(10/26/03 - 10/28/03)
Opening day, 2003, a few of us were at Fort Peck Reservoir, Montana, hunting for deer. Below are some pictures. Later we went on to the East Fork of the Bitterroot River to hunt for Elk. Click here for pictures from that.
Here is a map of Montana, with the location of Fort Peck Reservoir on it:
Bruce (my cousin) picked me up at the airport in Missoula, and we headed out east towards Fort Peck, which is near Jordon, Montana. Here we are an even 100 miles from our destination.
In camp, the whole crew. From left to right: Brian, Chip, Bruce (all Wilson), Kip Linder, his son Austin, and Steve Sanders.
First day of hunting, 8am, this is the terrain we're hunting in:
As I'm looking out this direction, I hear a "BANG!" behind me in the direction Bruce is in. We started hunting 2 hours ago, it's 9am.
Waaaay down below in this ravine I spy Bruce with his fresh kill. Yep, 2 hours into opening day and he's already bagged his deer.
Bruce, with his nice buck and the pistol he shot it with.
Random terrain shot:
There are 3 hunters in this photo, if you click to zoom in you can see the hunter orange in the picture. They are all coming to pick up Bruce's deer, this is later in the day and they plan to walk down the hill with the game cart (following the stream).
The next morning (10/27/03) as the sun is just coming up. I take an ATV up the mountain ahead of the pickups to take a photo or two.
Here is our pickup coming up the hill following me, it's about 6:30am.
At about 11am, I'm at trail head #1 to take this picture of the lake:
A shot of the terrain we're hunting in, we walk along these ravines such as this one.
A deer! (Look very closely in the center of the picture.) Unfortunately for me, it has no antlers (it's a doe, a female, we can only shoot bucks, male deer with antlers).
Another random shot of the terrain, this is a dry creek bed I followed to the bottom of the hill (about 2-3 miles). Very pretty stuff.
Sunrise on the final Fort Peck hunting day, 10/28/03 at the top of the hill, about to start our hunt.
Below is a stitched together 360 degree panorama from the top of trail head #2. That's Kip sitting in hunter orange. Click on this picture for a HUMONGOUS version you can get a feel for standing at this point.
A picture of the reservoir below trail head #2.
The valley below trail head #2.
A loan boat cruising through the reservoir. They can get to (and hunt) places we just cannot reach. My grandfather used to hunt Fort Peck in his boat 15 - 20 years ago with some of the group I'm here with on this trip.
"Prickly Pear" (cactus) that bites your legs as we walk by it.
Driving the pickup off the hill at the end of the day.
Another shot out the pickup window at the terrain we are driving down.
This picture is through the pickup window down at the campsite area. Our tent is the dark spot slightly to the left of center.
A picture of our camp.
Austin and Bruce's deer, hanging in camp.
My hunting rifle and GPS. The rifle is a Ruger 7mm Remington Mag with Leopold scope, the GPS is a Garmin Rino that we have two of. The Garmin Rino automatically transmits it's location to other Rino units in the area, a very useful feature. You can track the other hunter's locations exactly at all times.
Bruce and Austin with their deer.
This was the end of our Fort Peck deer hunt, then we traveled over to Western Montana, to the East Fork of the Bitterroot River to go Elk hunting. Click here to go see pictures from that hunt.