Yellow Knife Is Razor Sharp

           This hunt is one of those rare hunts I have gone on where I didn’t select the outfitter. All of the other occasions turned out to be disasters, but I trusted my long time friend Dennis Campbell, and I was confident that he had been on enough hunts to where he knew what he was doing. I found myself in camp with three other hunters who turned out to be the friendliest people I will ever meet.
            Usually if I have a terrible time traveling to my hunt location, I have a terrible hunt.  If the opposite holds true, this shall be the best hunt I ever had.  All the planes were on time, we made all the connections.  The outfitter was at our final destination waiting for us when we got there and everything went well.  The next morning we flew from Yellowknife in a float plane to Humpy Lake at Camp Ekwo. Ekwo is Dogrib for Caribou.  You can’t hunt on the same day you fly in, so we unpacked and took a hike to Grandpa’s Rock.  From there you could see forever.  We saw 2 herds of caribou a long way off.  A long way off became a relative term as the week grew on.  I learned on the first day of the hunt, the second day in camp, that it really wasn’t a long way off.  As a matter of fact, on our first stalk, I learned a new meaning for a long way off.  Dennis Campbell, a long time good friend, had gone on the hunt with me.  He was rifle hunting and since I was bow hunting, he decided to let me make all the first stalks.  After about a 3 mile stalk, I was unable to cut the caribou off before they made it through a funnel between an esker and the lake.  I was about 150 yards from them when they made it through the pass and there was no cover for me to hide behind or to stalk behind.  The last 100 yards of my stalk was on my hands and knees through marshy wet lands.
            The three of us spread out around the top of Grandpa’s Rock.  We were all glassing for Caribou.  We stayed at Grandpa’s Rock until lunch time and then headed back to camp for lunch.  After lunch the winds had died down so we got in the boat and went to a new area.  We hadn’t been on top of the esker long before we spotted a group of caribou headed our way.  Dennis stayed on top of this esker, Don went to the top of the next esker, and I moved over one more esker and the next group cross one esker even further.  I moved one more esker over and another group crossed the esker that Don was on.  I then moved back 2 eskers to the one next to Don.  Although Dennis had decided to wait till the later days of our hunt to fill his tag, we still kept in contact with him by radio as to the quality of Bulls in each group. The next group came over the top of the esker to my right. Dennis and Don had stayed back the last 800 yards and saw that the caribou had slipped by me.  They had glassed the bulls for along time and had determined that the nicest bull was close to being Boone and Crockett record material.
            They ran back and circle left to cut the Caribou off at the next pass.  By the time they topped the esker; the caribou had beaten them through the pass and were climbing the next esker.  Dennis took a prone position on a rock and made a shot at the Caribou.  It was a hit just behind the shoulder but low.  His next shot hit the Caribou in the left leg.  His next shot hit the caribou in the neck and his last shot dropped him. We took a reading with my range finder and found the shots to be 447 yards, not bad shooting.  The bull will be high in the B&C record book.  We took plenty of pictures.  The fun was over and the work was beginning.  The first tall hill, which the locals call an esker, we climbed, we sat and began to glass for caribou.  Dennis and Don were facing one direction glassing and I was facing the other.  After we had been there about 45 minutes, I heard a rustle of fabric and looked back at Dennis.  He was swinging his rifle to his shoulder while simultaneously chambering a round.  I began to glass in the direction his rifle was pointing and spotted a beautiful white arctic wolf.  Dennis fired and through my binoculars I saw the bullet impact the animal just behind the shoulder.  The shot was 150 yards.  The wolf began to limp away but by the time he had gone about 25 yards, Dennis chambered another round and shot.  He hit the wolf in the hip which spun him 180 degrees.  Dennis fired more, which found its mark and dropped the wolf.  Dennis was more excited about the wolf than he would have been if it were the new world’s record caribou.  He had been trying to take a wolf for over 16 years and I am proud to have experienced Dennis’ dream come true.  We took lots of pictures and brought the wolf whole back to camp.  At camp more pictures were taken and then the camp taxidermist went to work skinning the wolf for a full body mount cape.
We left again with lunches in our packs to hunt our trophy caribou.  We went to grandpa’s rock to glass.  After we had been there about 1 hour we spotted a group of caribou that appeared to have some pretty impressive bulls.  We decided to stalk them. It is a tradition at camp for the hunter to pack his horns and cape out and Dennis was up to that. You couldn’t wash the smile off of Dennis’ face with a wash rag and a bar of ivory soap.  Needless to say by the end of the first day we had, had a successful hunt.
            On the second day we climbed several high eskers and glassed miles of tundra.  We spotted a huge group of 2 or 3 hundred caribou which had several nice bulls.  The herd was across the lake 3 eskers over.  We knew about how long it would take to get there so we planned our ambush point accordingly.  What we didn’t anticipate was the caribou bedding down way before our ambush spot. When we got there and realized what had happened, we decided to have lunch and wait them out.  After about 3 hours the caribou began to get up and migrate toward us.  I waited till the first group committed to the direction they were headed and I made my move.
