked for the Wisconsin dnr and he was a deer hunter. But we never connected over hunting. So as I got older and as I got further along in my career and was able to kind of invest in some new hobbies, I pursued hunting. It was something that I've always Been kind of intrigued by and just living in Minnesota. It was a community that was always kind of adjacent to what I was doing. And. And if I look back, if I think about getting into hunting, it was a nice break from my work career and a whole totally different community that. That I was connecting with. So I would say that I was started maybe in my late 30s, early 40s. The gateway drug for me was sort of upland hunting. So grouse and pheasant in Minnesota and turkey. And then as I got more and more into it, deer hunting. And then, as you mentioned, got into some western hunting as well, too. The first antelope trip we took with a group of Buddies was in 2021. We were just outside of Casper, and in 2023, with your help, we went to. We went back to that similar area near Gillette in region C, I think, for mule deer.

Yeah. Wait, so you didn't start hunting until you were 38, 39, something like that? Is that what you're saying?

No. And.

And so how many years did you go from. And how many years did you go from upland and, like, catching the. The, you know, dipping your toe in the water of hunting to doll sheep?

Well, depends. So I'm 50. I just turned 50.

Yeah.

In April. But I made this commitment. I. I have the text message that I sent to my wife. It was on September 16th of 2020, and I was working at a job, and I was hating it. And I said to her, I said, this is what I want to do for my 50th birthday. So I went from upland hunting to making the commitment in about seven years.

That is rapid.

And from that time, from 45 to 50, it was about five years of planning and really saving, really just kind of squirreling away cash and money to just put into. And we all know how expensive those are, but just kind of squirreling away everything I had to get into to make that possible.

Dude, that's. That's next level. And I don't mean to. I don't mean to disparage your line of work, but as a previous nonprofit employee myself, like, it's not like you're raking it in. It's like, this is. Took a lot of dedication to save money, didn't it?

Yeah, I like to sort of say that nonprofit people are passionate people. Like, they put a lot of passion to what they do because that's usually what drives what they do and why they have. Have jobs that many cases are undervalued or underpaid. So I just poured that same amount of passion into this content, getting ready for it. I have a screenshot that I saved from 2021 and it was a savings account that I was kind of swirling away money into. And in 2021 it was $334.

That's awesome.

So it just kind of accrued and went from there, so. But I just knew enough about these experiences and these opportunities to know that it's not something you. Well, some people can maybe just book a trip every couple years or so, but I knew that the cost is just going to get incrementally more expensive. I think that's attributable to labor, to guides and packers, to supplies, to airplane fuel, everything that kind of goes into it. Tags? Yeah. And my body. I just felt like at this stage of my life, I don't know if I could do this when I was 60. So I really wanted to kind of time things so that felt like I could do it all comfortably.

Did you have a mentor or a friend who was helping you out along the way get into that? And then who also probably just stoked the fire as well?

Yeah. I got a buddy, Will, who I met really early in my hunting career, and he kind of was that gateway person to kind of get me thinking more about deer hunting. We talk a lot about calibers and reloading and shooting, so he's been really, really helpful. I've got a great group of guys on a group chat that were really helpful as well too, as I got sort of booked up with my. My outfitter. He was really helpful. I've watched every YouTube bell sheep hunt, every podcast. I wouldn't say that that's necessarily very helpful because it's just a small fragment of what you need to know. A couple of guys, Jeff and Dave, or I'm sorry, Chris and David here, have been really helpful with getting me shooting. I reached out to you. I know a couple times about all sorts of stuff related to hunting too. So yeah, it's group effort. It takes a village.

That's really cool, though. And it takes someone, but it takes someone knowing that they need to reach out and knowing that it's like, look, I don't. I think about this all the time. Like, obviously people reach out to me, but I have also learned a lot from people like you, and I've also learned a lot from my mentors. Like, and it's always a constant evolution. It just so happened that your evolution happened in a very compressed time.

Yeah. And I'm very aware of that, and I'm very aware of that, that, and I know that, like I said, this is something I'm very thankful for. I know that. You know, I, I don't mean to, I didn't grow up with this dream. This is something kind of came to me relatively recently.

Yeah.

Because I didn't grow up in a hunting family. But I just, I just saw, I just knew enough to know that if I didn't do it now, that I was going to be that guy that said, coulda, woulda, shoulda, you know, five years from now. And my guide on our hunt, Cole, he had this sticker on his climbing ax that said, die with memories, not with dreams. And it's sort of a great reminder to do it irregardless of the costs, because there's nothing worse than having a dream unfulfilled or a dream deferred.

That might have to be the episode title. Dilate memories, not with dreams. Yeah, that's so good.

But I, I, I think that that's, that's something that kind of drove me. Yeah.

My, my friend, like one of my best friends and best hunting buddies, Hayden, he always says, just think of the story that's always like in the same, in the same vein. It's like, dude, you're not going to have a story if you're at the computer, you know, or on the couch.

So I thought about this a little bit in terms of storytelling, Jaden, and know I'm not old, but as I've gotten older, I would say that human beings are storytellers. You know, we, we sort of have stories and tell stories to, you know, share who we are and talk about our experiences and, you know, kind of explain behavior, I suppose. And as I've taught, thought about that and what your friend said is there for me, there's no better way narrative generating activity than hunting. Yeah. Because it's something that starts depending on where you're at, you know, maybe a year ago. You know, as you're putting your applications, you're buying tags, you're getting gear, you know, you're training, you're doing your, your exercise, and that all of that entire process contributes to a story that is a fragment of your life, but nonetheless kind of makes you who you are, you know?

Yeah.

And I think that whatever we have in our lives, I think stories are just really important.

Yeah, I totally agree. And the other way I kind of characterize people's stories is like we're made up of all these little circles of interest and things that we do on a daily basis and where those, those Things the. The Venn diagram meets in the middle is what makes, like, that person. I will say I also am always interested by people who have unique Venn diagrams like you. You've got. You've got a unique Venn diagram of art curator and hunter. Right. Like, not only hunter, but, like, now, sheep hunter. And so those are, Those are good qualities, man.

Talking with one of my, One of the guys that was getting us to our hunting location, and I. With all my, my hunting tags, I always put curators who hunt because it's such a unique hashtag. And as far as I know, there's no one else out there who uses it. But I'm just waiting for that other person, he or she join me on that. But we were talking about this overlap between art and hunting or creativity and hunting, because he's a filmmaker, he's a photographer, and he does documentary and fine art photography, too. And the point I made was that if you, if you look back to the Paleolithic era and the caves at Lascaux, these are the famous cave paintings that show people hunting stags. And so 14,000, 15,000 years ago, you have that conflation of art and hunting or art and animals. So right now, maybe we're getting a little bit divergent from that nowadays, but maybe we'll bring it back.

