The pursuit of a Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep had been a dream of mine since childhood over 40 years ago, so much so that when asked, “What is your dream vacation?” my answer had always been, “A bighorn sheep hunt.”
When 2023 applications were due, I was coming to terms with the reality that my dream likely would not happen and was about to give up the pursuit of the sheep. After applying for over 15 years in multiple states and building several preference points, the reality was that the draw odds have continually been getting less and continue to become more and more expensive. However, with my wife’s encouragement, I completed the applications. I had such low confidence in drawing a tag that I didn’t bother checking the status on the draw date. When driving down the road one day and a credit card charge alert came across on my phone for the amount of $2,554.04, I casually glanced at it. With that amount, I presumed my wife had booked a vacation. When I arrived where I was driving, I looked closer to see where we were going for vacation and noticed the charge was from State of Colorado Game and Fish. Initially, I was leery and assumed it must be a fraud charge, so I logged into my CO CPW account to check the draw status of my sheep application. It was April 18th, and my status was PENDING. The next hour before the CPW office opened, I spent looking at the sheep application and verifying the dollar amount for a non-resident sheep license, which was the exact amount of the credit card charge. I was getting excited.
It was finally time to make the phone call. The staff member verified that my application status was still in pending status and stated the computer would have a delay, and the credit card charges would hit before the status changed to SUCCESSFUL. They also told me that if I were successful, I would receive an email shortly. At 11:13 a.m., the email arrived. Immediately, I took a screenshot of the email and sent it to my wife. Within minutes, she called, elated about my news. My next step was contacting Huntin’ Fool to start the process of planning and choosing an outfitter for the job. With draw odds of less than 1%, I was feeling lucky and bought a Powerball ticket. I did not win the Powerball, but I did win my lottery dream. I was going bighorn sheep hunting!
My lifestyle changed that day. Like my previous hunts, it was all about the planning and excitement of getting ready for the experience-of-a-lifetime. Being a flatlander from Minnesota, I knew I had a lot of work to do both physically and mentally – new diet, exercise bike, riding bike, and hiking. I also purchased a weighted training vest and started wearing it to work and in other daily tasks. I am a roof inspector, so I wore it while climbing ladders, walking on roofs, loading shingles, as well as push mowing the lawn and hiking on hills around the lake. I was wearing it 10 hours a day, 5 days a week and gradually adding more weight every other week until it was 50 lbs. Even when people looked at me funny, I knew the mountain was going to be tough on me, and I wanted to do everything I could to be as prepared as possible.
The four months flew by, and before I knew it, I was packing for my dream vacation. The outfitter I chose was Compass West Outfitters. Chris was fantastic to deal with, and my guides, Dalton and Zach, were going to help me. In mid-August, I received a message from Dalton with a photo of a nice ram and a text, “It’ll be a physically challenging hunt but very rewarding.” That statement got me extremely excited, yet at the same time, I was concerned about my physical abilities to conquer the mountain. In my mind, I knew I had trained extremely hard.
Dalton and Zach headed up the mountain a couple of days before I arrived to try and relocate the ram, and it was decided that depending on where he was, that would determine what drainage trail I would hike up. I arrived several days before the season opened so I could acclimate to the elevation and met Dalton. We checked our packs and started hiking up the mountain. It was very intimidating, very steep, rugged, and
rocky. As I looked up at where the bighorn sheep resided, I thought, “How am I going to make it all the way up there?” Dalton must have sensed my uncertainties and told me, “One step at a time and we will get there.”
After hours of hiking, we made it to our first camping spot about two-thirds of the way up. The following morning, we were to meet Zach at a higher glassing point and try to locate the rams. A group of four had been spotted over the past month, and we were going to make a game plan for how we were going to get to them and make my dream come true.
We spent the first couple of days glassing and searching. On day three, a group of three rams were spotted all the way across on top of the other side, approximately a 10-hour hike away, so we packed up camp and started to make our way up and over. Our only stop being to fill enough water for a couple of days as there was none where we were headed. We were about 300 yards from the top when a legal ram appeared above us, standing at the ridgeline, so we hurried to get into a shooting position and waited to see if the bigger ram would follow and show himself. The smaller ram came within 90 yards of us and then headed away. We waited an hour but no bigger ram followed. We continued our trek to the top and spent time behind the glass with no other rams to be found. We continued hiking for another few hours and reached an area to set up camp just before dark.
The following morning, Dalton and Zach headed to higher ground to glass and I stayed close to camp. Mid-morning, Dalton returned with news that Zach had spotted the bigger ram. He was a three to four-hour hike away, so we headed out and up. This was where I had to really dig deep. When I spotted Zach sitting at the top of the mountain behind his spotting scope, I started to get nervous and excited. We crawled up slowly and observed two rams 600 yards away feeding up the mountain. I rested my rifle on a rock and located the bigger ram in my scope. I set my scope to 600 yards and settled in to take the shot. I squeezed the trigger, and “Bang!” I had shot high, just over his back. The two rams moved down the rocks, and we lost the larger one in some cover. After a couple of minutes, he reappeared in a rock field and bedded down broadside at 480 yards. I repositioned, reset my scope, pulled the trigger, and it was hooves up! He rolled down the rocks. I had just harvested my bighorn sheep. There were high fives and smiles all around.
The hike down to him seemed like it took forever. It was remarkable to put my hands on his heavy horns. I was filled with so many emotions that are difficult to explain. What an amazing animal. After a lot of pictures and celebration, we were able to get him onto our packs. Before heading off the mountain, Dalton asked me to sum up the hunt and only one word came to mind, EXTREME.
After a long hike off the mountain, we arrived at the trailhead at 1:37 a.m. and slept in the trucks for a few hours before heading to the Game and Fish office to have the ram registered and plugged. As I drove the 17 hours back to Minnesota with the horns in the seat next to me, I still had a tough time actually believing I had been successful.
This was truly a dream hunt-of-a-lifetime! I want to thank all parties involved that helped make this dream come true, especially the above and beyond amount of time the guides spent prior to the hunt to enable me to have success in a unit that has had a 35%-45% success rate the last several years. If you find yourself winning your “dream lottery hunt,” my best advice is to use the resources that are available so you too can dramatically increase your odds of success!
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