             I had to run down the back side of the esker and around to the right side.  The wind was blowing from right to left.  The side of the esker was on my left and the lake was on my right.  The esker wasn’t to steep for them to travel but I felt they would walk more toward the bottom of the esker or in the flat before the lake.  The flat was about 150 yards between the bottom of the esker and the edge of the lake.  The flat was about 150 yards between the bottom of the esker and the edge of the lake.  I ran down the flat and realized it was wet and marshy.  The wind was blowing from the lake to the esker and I felt the caribou would prefer to travel along the edge of the esker or even on the side of the esker instead of the marshy flat.  If my feelings were true, my scent would be blown right to them.  I ran back to the esker and up the side about 30 yards. 
            I found a large rock and squatted behind it.  The caribou came along the side of the esker and were headed right toward me.  When they were about 200 yards, they began to angle down toward the flat.  At the bottom of the esker, I had hoped they would stay along the edge.  They did not, they continued to angle toward the lake but now they were not traveling at such a sharp angle.  At their closest point to me, I had some bulls at 47 yards.  The biggest bull, which would have made the Boone and Crocket records, was now crossing the closest point to me.  He had angled a little steeper and my range finder showed him to be 68 yards.  I only had pins up to 60 yards.  These caribou were constantly walking.  Their stride is long and deliberate.  I drew my bow, put the 60 yard pin at the tip of his shoulder and released my string.  The arrow flew straight and accurate.  Unfortunately I hadn’t allowed for his stride during the flight of the arrow.  The arrow passed just behind his rump at exactly the right height.  The caribou spooked and jumped into the lake.  They all began to swim across to the other side. 
            Dennis was positioned on the top of the esker behind a large rock and saw the entire episode.  He radioed me to tell me there was another group of caribou coming in the same path as the last.  I quickly moved down to the edge of the flat behind a large rock there.  Dennis moved a little farther down the side of the esker to a rock of his own.  Not five minutes later I saw the tops of the antler of several bull caribou.  They were higher than the last group and they didn’t angle toward the lake.  I glance up at Dennis and he was surrounded by caribou.  His rock parted the herd evenly on both sides.  He later told me he could have touched several of them.  When they got almost parallel to me they came to an abrupt halt. 
            They were only a few steps from being in perfect position for a shot.  You guessed it, they had winded me.  They did a 180 degree turn and went back in the direction they had come from.  I was afraid Dennis was going to be trampled.  The caribou circled around the esker and ran along the base of it on the other side.  Dennis had to run to the top of the esker and had pin pointed where they had traveled.  Don was still glassing from a rock on the front side of the esker.  Due to his position versus mine, I couldn’t hear him on my radio.  Dennis was between him and me.  Dennis acted as a repeater relaying messages to me from Don.  Don had reported that there was another group of caribou headed our direction and he would let us know which side of the esker they were going to pass as soon as they were committed.  Fifteen minutes later Dennis radioed me to tell me that Don said the caribou were coming on the right side.  I ran to get into position behind the same rock as before.  I was about 50 yards from the rock when Dennis reported the caribou had reversed their direction and were now going to the pass on the left side.
            I quickly ran around the back of the esker jumping from one rock to the other trying to be quick and careful to keep my balance and not twist my ankles.  I finally reached a boulder to hide behind.  Dennis spotted me and told me I was not in the right position.  He described another boulder that was behind me and to my left, 180 yards away, I could see the tops of the antlers as the caribou were approaching.  I crawled on my hands and knees to another rock 60 yards closer to the boulder that Dennis had instructed me to get behind.  There was no cover at all between me and that boulder and the caribou were in plain sight.  Dennis had these caribou pegged.  They headed straight for the boulder and it parted the herd just like Dennis’s rock had earlier.  I used my range finder to determine that the caribou that stayed on my right side of the boulder were 100 yards away and those on the other side were 120 yards away.  In the middle of the herd was the largest caribou seen by any of the hunters in the camp. 
            Unfortunately, for me he was 120 yards away and rapidly passing by.  Dennis radioed me to tell me there were still 4 nice bulls at the rear of the herd that had not passed me yet.  He suggested that I walk toward the infamous boulder and see what happens.  I had heard that if you walk slow enough and hold your bow over your head, the caribou would not recognize you as a human.  Well, either I didn’t walk slow enough or I wasn’t recognized as a human but an alien instead because I sure spooked the caribou.  Most of the herd ran by me but those 4 bulls ran back the way they came.  Determined to succeed in there migration path, they circled the front of the esker and around the right side.  Dennis radioed me this info and I ran as fast as possible to what by now I refer to as my pet rock.  When I got there, the caribou had already past.  I glassed them and watched them connect with the rest of the heard.  I climbed back to the top of the esker and found Dennis and Don sitting at the front side glassing again. After I caught my breath, I pointed for Don where the caribou had headed.  He told me that was a collision course with Don and Doris Miller.  It wasn’t 30 minutes later that we heard the shot of a rifle form that direction. 