Yeah, we start. We sure started there. That's for sure.

We should have started there.

Yeah, that's for sure. I oftentimes think, like, maybe the reason why there's so many. Why it started there. And you find so many art, like, I want to say artists, like, the average. The average dude who's out there hunting doesn't consider himself a quote unquote artist. But when you actually, like, describe what a lot of guys are doing, taking photos, like it's their job, you know, filming, like, doing all these things, it's. It totally is. And I think part of it is, like, you're out there and you're just like, I want to be able to relive this at another moment with, like, some supporting materials.

Yeah.

Because otherwise it just lives in our own dome. And, like, that's just not easy to share unless you're getting people around a campfire, around a podcast, I guess.

So I think there's a. There's something to be said about creative problem solving. You know, when you're kind of putting a plan together. You know, if you, if you see your elk or you see your sheep and you know, with you and your guide or your guide, there's a lot of Creative problem solving to figure out, well, what's our plan here? You know, yeah, we've gotten these animals for a couple hours. We've got a couple of options to go up or to go low or so. Yeah, if you think about it just in terms of problem solving, there's certainly a lot of creativity there too.

Yeah, for sure. So when you first came out to Wyoming and both your pronghorn hunt and your mule deer hunt, what were some of the biggest lessons that you, you picked up? You know, especially as you're getting into these big open spaces and, and learning how to, how to move around bigger country, like those first two trips especially.

I think the, the biggest thing you learn is to, is the concept of ground truth. You know, you can look at ONX all day long, but when you actually have to walk up those topographical lines instead of just like look at them on the screen, it's a lot different. The topography, no matter how accurate the 3D rendering on onx is, is never the same. So I think that's sort of an obvious one. You just have to, you just have to know the ground and have to correspond that. To what you're looking at with the, with the software. I think the, what I learned as well with going with a group of people was just how to work with a team. How do we divide which areas we're going to go to, who's going to go with who, and once we struck out together, how we work together, flipping a coin to see who shoots first, of course, but also just kind of working as a team to, to be scanning and glassing. Pronghorn for us was brand new. We all tagged out, we were all successful. But yeah, we all learned a lot that way just in terms of what we could get away with, what we couldn't get away with.

Yeah. Are there any. Go ahead.

Testing your gear before you go. Knowing, you know, set up your tent 800 times before you go. Yeah, because you may have to do it really quickly or you may have to do it the dark or you may have to do it, you know, in the cold. And it's kind of troubleshooting that knowing what your pack can accommodate. Shooting, shooting, shooting, you know, it just. I kept a budget of all my expenses leading up to my sheet pump. I didn't include the bullets and the, all the costs, but on that, because I just knew it was going to be. I didn't want to look at that number. But in the end, I think that number really helped. So knowing your rifle or your, or your or your bow. That's what you do.

Yeah, for sure.

Food and nutrition, I think, was important.

Too, when you were. When you were out there, you know, and especially on your pronghorn hunt, did you have any situations where you were just in a. In a totally different shooting scenario than you expected that, like, stick out to you?

Yeah, this was. This was shortly after I got started, so I really didn't have the experience of shooting in a lot of different positions. The rifle I had. Not the right rifle. I. I sold it. So I'm not. I'm glad I got rid of it. So, yeah, I ended up shooting off some sticks from a seated position. It wasn't a great shot, but.

Killed.

The doe that I shot. So, yeah, it was. And then crawling and kind of just getting into position with something. And then, you know, if you've got a pack on it, just you're trying to lift your head to look around. And so a lot of that positioning stuff, you learn really fast. It's a really steep learning curve.

It's one of the things that is the most cumbersome about hunting with. As a guide. Like hunting with people who don't do it very often is, honestly, like getting people to move around in the mountains and like you said, like getting on hands and knees or crawling on your butt, trying to get down into position. Like, those are some of the. Those are some of the things that I think unless you've done it before, you don't have. We've lost the body awareness for when we were kids or in high school and doing sports. Like, you've lost that body awareness, and it's kind of a perishable skill if you're not. It's why we always talk about pronghorn hunting being such a good training ground, because you get so many opportunities, and every time you get another opportunity, you are re engaging something that. In. In your stalking skills and your body awareness that you maybe hadn't thought about for a long time. So I'm. I stoked to hear you say that, because that was. That's been my experience, too.

Knee pads were essential. I ended up buying some of those before I left. And even with those knee pads, I was still pulling cactus needles out of my knees, I think, in December. They're still in there, and my. My. They're still kind of pushing them out. But, yeah, that was. That's an essential skill. And just. Just being on the ground, I think just whether you're sitting on the ground or sleeping on the ground or whatever you're doing and then learning how to get up and not wreck your knees or roll over or anything else. Yeah, just good practice.

Oh, that's awesome. So you followed up, you followed up your Wyoming hunts with an audad hunt? Yeah. Tell me, how'd that come about?

And what Was that, like 20, 24? I went down to Texas. I was looking for a free range, non high fence aud ad hunt. We might found one. It went really well. It was a short hunt. It wasn't. It was like a three day. It's a three day or four night, three day hunt down in Texas really close to the border. And it was something that I wanted to do again as practice and sort of preparation. And it was easy to book and to talk with the guides about and get down there. It was a chance to test out gear. It was a chance to fly with a rifle and make sure that all the things that the TSA needed to be aware of in my, my case were there. And then just practice, you know, with, with harvesting an an. That was a great, it was a great hunt. We, it was a little bit of a further shot than, than I was expecting, but I had practiced out to 400 and I was really comfortable between 400 and in with my rifle. And, and there's. They're, they're tough animals. It was a bit of a rodeo. They're also, their organs are a little bit lower in their body. So what I've heard about a lot of African animals is that their heart and lungs are a little bit lower. So where you might aim for a deer or a sheep is actually a little bit too high. So. So it took a couple shots to, to get them down. But you know, I was proud of the accomplishment and being able to shoot and kind of keep up with my guide who was half my age and had great legs and was able to get up and down the mountain really easily.

Yeah, well, and, and people oftentimes don't think of Texas as having some, some vertical, but where you were hunting, I mean, it's, it's sheep country, right?

Yeah, it's, it's pretty steep and we were kind of at the top of a, of a sort of a plateau and some pretty steep incline or declines down to the river and then within that some other fingers and, and drainages that wouldn't go down that far.

But yeah, so.

