Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/590511
S P O R T I N G C L A S S I C S 8 3 T hey surely do have a hold me, those monarchs with the curling horns. Always have, at least since I can remember. Over the years, they've taunted me to climb where I ought not have climbed in mostly failed efforts to lash one on a pack frame and bring it down the mountain so it could be mine forever. Sheep fever. I've got it bad, loving and resenting this grand affliction in equal parts. Sheep hunting is a game best played by young men of means. Somehow I've managed to do it enough that I'm able to set aside the slightest doubt that, with exception of the great bears, no other hunt in North America is an equal. It would be easy to give much of the credit to the overwhelming majesty of the places they live, at least as much as to the barbaric structure of an old ram's horns and what they do with them. Ram. Unequaled as a moniker, it kicks you square in the heart when you hear it hissed by a guide, or even better, whisper it to yourself after days, weeks, or possibly years of searching alone. That single moment is worth all the worn-out boots, the squandered college tuitions, and the blown-out knees that will nag on you for the rest of your life. better part of a week for the sky to clear, and when it finally did we flew to a drop point. That first hunting day was pure torture—14 hours of following a guide through devil's club and dense alder thickets. Too tired to pitch the tent, we used it as a tarp for the sleeping bags, hustled dinner, and spent the short night trying to recover. At first light, we sized things up. "That rock," said the guide while pointing toward a speck at the top of the mountain, "we'll climb for that rock. Jim said an old ram hung out in a bowl up there all summer." Up we went, then I took a rest over that rock and shot my first ram, a beautiful Dall sheep. We rushed through the dressing and boning, hoping to get off the cliffs before dark. Too tired for words, we split and picked our way down. I heard the guide fall and thought the worst after following the trail of his mangled gear and shattered rifle down a chute. He'd stopped just short of a drop that would have been the end, but he banged up his Sako rifle, a gift from his father. "I'll heal up," he snarled, "but my rifle looks terminal. I think it hung up and broke my fall." After crawling down the face for another half-mile, we reached a little an Brunt called it "the surprise of my life" when he drew an Arizona desert bighorn tag. V "Ram!" It kicks you in the heart when you hear it hissed by your guide, or better yet, when you whisper it to yourself on a solo hunt. I was lucky on my very first sheep hunt, outfitting from Jim Harrower's lodge on Alaska's Stoney River. Initially grounded by rain, we waited for the dventures l L Dwight Van Brunt