One Heck Of A Ride

67 Arctic Islands or Peary caribou, the smallest of the world’s caribou/reindeer subspecies Other North American Game world’s wild oxen, but I’d expected they would be closer to the size of a cow bison and it was at least a hundred pounds less than that. There was no way to weigh it in the field, but it may have weighed only 500-600 pounds. Its head was large for its body, and its horns did resemble a Cape buffalo’s. They were later officially measured at 78 5/8 SCI, easily making it a gold medal animal. What really impressed me was the softness of its long hair. Its coat was a mixture of grey, black, and brown, and it had a whitish face and saddle. While we were skinning and loading it on the snow machines, the hair had a distinctive sweetish smell. Over the next two days, both Norm and Bud filled their muskox tags and we all collected what SCI calls “arctic island caribou.” Mine was in a herd of seven or eight caribou with four bulls when we found him. I’d told Jimmy I wanted a caribou with “lots of points,” and this bull had them. He scored 351 SCI. I was back at the hotel in Cambridge Bay when I heard the temperature had dropped to 100 degrees below zero outside! With our hunt over, we packed our gear and began the long trip back to California. Hunting in the arctic in mid- winter had been interesting, and I had enjoyed the experience, but I was happy when I finally reached home. The only mishap on that hunt came when I slipped on the ice outside the hotel after walking to the church to check out the weather. I pulled some muscles and was stiff and sore for a couple of days, but nothing was broken. Return to the north to hunt Barron Ground Caribou and Barron Ground Muskox I returned to Cambridge Bay fifteen years later to hunt a barren ground muskox. After spending the night in the Cambridge Bay Hotel, I boarded a charter flight south to Canada North Outfitting’s semi-permanent camp with wood cabins and tents on the Ellice River. There was no snow, so my guide and I hunted from a boat and all-terrain vehicles until we found a herd and went off on foot to check out its bulls. It was September; the daytime temps were in the mid-50 degrees, which was considerably warmer than on my earlier trip. I was comfortable wearing long johns, wool pants and shirt, and a sweater. The foam cushion on my ATV’s seat was missing, and riding that machine over bumpy tussock and tundra was as uncomfortable as riding bareback on a skinny horse with a boney backbone. The wind didn’t stop blowing the first two days, and some of the gusts were strong enough that they could knock someone off his feet if he wasn’t prepared for them. I was talking with two other hunters and their guide the third morning while my guide, George Pomick, and his son climbed to the top of a mountain to glass the eskers on the other side. They had been gone maybe ten minutes or more when a wolverine waddled into view 150 yards below us. I had a wolverine tag and was getting into position to shoot it when the guide touched my shoulder. “You can’t shoot if George isn’t here,” he said. ‘Why?”