And we're still, we're still eating the odd Ed. Me too. It's great. I don't care what people say. It's. I really enjoy it. My wife and I Enjoy it as well, too.

That's awesome. So on that hunt, was that similar to the. To the pronghorn and meal day, where you were glassing a lot and it was big open country, or were you.

It was a lot of classic. Just a lot of being patient. We knew where some of them would kind of come up in the morning. We got out there in the evening. When I first arrived again, it was a little bit of a hustle to get from San Antonio out to where we were. So we did some glass in the night before, and then we had an idea where they might be showing up so we could ambush them on. On the next morning. I think it was a Friday morning that we saw them. So the country wasn't as wide and as vast as. As Alaska, obviously, but the Auded tend to blend into the environment a lot better. A lot. A lot more than sheep. You know, sheep sticks out like a big piece of rice on the green grass and even in some of that shale. But the Audad, with their chaps and their. Their horns really blend in. So it's. Sometimes it could be a struggle to see them. And what I notice is that when you see one, then you see another, and they start moving together. It looks like the whole hillside is starting to move, because it might be 15 of them that you didn't see before, but all of a sudden, they're. They're on the march over a hill or side hilling, too.

That. Dude, you described that. And I'm like, that sounds like. That sounds like a good meal deer hunt to me. Yeah, that's. That's awesome. So when you were talking about, you know, you said that that hunt or that shot presented itself a little further than you expected, but you'd been practicing. Um, I was just looking through our old text messages. Like, I went way back, and I know. I remembered reading that you had gotten, like, your Springfield Waypoint 2020. Love it. And that was in Six5 Creed, right?

Correct.

So when you think about, like, what's your setup with that? Like, what kind of scope you run in? Like, this is. This is such a. I look at that rifle and then the way that you've set it up, and I'm like, yeah, that's a. That's a sheep hunter, mule deer hunter's gun. You know, like, so what. How's that thing laid out?

So I had a. Before, I had a Weatherby one of the Vanguard series, and I just. It was one of those really thin pencil barrels, and it was lighter, and it was just. It just Got too hot. It wasn't something that I could really practice with. It was a little bit too whippy. So I, I got the Springfield because I wanted something a little bit more, a little heavier. I wanted a, a thicker contour barrel. This one's wrapped in, in carbon fiber. The geometry's a little bit more newer. It's more of the sort of a combination of like a, a long range as well as a hunting geometry on the stock. And also that, that, that grip that kind of keeps your hand down rather than back threaded barrel. It's got a, a nicely contoured bolt as well too that, that cycles really nicely. The magazine that it came with is a little cheap. It's one of those magpuls. So I got a Hawkins Precision. That kind of flush fits so it's easier to carry if you're carrying it. But it also just, it's a little bit nicer. Doesn't rattle so you're not making any noise. For the sheep hunt, I decided to upgrade to the Leupold VX6HD3 18X44. Nice. I knew that we might be in some low light conditions and I knew the animal was going to be bright white too. So it does have an illuminated reticle on it. I didn't do a CDS dial for it, which I, I might do in the future. But my buddy Chris, who's a hunter here, he cooked me up some laser beams with some custom 143eldx bullets.

Nice.

And then they were great. They shot really, really awesome. So I have a backcountry, a banished backcountry suppressor which has been, I'll never go back. I've heard, I'm sure your guests have said the same thing. But what it provides in terms of just hearing protection, recoil mitigation, staying in the scope and staying on your target. It's just such a great tool. I think that's it for the kind of, the specs of the, of the rifle. But it shoots great. I, I, I've been spending a lot, I think I mentioned this to you as I was getting ready. I went through a lot of like minor panic moments getting ready. I was thinking, oh my gosh, are my, my bullets okay? Am I shooting? All right, what's going on? And, and I'm not sure if there's time later on, but I've been thinking a lot about spin drift as it relates to right throated barrels and how that affects your bullet as you get further and further out, especially as you get past 400 yards. Or so and kind of correcting for that. But. So, yeah, so. But it's cool. It's a, it's a sub, I think 9 pound rifle with scope and, and can. It's easy to get behind, it's easy to carry and durable. I felt like it would, I'd have to baby it.

Yeah. That's huge. Yeah, that, that kind of a setup, man, is, I think, you know, for especially these lighter game. I'm still, I'm still not convinced that the light calibers are always the best for elk, but for everything other than the big, big animals out there, dude, I feel like a setup like yours is pretty much the, the happy medium of a do all. And I also have that banished back country on my rifle. And gosh, it's like you said, it's like finding a new religion because you just go like, oh man, I don't want to hunt with anybody who doesn't have it now, you know? Yeah.

One thing, one thing I will say is I used the 143eldvx on my sheet pun and it worked great. But I did use some 120 grain copper bullets on the Audad and those didn't perform as well as I thought. And I don't know whether that's. They sort of penciled through. That could have been where I was aiming. Like I said, I probably could have aimed a little bit left and low to really get to the shoulder and get to the heart. Yeah. But I, I haven't given up on copper bullets yet. I do want to. I have a mule deer hunt coming up in next year that I want to, I want to use some copper bullets on.

Yeah, it's been, I've, I've. When I shot a 300 short mag, I was using a copper bullet, monolithic bullet, because I was using it for everything from pronghorn to elk. And I was like, okay, well, I don't want to just because I had shot a pronghorn doe with the.300 and was using just a classic partition, like lead bullet. And dude, I lost like both front shoulders off this. So it's like, I was like, man, I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go to the monolithics with, with 300. So then I, I, I transferred that over to my 6.5prc that, that line of thinking. And I'm actually coming back to the same direction that, that you just discussed where I got a, A friend of mine, actually a client of mine, good friend of mine, he and I were having this exact same conversation and and he was like, dude, I've got six, five PRC bullets laying around and I don't have a use for him. So I got, I got some. I know it's right before season. It's not the right time to be messing with bullets. But I'm going to be doing it anyway because. Yeah, anyway, I, I ended up in the same realm you are where you're like, man, the coppers just are not, they're, you know, on the smaller caliber bullets, not doing it the way I want them to. So I'm gonna go, you know, step back up and go to like the, you know, 143eLDX probably and maybe mess with some other bullets just because I like to tinker.

But I think I do have some, some covered bullets in my 350 legend that I use here. And, and I was my deer rifle. Because we're a straight wall state, we can use those 350 legends or those 450 Bushmasters. And the, the bullets I have are the frangibles that when they hit the pedals break off.

Is that the hammer bullets or another brand?

It's a brand called Cutting Edge.

Cutting Edge.

