Kodiak Deer Hunt 2018

This November headed back to Kodiak to chase around some Sitka Blacktail deer.

A Successful deer hunt means heavy packs

It felt so good to be back in Kodiak with our favorite local pilots Island Air, heading out on a new adventure! This time Casey's girlfriend Chantelle was joining us for her first Sitka Blacktail hunt. Weather was iffy as usual, but after a couple hour wait our pilot gave us the go-ahead and off we went!

Establishing camp. For those of you who have been there, you know how hard it can be to find a flat enough spot for a tent in a valley of tussocks (let alone two tents near each other!) We filled in the holes with moss and made do. Home sweet home!

Anticipation continued to mount as we saw buck after buck on the hike in. Morning couldn't come soon enough!

The terrain was devoid of snow, and temps were in the 40's. Pleasant weather indeed, a rarity on Kodiak.

We split up, with Casey and Chantelle going one way, and John another, as we had only a couple of days and a lot of tags to fill. Chantelle starts the hunt off right, taking down a beautiful big buck by mid-morning.

Chantelle approaches her big buck.

As they were admiring her buck, another big buck appeared on the horizon. A quick decision and set up resulted in Casey harvesting a nice buck as well!

Two bucks down!

Meanwhile on a nearby hillside...John draws first blood with his new Kimber Talkeetna 375 H&H. A little over-kill perhaps, but it sure did the trick

Arguably one of the best eating wild meats in Alaska.

John packed his deer back to camp and stashed it in a tree, then decided to use the last hour of light to try and get his first pistol kill with his new Kimber Super Jägaer 10mm...

John admires his second sitka-blacktail buck, taken with a Kimber 10mm pistol.

John dressed his second deer out in the dark, meanwhile Casey and Chantelle were still hiking off the mountain which their deer. It was turning in to a late night for everyone!