The Moose Hunt
Hunting Moose.
This is an activity not for the faint of heart!
First, it is difficult to find moose during hunting season. They know you are coming, and they hightail it far up the mountain valleys, onto the prohibited spaces such as Kincaid Park and the Airport in Anchorage, Fort Richardson and Elmendorf military properties, and other areas that prohibit hunting. So that is the first problem.
The second problem is how to transport the fruits of your hunt… 400-500 pounds of meat.
Since I had a 7MM Mag rifle that could stop a moose in its tracks, I decided it was time to try to find one during hunting season. This had to be carefully choreographed since I was a schoolteacher and the hunting season opened almost simultaneously with the beginning of school. Our school system did not take kindly to its male teachers disappearing during the first week, so many years the choice was either a hunt or a job. While my friend Ron had offered to take me on a hunt flying in with his Cessna 180 on floats, I had to decline because I could not take the time off.
But one year my school schedule allowed me to plan a hunt with several teacher friends.
The plan was to travel to my friend Denny Weston’s lodge. Travel was north on the Richardson Highway toward Fairbanks, then taking a left to drive 20 miles west from the Paxon Lodge on the Denali Highway. There, if one was lucky, you could park off the road and Denny would meet you with his old pickup truck and help you carry your pack into his lodge. If you were unlucky, it was a walk for 4 miles battling mosquitoes and thawed tundra mud.
Denny’s beat-up Chevy pickup truck, with its high aspect and chains, could travel in over an old military “road” that was pocked with large mudholes. Denny hid large metal military landing mats (bought as surplus in Anchorage) in the bushes surrounding these holes. He could haul these out and place them in the bottom of the muck to allow him to navigate these spots. Other intrepid travelers not knowing about the landing mats would find barriers to entering his 40 acre “manufacturing and trade” site which Denny procured from the State of Alaska at no cost.
Thus, one Friday, I, Leigh, and Chuck traveled to Denny’s place for a moose hunt. His cabin and outbuildings were on the side of a hill overlooking Swede Lake, a deep, pristine, lake on a high plateau. The lake was filled with fish, beaver, eagles and loons, and one could use binoculars to “glass” the opposite shore for brown bear and moose. Indeed, a few weeks before our arrival, a large brown bear worked the top of the opposite hillside, rooting for berries for days. When we arrived, he was nowhere to be seen.
Denny had an ancient John Deere tractor on his property that he fitted with wide wheels on the front and a track system leading to the large back tires. This enabled him to haul a small wagon on the rear and go up and over the old military trail leading 20 miles into the wilderness beyond his property. The area was largely unpopulated, having been left alone after army maneuvers conducted in the mid-50s. Here, we conjectured, was the home of many moose, at least one of which we would be able to haul out if we could get close enough for a good shot.
One of our party, Chuck, was an Alaskan State trooper. He decided he could not spend enough time with us to make it back to his work, so he stayed at the lodge when we departed.
The tractor was slow and methodical, but also noisy. A few miles along our trip and one of the front tires fell completely into a hole designed to hold it. We could not power out and had to figure out a way to lift the tractor to get it onto level ground. There were no trees around to attach the front winch to, but we found an old log. Denny, Leigh, and I took turns digging a good size hole into which we placed the log. We attached a chain to it from the front winch and turning on the winch we lifted the front enough to free the tractor. We detached the winch and went along the trail.
A few miles further and we were high enough to view the complete Alaska range from right to left, framing the sky to our west. As we reached a high point and were about to move downward, to the left we saw the rack of a large bull moose. It was a good distance away, in a very heavy brush almost 5 foot high.
The moose lifted its magnificent head and looked directly at us. As we dismounted and tried to pry our way through the brush to get close enough to shoot, the moose leisurely stepped up and over the brush as he moved into the distance, far away from us.
Alas. That was our only moose sighting!
We chugged along another 4-5 miles and then settled down for the night next to a burbling stream about 10 feet wide. Denny pitched one tent for him and I, Leigh popped his up for himself nearby. After placing wo sleeping bags in our tent, we settled in with our gear in the wagon. Denny took his rifle to bed with him! I thought this odd but didn’t worry since he was a seasoned hunter and knew what he was doing.
It was almost 3 AM, finally pitch dark in the tent, when I heard a loud click.
Denny had just chambered a round in his rifle.
Outside, I heard a snuffling and the rolling of rocks as something, something big, moved around our tent. I heard a splashing as it entered the stream and splashed across.
Then silence.
And Denny put the safety on his rifle and went down to sleep.
I didn’t. I lay there for the next hours wondering what was out there.
In the morning I looked at the hard scrabble rocks surrounding the tent. Were there bear tracks? Moose tracks? I could find nothing. And Denny awoke, took down the tent and loaded up to continue. He never even looked about, ignoring the fact that we might have been a bear snack.
We spent two days searching for any elusive moose. As I sat with my head net on and glassed the hills across from a nice perch near the Gulkana River, a white ermine ran over my feet. I picked through rocks tumbling by to find gold glints of pyrite - fools’ gold I figured. I thoroughly enjoyed the peace and noises of the small stand of trees nearby.
But I and my company of intrepid hunters never saw another moose.
And Chuck, back at the lodge, had glassed the opposite shore and spied a good size cow moose munching at the water’s edge. He ran down to the lake, rifle in hand, and motored one of Denny’s small boats across the lake. He shot that moose, dressed it, transported the meat back to the lodge, and used Denny’s old truck to return to the Denali Highway.
By the time we had returned he was long gone with a nice note thanking us for the wonderful moose hunt!