They make a bullet called the Raptor that I got these bullets from. Choice ammunition in Montana. And they work great. So if I do go to Copper, I might check Cutting Edge or those hammers where they, the pedals break off rather than mushroom and, and drive through in pencil.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Pencil. Yeah.

Yeah. So okay, fast forward a little bit. You are in. You, you. You have packed your bags and you have gotten on the flights to Alaska. What was the travel like? Was it like a whole bunch of travel and, and three planes and the whole, the whole shebang?

It wasn't too bad. So I decided I wanted to fly out of Minneapolis because it's just non stop from Minneapolis to Anchorage. A half hour drive from, from Sioux City. My wife and I recently moved from Minneapolis. We have a lot of friends there. So the night before I left, we had a gathering at a local brewery. Some friends of mine came. I met my, my group. Chat buddies were there. Yeah. And some friends of ours who lived there as well too. My wife was there, she was coming back from another trip. So we had a big pile of people hanging out. People were kind of slapping me on the back and wishing me luck and seeing friends and family who live there as well too. So the next day. So it was a really nice send off.

Yeah.

Sort of shared people like you're going to get a weird inreach message that's me letting you know there's good news or bad, that sort of thing. So the flight was pretty easy. It was, let's see, I think we left around 6 to 3 hour flight, 3 hour time change. So got in around 10 o'.

Clock.

Everything went well. I kind of double, triple, quadruple check to make sure my rifle was empty, the bullets were here, knife and suppressor were there. And then the next I got there. Yeah, it was Sunday. Monday is when I met a courier who got us up to where we were meeting some other people that were on the hunt. I met another guide and his hunter and then I drove up to where we were taking off with another guide and he was meeting his hunter in the field. So it was a group of us who got up there and then we had lunch and then we got on our plane and then we flew off into the lake where we were going to kind of start our hunt. So. Okay, it wasn't too bad. I mean it was, it was fast. And I remember the, the pace of it was like it was a little bit of hurry up and wait. So we get here, let's wait for the weather. Okay, weather's okay. Let's get on, let's weigh everybody, let's get, let's make a move. Yeah. And first time flying on one of those de Havilland planes from, I think it was from 1963. It still runs like a top. It was, it was great. So front seat. Got to see the whole thing.

Oh, that's sweet. That's sweet.

It's great.

So when you guys landed, was it you and another hunter? Were there a couple hunters or how'd that, what did camp look like for you guys?

Yeah. So when we landed, there were five people on the plane. There was myself, two guides and a hunter and then the pilot, of course. When we got off, we met the outfitter there and he had another, he had a packer who was helping out one of the other hunters. So it was a good group of us. And that was our chance to kind of check all of our paperwork, make sure that we have all of our harvest tags, make sure we have all the, the locking tags, make sure that, you know, if a trooper did come by, we had everything that we needed, including license, including firearm safety as well too.

Oh, that's good. That's a good deal.

So that was from there. I mean, when we landed, it was just kind of put on your waiters real quick. Your wiggies, waiters jump into the water, start unloading the plane. There was a Piece of high ground that we staged everything and kind of shook hands and then we kind of went our way, so.

Nice. So was this like a base camp where you're sleeping in a wall tent or were you sleeping in like your, your pup tent? Little. Little thing?

Yeah, this was, this was spike camp. We, when we left that, that sort of drop off point, I went with a guide and his hunter. And then we made our way a couple of miles along this creek where we were. And then we practiced our rifle, just kind of shooting ones to make sure nothing got jostled in transportation. And then we just camped there by the, by the creek. The plan was. And that was Monday night, Tuesday. The plan was for us to then get up, pack up camp again, walk a short distance, and then I would meet up with my guide and my packer at 9:00'. Clock. And then I. That was Cole and Ben, who were awesome. And then the other hunter and his guide went off in their direction and we made our march up to where we were going.

So, okay, so how far of a, how far of a pack are we talking or like a backpacking trip are we talking. When you talk about being from, from the drop off point at the lake to where you get into hunting, I.

Would say about seven miles. So two miles to, from the, from the lake to the first camp spot and then another half mile, another four and a half. So yeah, about seven miles to. To camp where we actually had our base camp for the sheep hunt. And I, I was talking with one of your. Or I was listening to one of your other podcasts and he was talking about the miles. It's, it's different. It's not trail, it's not hard pack. It's this, this term muskeg. Yep. Where it's like this loamy, soft tundra material that you could roll an angle really quickly. It's like a big moose hole in there somewhere. So you're constantly checking your poles. And so it's a long, it's a long slog. And it was wet. It had rained a couple days before, so it was pretty wet as well too. So a lot of up and down, a lot of busting through briers and bush bashing too.

So yeah, I had my first taste of that, you know, in, in August, and it was not the vast expanses of the muskeg and the tundery stuff, but we had like pockets and just making sure you don't fall up to your neck in, in the mud is like half of the, half of the mental struggle. You know, it's not like, it's not like up here where you can just kind of stormtrooper and, and you know, usually when you're, when I call it stormtrooper and you're just like head down like grinding and walking, you just gotta pay so much attention. I mean it takes a lot of energy, wouldn't you say?

It takes a lot of energy to like mental energy to kind of focus. But yeah, physical energy. When I was driving up to the kind of the staging area before we took off, I told the guide that I was driving up with where we were going and he said oh, oh, I don't end like what do you mean? He's like, oh, that's a hike. You're gonna, you're gonna need your energy.

Nice. Nice.

So that, that was the start. Yeah.

So did you. So then you had your pup tent. Like were you in like a classic like marmot tent or big Agnes or something? Like what. And was that yours or did they provide it?

I bought my own so. And that's another whole conversation as well too in this time from when I made this commitment to do this hunt to when it was time. I was buying and researching gear throughout that process. So I bought this tent and tested it out a couple of times on different hunts as well too again for that, for that purpose. But I bought the Kuyu Mountain Star two person tent because it has a little bit of extra room and it also has two vestibules as well too. It has a built in fly that you don't have to set up separately. So the, the waterproof part is already on there. That's pretty easy to set up. I had carbon fiber poles that broke on the last day of the hunt. So they replaced those which I really appreciate. So yeah, it was just a two person tent. Got it set up really easily. And then we had a bear fence around us as well too. But nice. We're running the Hilleberg tents. They had the one person Hillbergs.

Okay, gotcha. It seems like the, the qu tents and the qu stuff it is, you know, baked into that DNA to be be built for those kinds of hunts like that. That's just like their background. But I know a lot of those guys, they love the Hillbergs. You know, like a lot of people love the four season Hillbergs.

