“Wahoo! No way!” echoed through our house and the neighborhood. My mom and I thought Dad had won the lottery, but he said it was even better. Dad had drawn one of the incredibly coveted Alaskan bull muskox tags for the fall hunt. Dad’s research on this hunt led him to Matt White at Huntin’ Fool who had just returned from the same hunt. Matt was an excellent resource with first-hand intel on all the crazy logistics and hunt details, including his experience with one of several Nunivak Island transporters, Ed Kiokun. We quickly learned Ed was a stud who had an awesome seaworthy boat and a nice private cabin for before and after the hunt. Dad had also heard about the slim possibility of picking up one of the five Nunivak Island fall cow muskox tags that would be sold in person at the ADFG Betel office. It was such slim odds that we barely discussed. Once in Bethel, we waited for the ADFG to open. Patrick, the head wildlife biologist, let us in the building and said they had one cow tag left. It was my turn to holler with excitement.
Stepping onto the remote beach for the first time, my heart was racing with excitement. Within minutes of unloading our gear, Captain Ed and his fishing boat were quickly out of sight. The reality hit me, it was just my dad and me on a remote island in the Bering Sea. The only village on this island, Mekoryuk, was close to 100 miles away. We were on our own.
It had been a wild three days of travel challenges to get here. We had struggled with significant delays, missed flights, and lost luggage. We arrived at this remote beach with two coveted muskox tags (bull/cow) and gear to survive for a week. Once we had a camp set, we couldn’t wait to “beach comb” the miles and miles of remote beaches. We intentionally arrived several days before the fall muskox season opened on August 1st. We wanted to take every advantage of exploring Nunivak Island, located 30 miles off the West Coast of Alaska in the Bering Sea.
In all of our previous Alaska coastline adventures, we’ve always searched for the mystical “glass ball” style Japanese fishing buoy. The Japanese were famous for blowing glass balls on their fishing boats, wrapping them in rope, and using them for fishing. We had been warned that finding these old fishing treasures on Nunivak was nearly impossible since they had stopped using this style of fishing buoy more than 40 years ago.
Filled with excitement and an adventurous spirit, we set out to hike the surrounding beaches. We quickly uncovered all types of crabbing, boat rigging, and fishing equipment that had washed up on the beach. We envisioned that this fishing gear had come from the “Deadliest Catch” fishing fleet. Our destination was the very end of the beach that was inundated with driftwood and debris. Digging through debris, my heart raced with the blue sparkle of glass. My hands were shaking as I reached for the glass object. I yelled with excitement as I grabbed my first ever “glass ball”. We found one! To top off our awesome first day, we spotted our first muskox. There appeared to be a small herd several miles from camp. We also picked up a few dropped reindeer antlers. This place was awesome!
Opening morning, we spotted another herd of a dozen muskox about two miles from camp. Since it was just my dad and me, we really didn’t want to spook the herd and push them further away from our camp. There appeared to be a giant bull and several mature cows. Planning our stalk through the barren, treeless tundra was challenging. We struggled to stay hidden from the herd. Crawling through the marshy grass, using the minimal contours as cover, we eventually closed the distance. The famous Nunivak wind was thankfully blowing in our direction. Several hours later, we were within shooting distance.
Judging the herd was stressful. The squishy tundra and strong wind constantly jiggled the Swarovski spotting scope. Even though we were only 300 yards out, determining the largest bull and oldest cow was tough.
The animals were constantly moving and mixing with the rest of the herd. My heart was racing as I finally slid a 140-grain bullet into the Gunwerks 6.5 PRC and closed the bolt. After letting out a deep breath, I gently pulled the trigger. My cow dropped. I rolled over on my back with a huge sense of relief. My dad was studying his bull and making sure that it had the longest, thickest horns, with the largest bases called bosses. The bull was only 30 yards from the rest of the herd when my dad pulled the trigger. This giant bull tumbled down a small bank. We hollered with excitement and relief. We had two beautiful muskox on the ground.
Walking up on these two beautiful muskox was overwhelming. We shuttered with relief and trepidation, knowing the hard work ahead. We gave our thanks, took photos, and began the backbreaking work of breaking down these enormous muskox.
Packing my first load of gear back to our camp while Dad was butchering the animals, I remembered seeing an old seal skin-looking fishing dinghy close to our camp. I pushed, pulled, and dragged this old boat up the river by camp. There were no paddles, so I made paddles out of driftwood with some old nails that we had found. I managed to walk this vessel along the shoreline for over a mile. This boat would allow us to cut the distance in half for packing the meat back to camp. My dad was shocked when I told him about the boat and that it would cut our pack distance in half. He was in disbelief.
After two days of butchering and packing, we had two muskox loaded into our boat. We were terrified if it would actually float. To our amazement, it worked perfectly and we floated right into camp. We were incredibly relieved to be back in camp with both of our trophies.
Dad messaged Captain Ed of our status. Unfortunately, Ed advised us that there was a huge storm coming and he wouldn’t be able to pull us off the beach for another five days. The inReach chimed again. It said, “I’ll be there in 45 minutes.” My dad exploded like a tornado, grabbing armfuls of pots, pans, stoves, and food and shoving everything in totes. He yelled, “Go!” We had to break our entire camp down in 30 minutes and haul everything down the low tide on the beach. We’ve never moved so fast. As we were packing the last load to the beach, Ed was pulling up. It was a huge sense of relief that he came to get us and we were ready.
Nunivak Island was an awesome adventure. My dad and I also took an awesome Dall sheep while we were there. Edward and his wife, Beatrice, were incredible. We were blessed! We were sad to leave and hope to get back there someday.
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