This is an activity not for the faint of heart!
First, it is difficult to find moose during hunting season. They know you are coming, and they hightail it far up the mountain valleys, onto the prohibited spaces such as Kincaid Park and the Airport in Anchorage, Fort Richardson and Elmendorf military properties, and other areas that prohibit hunting. So that is the first problem.
The second problem is how to transport the fruits of your hunt… 400-500 pounds of meat.
Since I had a 7MM Mag rifle that could stop a moose in its tracks, I decided it was time to try to find one during hunting season. This had to be carefully choreographed since I was a schoolteacher and the hunting season opened almost simultaneously with the beginning of school. Our school system did not take kindly to its male teachers disappearing during the first week, so many years the choice was either a hunt or a job. While my friend Ron had offered to take me on a hunt flying in with his Cessna 180 on floats, I had to decline because I could not take the time off.
But one year my school schedule allowed me to plan a hunt with several teacher friends.
The plan was to travel to my friend Denny Weston’s lodge. Travel was north on the Richardson Highway toward Fairbanks, then taking a left to drive 20 miles west from the Paxon Lodge on the Denali Highway. There, if one was lucky, you could park off the road and Denny would meet you with his old pickup truck and help you carry your pack into his lodge. If you were unlucky, it was a walk for 4 miles battling mosquitoes and thawed tundra mud.
Denny’s beat-up Chevy pickup truck, with its high aspect and chains, could travel in over an old military “road” that was pocked with large mudholes. Denny hid large metal military landing mats (bought as surplus in Anchorage) in the bushes surrounding these holes. He could haul these out and place them in the bottom of the muck to allow him to navigate these spots. Other intrepid travelers not knowing about the landing mats would find barriers to entering his 40 acre “manufacturing and trade” site which Denny procured from the State of Alaska at no cost.
Thus, one Friday, I, Leigh, and Chuck traveled to Denny’s place for a moose hunt. His cabin and outbuildings were on the side of a hill overlooking Swede Lake, a deep, pristine, lake on a high plateau. The lake was filled with fish, beaver, eagles and loons, and one could use binoculars to “glass” the opposite shore for brown bear and moose. Indeed, a few weeks before our arrival, a large brown bear worked the top of the opposite hillside, rooting for berries for days. When we arrived, he was nowhere to be seen.
Denny had an ancient John Deere tractor on his property that he fitted with wide wheels on the front and a track system leading to the large back tires. This enabled him to haul a small wagon on the rear and go up and over the old military trail leading 20 miles into the wilderness beyond his property. The area was largely unpopulated, having been left alone after army maneuvers conducted in the mid-50s. Here, we conjectured, was the home of many moose, at least one of which we would be able to haul out if we could get close enough for a good shot.
One of our party, Chuck, was an Alaskan State trooper. He decided he could not spend enough time with us to make it back to his work, so he stayed at the lodge when we departed.
The tractor was slow and methodical, but also noisy. A few miles along our trip and one of the front tires fell completely into a hole designed to hold it. We could not power out and had to figure out a way to lift the tractor to get it onto level ground. There were no trees around to attach the front winch to, but we found an old log. Denny, Leigh, and I took turns digging a good size hole into which we placed the log. We attached a chain to it from the front winch and turning on the winch we lifted the front enough to free the tractor. We detached the winch and went along the trail.
A few miles further and we were high enough to view the complete Alaska range from right to left, framing the sky to our west. As we reached a high point and were about to move downward, to the left we saw the rack of a large bull moose. It was a good distance away, in a very heavy brush almost 5 foot high.
The moose lifted its magnificent head and looked directly at us. As we dismounted and tried to pry our way through the brush to get close enough to shoot, the moose leisurely stepped up and over the brush as he moved into the distance, far away from us.
Alas. That was our only moose sighting!
We chugged along another 4-5 miles and then settled down for the night next to a burbling stream about 10 feet wide. Denny pitched one tent for him and I, Leigh popped his up for himself nearby. After placing wo sleeping bags in our tent, we settled in with our gear in the wagon. Denny took his rifle to bed with him! I thought this odd but didn’t worry since he was a seasoned hunter and knew what he was doing.
It was almost 3 AM, finally pitch dark in the tent, when I heard a loud click.
Denny had just chambered a round in his rifle.
Outside, I heard a snuffling and the rolling of rocks as something, something big, moved around our tent. I heard a splashing as it entered the stream and splashed across.
Then silence.
And Denny put the safety on his rifle and went down to sleep.
I didn’t. I lay there for the next hours wondering what was out there.
In the morning I looked at the hard scrabble rocks surrounding the tent. Were there bear tracks? Moose tracks? I could find nothing. And Denny awoke, took down the tent and loaded up to continue. He never even looked about, ignoring the fact that we might have been a bear snack.
We spent two days searching for any elusive moose. As I sat with my head net on and glassed the hills across from a nice perch near the Gulkana River, a white ermine ran over my feet. I picked through rocks tumbling by to find gold glints of pyrite - fools’ gold I figured. I thoroughly enjoyed the peace and noises of the small stand of trees nearby.
But I and my company of intrepid hunters never saw another moose.
And Chuck, back at the lodge, had glassed the opposite shore and spied a good size cow moose munching at the water’s edge. He ran down to the lake, rifle in hand, and motored one of Denny’s small boats across the lake. He shot that moose, dressed it, transported the meat back to the lodge, and used Denny’s old truck to return to the Denali Highway.
By the time we had returned he was long gone with a nice note thanking us for the wonderful moose hunt!
Swede Lake compilation, stitched together before pano shots were available.