Yeah, it's a little bit more, it's a little heavier, more expensive I suppose. But they spend a lot more time in the field than I do. So that makes sense. Yeah. So they really like them and they worked really well.

Cool. So how'd the hunt go from there once you got up to where you needed to be? Hey, not to freak you out, because I know a lot of you haven't even gone on this year's hunt yet, but if you want to be hunting out west in 2026, your planning has to start now. Here's the reality. Most hunters wait until tags come out and then scramble. That's when hunts get wasted or you just end up hoping for the best. The guys who are consistently finding success out west don't operate like that. They're stacking hunts, building rotations and preparing months, sometimes years in advance. That's exactly why I created the Hunt west unlimited membership. It's $2,500. And yeah, that's a big number, but it's absolutely packed with value. Unlimited hunt consulting with me, Onyx game plans for every tag you draw in season, text access +Mountain Tough memberships. So your fitness matches your ambition. Honestly, it's probably my least profitable service because of how much time we spend together. But for the right hunter, it's a no brainer. If you're the kind of person who wants to take your planning and off season prep to the elite level, this is your chance. Spots are limited to five, and once they're full, that's it. So if you want 2026 to be your best year of hunting yet, head over to huntwestplanning.com unlimited and lock in your membership today. If you have questions, you can always reach out to me jadenuntwest.net or via email. All right, back to the show. You're listening to the Hunt west podcast.

So, so we got there on Tuesday night around 7. It was still pretty light out, so we had dinner and had some laughs. And by the way, I want to mention that my guides, I really appreciate their, their pacing. You know, a couple of times on that hike from where we met to where we finally ended for, for camp that night, they said, you know what, this is your hunt. You know, we're here to, to meet you at your pace. They're 10 years younger than I am, with many, many more years doing this hunt. So they knew that, you know, I was going to struggle a little bit. So I really appreciated how they kept us going. But it wasn't a forced march. It was, was really. And so we would stop and have a break. I, you know, by the way, there's never, there's no such thing as too much Lugo tape. I'll say that.

Okay, bring the Lugo tape.

Yeah, don't forget the Lugo tape. But we, we had a really good pace and, you know, we weren't in a hurry. You know, this is. See, this is the Wednesday before opening, so. Or the Tuesday before opening. So the season opened on Sunday. We were getting in on Tuesday, So we had lots and lots of time. And I think that strategy worked really well for us for a couple of reasons. We were squatting and we were in a spot where people, if they were flying over, they should have been done doing any airplane scouting by the 31st. But some people were still flying around. They saw us, they knew we were there, they saw our tents. They weren't going to come into that, that area. And the plan throughout this process that I talk about with Cole and Ben was find sheep early babysit, be ready for opening day, shoot the round. So that was how we kept the plan the entire time. So, so that's. So on Wednesday morning, Cole said that he was going to go up and do some scouting. Ben was going to stay in camp. And then they would switch every day they would do that. And then I would join them in the afternoons or whenever they got back. I heard Cole yell at about 8 o' clock in the morning, look at the rams over on this meadow. Two that we had been looking at. And so I kind of rolled out of bed and said, what's going on? And he was right. We looked over. We saw a band of four rams that were a mile and a half mile and three quarters away. They couldn't see us, but we could very clearly see them. So on the first morning that we were there, we had rams in our sights. We had four rams, one of whom, as we learned later, was really, really close. The other three, you know, with their scopes, they. They could. They could tell that they weren't. They weren't legal. So.

Okay, gotcha, dude. It's funny you talk about that like it was one of the things I noticed being in Alaska was managing other hunter. Pressure is a vital part of hunting in Alaska. And like, we always assume that you're like, going to this vast frontier expanse and, and. But because of the nature of how people hunt it and the interest in hunting it, you do have to think about other hunters. And it's funny, you talk about getting in there babysitting, then also getting there in time to kind of claim a spot. That's. That's like, that's how I'm thinking about doing my rifle mule deer hunt this year. Like, we're going to go into some high country spots on the 13th and it's like, okay, well if we get there two days before, then anyone who's getting there the day before will know that we're already in there. You know, and it's all that mental game. But that is wild to hear. You know, you guys were, you're managing that pressure. Did you see any other hunters up there or was it kind of like because you had that spot, you were good.

We didn't see any other hunters. We did see, like I said, we did see some planes who I think obviously were flying over where we were to to scout. People might have known about these rams way earlier and they were just kind of circling back. But no, we didn't see any other hunters.

That's nice.

But I really, you know, just going back to that strategy, I, I just, it's a little bit different because the, this territory is so hard to get into goofy that I'd be surprised if we did see anybody else. But we had plenty of food, we had plenty of water, we had plenty of good spirits and good humor to kind of keep us going for as long as we need to be out there. So I liked setting it up that way so that whatever we found out on opening day we would be either ambushing or stocking up on a ram. Which means that maybe the season's over a little bit sooner because it's about a 10 day season. But that means on the night of opening day or the next day, we're on our way back out. I like that for lack of trying. It's not for lack of effort, but we were just front loading the experience with all of that scouting, all of that stalking and all of that, that research and we ended up patterning these issue.

That's sweet. I love, I mean I think that there's. In the, in the west and in the Rocky Mountain west in particular, there's like two approaches to every hunt. One is to get your animal through scouting. It's like, it's one of my favorite things to do is just have spend enough time in an area that you go roll out there opening morning and you get it done. Like, and in that way you've spent so much time out there, like you said, you've had the experience beforehand. And then, and then when opening day comes, like obviously your quote unquote hunt is shorter, but you had the whole thing. The inverse of that is to say, and obviously this is separate from Alaska experiences. But the inverse of that is to say I'm going to wait until Every joker goes home. I can try to be on the other side. You know, it's funny, I was looking again, I was looking back at your texts from 20233 when you went on your mule deer hunt. And it's an area that you're helping.

That, by the way, I appreciate it.

Yeah, no problem. It's an area that I, it's busy. Like my friends who hunt that, who live in that area, it's. It's busy. But when you were there, you were like the second week of season, you got there on like the eighth when the season started on the first and I was reading through your text and I was like, no, we're not seeing other hunters. And I was just like, yeah, you, you've kind of picked up on that, that whole, that whole dichotomy either getting there, killing them from scouting or killing them after people have left.

One of the principles I like to keep in mind is most hunters are lazy. So if I can just put that much more effort, either front loading the experience or going or doing that and going an extra two miles or so. Yeah, a lot of that might fall apart, might fall away. Some hunters talk to, like to use that pressure to kind of set themselves up, you know, in a position where people might be pushing deer or elk or moose towards them. But in my experience, it's just been with turkey hunting as well too. Just going a little bit further or just getting up a little bit early or just getting there a little bit sooner than everybody else.

Yeah. So back to Alaska. When did you, when did you guys. So you had like five days or something before the season started. When did you spot the ram that you decided you would guys would go after?

I'd have to ask Cole and Ben. Exactly. We knew very early within this band of four that one of them was very, very close. And your. For your listeners who aren't aware, there's a couple of different ways to determine whether a ram is legal or the easiest. Well, I would say the easiest, but the one that you can actually count off is the 8 year old Ram where you're close enough that you can see eight of the annuli. And with the lamb tip, the age of the animal. The stick test, which is from where the ends of the horns cross over the base of the horns, if it's double broomed, meaning that both of the lamb tips are gone. Another one that I learned about is if the angle of the lamb tip matches, the angle of the base of the horn is also. And then also full curl as well. Too. You can look at the side and see that full curl. So I give these guys a lot of credit. They spent a lot of time, they were not in any hurry. They weren't going to be forced into determining whether this was legal or not. They just, they couldn't, they, they knew very quickly that was potential for this one. But we must have spent hours and hours and hours. Cole had 120 power Suaro scope that he was using. Ben was using a 60. They had their phone scopes zooming in, zooming out, capturing screen captures. I think they felt very strongly about this ram, otherwise we wouldn't have made our stock. But we spent a lot of time looking at that RAM to make sure he was, he was legal. Again, they, they felt very strongly. But when we started our stock on late Sunday morning, around 10 o', clock, we had gone through a couple different scenarios. We could do plan A or plan B. Plan A felt like we were putting too many eggs into one basket and it was just kind of limiting our, our options in case it didn't work out. Plan B was there was a little bit more opening in case this didn't work out. We could kind of pull back and go another route. So we ended up going with plan B and it was a hike down, grab water, hike back up still. I mean, we started at 10 o'. Clock. There was a photo that I took where I've got my right shoulder against this rock. And Ben and Cole got both scopes kind of looking out where they could see one ram. And then again after pattern, these rams, we still didn't know if they were going to come over where we had seen them feeding for the past few days. So all of this, all else to say that all of this was done with the presumption that he may be legal.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, all of this, eight hours of hiking and climbing, climbing and grief to get up there getting the position. And then there was a moment where Cole said to Ben and Ben said to Cole, yes, this ram is legal. And I was just like, oh my gosh. Because I, I was, I was sitting there unknowing whether this, this ram was legal or not. And we really had to get up to close to 500 yards for them to, to really make a certified determination that, that he was legal. So I think that's a part that people don't realize about sheep hunting is that there's, there are some kind of no brainers, but there's a lot that you may not be able to tell until you get really Close and you know, if he's not, then you pull back and you, you, you work on plan B, C or D. Yeah.

So what was the, what were the characteristics of this ram that made him, made him legal?

He was eight and then also four curl.

Okay, so he had both. He had two of them. Nice.

Get two of them. And then I don't know how the, the Department of Game and Fish does it if they do a stick test as well too, but he had two of them at least, so.

Yeah, that's great. So once you guys got up there, what, I mean, how long did that take you guys to, to get up and into position and do the stock? Was it an all day kind of adventure?

Yeah, we got up and I, we, we looked at it from, we were about a mile and a half or a mile and three quarters away from where camp was to where we were going to these, these meadows, these drainages. We left around 10. I shopped the Ram at 7:52, but we were up there by 5 o'.

Clock.

So it was about a seven hour hike to get up there and then to get in position and do everything else. But yeah, once we got over there, Jaden, the landscape totally changed. It was, the grass was greener. There were these beautiful flowers that were coming out of the ground as well too. The lichen on the rocks were oranges and yellows. You know, there's these beautiful sheep in this area as well too. It just felt totally different. On that south facing slope. You can see why the rams wanted to be there. They had escape routes, they had food, they had water, they could get down, they could get up. Plenty of places to bed, plenty of places for shelter as well too. It just felt like as soon as we kind of crossed and kind of walked up that, that side of the meadows, it just felt totally different.

Oh, that's sweet, man. I love, I love how, you know, and it's one of the things I hope more hunters can pull from watching sheep hunters, but like sitting back and glassing like you guys were doing a mile and a half away or whatever. Gosh, that's like such a, that's a tactic that I, I was, you know, kind of taught by guys for mule deer and elk hunting. It's like, okay, well step one, you, you need to find them. Look, you can't find them if you're standing on top of them. And you know, just with optics today, it's like so much easier to, to see them. Could you see those at a mile and a half in your binos?

Yeah, I could. I could see them with my naked eye.

Really? That's cool.

Yeah, it was like, we had beautiful weather. I mean, we had couple of just bright, bright sunny days. There was a point where we would walk up this hill and kind of shield ourselves so we weren't skylined. We'd get. You know, we would cut off maybe a half a mile and then see them from a mile as well, too. But I could roll out of my sleeping bag, unzip my door, and I could see them.

That's pretty sweet.

It's amazing.

That's cool. Yeah. And at that distance, like you guys were talking about, you were talking, yelling, you know, you could do whatever you can get away.

Couldn't do. Couldn't see us. And even if they could, it didn't bother them. We.

Yeah.

Considering how far they were going down and how long they were in that area, it was a big indicator to us that there were no wolves, there were no bears. There were none of the sort of the natural predators that would. Would spook them, would bump them out. They were in no hurry, and they were in. No. They were not concerned. So.

That's sweet.

It's been easy, which I don't. I've never heard too many stories about people patterning sheep. I don't know if that's possible in some cases, but in this case, they were. They had everything they needed, not knowing that we were there.

That's awesome. So you said you got up there at 5, but didn't shoot him for another couple hours? Like, how did. How did that whole stock go? Did you guys have to make a bunch of adjustments and. And get into good shooting positions? Like, how that. How'd that all play out?

Yeah. Cole had been hunting in this area before, so he kind of knew a little bit of the topography. So we went up to a spot, sat for a little bit. Cole and Ben had to go up and see if the rams were kind of making their way over this. This ridge that we were on. We had to make our way down. We took a break to just kind of have something to eat, put on our installation, get my rifle ready, go over last steps. I should say, too, before this, we even got to this point, Cole, Ben, and I spent some time talking about communication about what the. What the shot would look like if we were. If we were there. So, you know, Ben would be on my right, Cole would be on my left. Cole does bring a rifle. Some hunters do in the case of, like, a gut shot or. Or a bad shot where they Put an animal, they try to just shoot at the animal again. Was hoping it would be necessary. It wasn't. But we talked about communication, first of all, making sure that we're both all looking at the same ram, Making sure that we understand which one we're shooting at. Waiting for the right shot. Cole would communicate with me about where the animal is. So I made sure to stay on him. He would say wait if it's. Something changes. And then when you're ready, would be my signal to, to turn on the, turn off the safety and then, and then wait for the shot. So that kind of put my mind at ease a little bit because it wasn't improvised. It was. We kind of knew what we were going to do when we got up there.

Yeah.

And I will say seeing these animals over the span of a couple days took the fever out of it a little bit as well too because I could see the animal that we were looking at for days. And so I got used to the, to the fact of seeing him and, and what it would be like and his movements so that it wasn't as if all of a sudden we saw this animal coming over ridge. My mind goes crazy like there he is. And then lose that concentration. And that was important. So.

Dude, that is such a. That is one of the, the biggest advantages I think to just the spot and stock method in general is when you have that kind of time to be measured and calculated like you said, you get a chance to really quell the, the buck fever on it. So you kind of alluded to it, but it sounded like like your, your gun, you're shooting, your processes, they all, they all ended up executing a great shot. Yeah.

So we got up there, I said it was about 7:30, I would say, when we got into position, like I said. And I was a little issue prone. I had my bipod, had a bag underneath my shoulder. I dropped the mag. I did a couple of dry fire shots as well too, just to make sure that again, the nerves were kind of settled down. Jaden. The wind was howling. It was, you know, Cole had a Kestrel and it was gusting from 5 to 20 miles an hour. So that's was a downhill shot. 367 yards. And I just kind of waited for a calm moment. I just know from experience that, you know, if you've got that crosswind or if it's coming straight at you, it tends to push the bullet up, from what I understand. So I was trying to aim a little bit low, knowing that I was shooting downhill Then also there was a straight wind kind of coming at me, but at that distance, it felt calm where I was. But then, um, at the sheep, there might have been some wind, but I, I held. He gave me sort of a. A short quartering away shot. So I just aimed for his back and hit just the top of his lung, just below his spine, and he just tumbled down. Um, as I just, I, I said just fall. Just stop. And Cole said, reload, just in case. Uh, and he kept rolling in the end, which actually helped us because it got him a little bit further down, but we rolled down a little bit further and just, just passed there. So.

That's great, man.

Yeah.

Oh, well, congrats again. And I will say this too, like, one of my favorite things is, and maybe this is due to your professional background, maybe it's due to being an adult, like, observing these new things. But those guides sounded like that they were professional. They, they did a really good job with, like you said, their communication, working you through the dude, you know, talking, like, reload, like, stay on him. Like, that is. Those are all the things that I try to do both with guiding clients and then also just hunting with my buddies too. It's like, you know, like, if, if you can embody some of those things as a hunting partner, that you don't have to be guiding folks, but, like, it makes that experience so much better.

Yeah, I really, I'm really thankful for that because they were. I'll send you the video of the actual shot, but they're really cool as cucumbers, which does the same thing for me. And it wasn't, yeah, shoot or fire or kill. It. It was just when you're ready. So the agent Cole always said, and Ben always said that your job is the last 10 seconds of this hunt. You know, your job is when we're on the, on the sheep to shoot the shot. It's not a very long job, but it's a very important one.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So that helped a lot. That helped a lot.

That's sweet. So obviously, you know, you had a. You. It helps having three guys, but you had a pack out back to camp and like, all this stuff. How did you feel like your physical fitness was, all things considered?

Yeah. So I'll say it was a three day pack up. We shot the ram on Sunday. It was late, it was getting cold, the weather was starting to turn. So we gutted them, opened up the chest cavity, and we left him on the mountain. We walked down the hill and found a flat spot set up this really nice Dyneema TP tent that we just used for spike camping. It slept all three of us in there. And Jaden, when we set up the tent, the northern lights started firing. So it was this beautiful moment of this animal's life. The. This hunt experience with these guys and this. All of a sudden, this beautiful ending to this day, it was just spectacular.

So that's cool.

So I would say when I can get back to the details, but when I look back at what I was preparing for my hunt, it was just like, oh, man, you have no idea. Know, I was. I was carrying my 25 pound pack around the hills around here, taking it to the gym, getting on the StairMaster for 30 minutes, an hour or so. But, dude, yeah, there's. Here's what I'll say. It was more than I expected, but I'm glad that I met the challenge and surpassed it.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's. It's. You have no idea what you're getting into. All you. All you can do is you can meet the challenge and surpass it, or you can meet the challenge and, and not. So I think that's something I would share with people who are thinking about this. You can be in really good shape, and some people really are. So it might not be much of a challenge, but for me, there was some. There was some challenging parts to it.

Yeah. Well, and that's part of it is like I. I'll take a guy who's out of shape, but has the mental fortitude.

Yeah.

10 times out of 10 over someone who is in shape but like, starts getting in their head. Like, that's, that's, that's not a recipe for success. Doesn't matter how, how good, how fit they are.

Yeah, I think everyone will have their challenges. I had my challenges, certainly, and. But you have to be able to either get through it or just manage it and just say, you know what?

This.

I kept saying it. Embrace the suck.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. You gotta embrace that sucker. So it took you guys three days to get them out. Was it. Was it just heavy packs and multiple trips and the whole shebang? He got everything.

We got the animal cleaned on Monday. It was cold, it was wet. We got. And I'll. I'll send you a picture, but they got almost every scrap of meat off this animal, including the rib roll, all the, the leg meat, and it was all just completely deboned.

Nice.

We had one of the. Up the, of the sort of the paths that are available through this outfitter. We had one of the longest ones to get to camp. And then we added onto that to get to this, to this place to shoot the rams. So by Tuesday night, Monday night, we weren't even back at camp yet. And then we camped there, left the meat on a rock, which is like near the river, to kind of keep it cool. And then Tuesday morning we made our way back to the camp where our base camp was, added more weights, and then got back to another maybe about two thirds of the way back to where the plane was going to pick us up on Thursday. And then Wednesday we got down to the river, followed that for a ways, and then camped maybe about a half mile from the lake where the plane was going to pick us up. And then Thursday morning we got up and the plane picked us up around 12 noon. And then we got back, we weighed the packs. Mine. And maybe this is, this won't be news to a lot of your listeners, but with the cape, the prime cuts and the rib roll, rifle gear and horns, my pack was I think 75 pounds. And then their packs were 92 and 98 pounds.

Yeah, that's, that's. Those are really.

And they were carrying these, these frontier gear packs. They're the. From Cat. Have you seen those?

Yeah, there's. They're pretty popular up there up north.

Yeah. So they have, they have a little bit extra weight, but they're framed. And so. Yeah, so I'm, I'm sucking eggs and these guys are just. So we did, we did it.

Yeah. I mean, crap, man. Anything. Once you get north of that, like 70 pound mark, it's when things in particular, the thing I'm most concerned about is just making sure no one blows a knee, rolls an ankle.

Like it's really easy to twist an ankle or something.

Yeah. I mean, I've been on trips before where buddies have gotten injured on the packout and then whoever's not injured has to make multiple more trips. You're like, yeah, and of course you feel bad for whoever, you know, goes down, but then you're just like, oh, this is a, this is big. It's. So, yeah, good on you for having a good, good slog of a pack out. That really is like where the rubber meets the road is. It's not getting it there or it's not getting there. It's. It's getting it out.

And that's where, you know, like people say that's where the real work begins is, you know.

Yeah.

Getting rid of the meat, getting it partitioned. So who knows who's carrying what and Then yeah, at least that much time to get it back out.

That's awesome.

I think that I was really careful with is we always put our poles straight up. We didn't lay them down just because I didn't want to drop a pack and snap a, snap a pole. Because if you try to do that walk without trekking poles, it was murder. So just little things like that just to make sure that your, your pack out or your experience is easy.

Yeah, for sure. So looking back now, I mean, it's hindsight's always 20 20, but what, what would you have done anything differently preparing for this? Because I know I, you've done a really good job and you did a really good job of getting some good experience in the, some western landscape shooting a lot. You know, you were consistent with your exercising. What would you have done differently?

I think I would have. Well, one thing I, I, I, I wanted to mention too is that I had a, a few conversations and some good text conversations with both of my guides leading up to the hunt. Yeah, that was really helpful. Like they, they shared do's and don'ts. One of the first questions they asked me is, what's your why, why are you doing this?

Nice.

Can't ask that question or answer that question for yourself. Then you should be able to. So we went over, I sent them a spreadsheet with the gear list and weights and kind of measuring. I would pack my own food. I would not leave it up to the outfitter to, to provide food. I would talk with my guide and they both did a good job of this. I was like, oh, you guys get all this good food?

Yeah.

I'm like, well, I got this Halloween candy, so I would definitely do that. I would spend some time to research, you know, what I like to eat, how many calories I need to have per day, how much that weighs in the end. And just. Yeah. Because food should not be a limiting factor to your success.

Do you think, do you think you packed enough food or was it not enough food or was it just not the right taste and stuff? Like what, what was the downfall?

The outfitter provided the food, so. Oh, I take control over it. Got it. And in hindsight, I would have just said, listen, just, I will work with my guide and he and I work both of them and I will figure out a food situation. So, yeah, yeah. So I would do, I would, that would be a big thing. It's hard for anyone else who's never met you to know what you like, you know. Yeah, these guys didn't know, I was 6 foot 2 and 200 pounds. I, you know, I'm a 3,000 calorie machine, you know, if I'm putting a lot of, you know, miles in and stuff. So, yeah, so I would definitely do my own food. I. Unless you've been on it, it's kind of hard to share with someone what the physical characteristics of a hunt like this is. Yeah, but I would do even more. I mean, I can't drive to Wyoming to spend a weekend climbing mountains at, at 8, 000ft, but I feel like I'm more prepared now than I was then.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But even there's, there's. I've got a guy coming out, he's got Wyoming hunts, and he's, he's coming out for just a trip with his wife and they're going to go hiking around and just go climb some of these mountains on the trails and stuff. Not hunting, but just spending time on the mountains, you know, and, and just making it a quick trip from back east. And I think that's, man, that even doing that, like, sounds like it would probably help, and especially help, you know, with something that you talked about in the, in the beginning is with scale, you know, helping understand the scale of these things.

Yeah, that's a great idea. I think. I think that's a great idea that he's doing that.

Yeah.

Yeah. Well, I think, you know, the shooting part has been great, is, I think, is key. Yeah. And reaching out to people, you know, I think I, Yeah, I try not to bother people, but if I see people who have done these sheet plants, it's. Most people are willing to share the experience. Um, you might not get them on the phone for too long, but you'll get some good advice. Some things that maybe reiterate what you already heard.

Yeah, well, it's one of those things, man. Like, I listen to hunting podcasts all the time still, and it's like, you know, I remember talking with somebody about this and they were like, but don't, you know, I already, like, already know all this stuff, but it's like, yeah, it's just like reiterating a lot of things I already know. So you keep the things at the front of your mind that you need to know, and then every now and then you pick up a little gem and you're like, oh, that's, that's new information. You know, like, this is. It's a constant learning, so it's worth, worth trying to keep at it.

I find that most people have been pretty helpful they're not going to tell you where they shot the ram, but they're going to tell you what the experience is. Like, I found most people have been pretty, pretty open about that. Kind of makes that makes it feel like we're sharing information here and not being too possessive of it.

No, that's awesome. Well, man, I've really appreciated you like sharing your experience and your stories. What's, what's next on the docket? I mean, now that, now that you've gone through this compressed evolution, like now what?

Yeah. Well, first of all, I want to say thanks for having me on the podcast here. I really appreciate the time to, while it's still fresh in my mind to be able to share it you since you've been around and been available. So I really appreciate that, Jaden. So thanks for that.

Yeah, of course.

My, my little brother and I have never been on a hunt together. So we're going to go sort of like a farm to table experience or feed the table experience. In Texas, a group called Harvesting Nature has a wild pig harvesting weekend where you learn how to, for some new hunters like my brother, how to shoot, clean, process, and even cook the animal too. So we're going to do that in Texas on December. Nice. Cook some wild hogs. And then I've got a mule deer hunt in 2026 in South Dakota that I'm getting ready for.

Nice.

And you know, maybe, maybe an elk hunt, but I just, at this point, I really have to pace myself. It's, it's. I'm really eager to kind of get back there, but same time, I have to kind of pace.

Yeah, you gotta, you gotta finish catching up on some bills that were neglected last five years.

I won't share that, but just know they're there.

Yeah, exactly. Oh, good. Well, again, thanks, Chris. And yeah, I'm, I'm excited that you got on and shared your story because I, I think it just is a good reminder, you know, when, when you set your sights to something. Doesn't matter at what age you start. Doesn't matter what you do for a living. Like set your mind to a goal and just go get it. So good on you for doing that and doing it well.

Thanks, man. I appreciate it.

Yeah, you bet. All right. That's going to be the pod.

Okay.

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