            We saw close to 1,000 caribou this 2nd day of our hunt as we watch 3 more different groups bed down in front of us.  On our way back to camp we saw Don and Doris’s boat so we decided to motor over to it.  When we got there Don and Leon, their guide, were both carrying their gear and weapons.  Don and Leon had to head back for another load of meat and still another cape and another set.  Don had taken a nice Boone and Crocket Bull and Doris had taken 2 bulls.  The first was earlier in the day and the 2nd was at the same time Don had taken his.  The 2nd one was the shots we heard and it was the monster we all had seen earlier when it passed the infamous boulder.  After gawking over the antlers we all loaded back to camp for supper.  Success is not always measured with filling a tag.  Today had been a glorious day for me and Dennis and I thanked the Lord for his awesome magnificence.
            On the third day it was raining hard when we woke up.  By the time we had, had breakfast, it had let up to only a drizzle.  We got our rain gear and headed to Grandpa’s Rock.  The winds were blowing at about 25 knots with gusts up to 45.   
            Don our guide, couldn’t swim so he decided we should hunt Grandpa’s Rock because we could walk to it.  On the way to Grandpa’s Rock, we spotted a grizzly bear.  As we got closer, the grizzly spotted us.  He stood on his hind feet to get a better look.  I don’t know who was the ugliest but one of us sure scared the old grizzly.  He took off like he had been shot out of a canon.  When we finally got to Grandpa’s Rock, some 15 minutes later, we could see that the grizzly was still running and was at least two miles away. Boy, Dennis must be really ugly.
            The 3 of us spread out around the top of Grandpa’s Rock.  We were all glassing for caribou.  We stayed there until lunch time.  We walked back t camp and had lunch.  After lunch, the winds had died down so we got in the boat and went to a new area.  We hadn’t been on top of the esker long before we spotted a group of caribou headed our way.  Dennis stayed on top of the esker, Don went to the top of the next esker and I went even further to the next one.  That is when this group past it crossed the top of the esker even further.  I moved 1 more esker over and another group crossed the esker that Don was on.  I then moved back to eskers to the one next to Don.  Although Dennis had decided to wait till the later days of our hunt to fill his tag, we still kept in contact with him by radio as to the quality of bulls in each group.  The next group came over the top of the esker to my right.
            This time I decided to stay put.  I glassed the group closely and found it to have several Boone and Crockett bulls.  One was still in velvet and had high long and wide tops.  It looked like huge hands with 8 or 9 long fingers each.  Also it had a single but huge shovel.  I radioed Dennis and described the bull.  I got his curiosity up so he circled around the left side of his esker and topped the esker in front of him.  He took a prone position and began to glass the bull.  At first the bull was about 300 yards as we discussed back and forth its features.  After long debates, Dennis decided to use his last tag. By this time the caribou was over 500 yards from Dennis.  He took careful aim from the prong position and squeezed off a round from his hair pin triggered 27 degrees.  The caribou went down.  Dennis waited about 15 minutes and began casually walking toward the caribou.  The caribou got up and began to walk away from Dennis.  Dennis took a Texas heart shot which appeared to miss completely but which actually knock the bull’s shoulder right off its head.  Dennis continued to walk toward the caribou as it continued to walk away from Dennis.  Considering a caribou’s long stride I don’t have to tell you who was winning the foot race.  I continued to hunt while watching all the excitement with my binoculars.  Finally, the bull turned left and gave Dennis a broadside shot.  He took it and dropped the caribou in its tracks.
            There were hundreds of caribou in the valley were the bull had fallen.  As Dennis walked to his caribou so did Don.  I stayed and continued to hunt.  Caribou began to leave the valley as Dennis and Don entered it.  All the caribou wanted to continue in the direction they were migrating.  Some ran in that direction.  But others hesitated, stuttered back up, went forward and then decided to back track and circle around.  Man did I have caribou all around me.  Several B&C bulls, ninety two yards was the closest shot and they weren’t just whistling Dixie, they were moving.
            I didn’t take any shots, and by the time Don and Dennis had skinned, quartered and packed the caribou; it was dark so we headed back to camp for supper.  Dennis had now filled all his tags and I was fortunate enough to have experienced it all with him.  Life is great.
            On the fourth day, it was raining again.  Everyone had filled all their caribou tags but me, so no one was in a hurry to get out in the rain.  We had a leisure breakfast.  By the time we finished, the winds had picked up and blown most of the rain away but it had kicked up the lake water.  Don was afraid to go out in the boat.  It was the coldest morning of our hunt and it was still drizzling.
            I decided we would go back to Grandpa’s Rock.  We stayed there about 2 hours and didn’t see anything.  Don said lets go back to camp and warm up.  When we got back to camp, I asked what the game plan was; it was about 10:15 am.  Don said we would stay in camp to warm up and eat lunch then go back to Grandpa’s Rock.  I wanted to go in the boat to an area where we had seen hundreds of caribou.
            Dennis went to the camp manager and had a heart to heart.  He told him I didn’t want to hunt Grandpa’s Rock.  He told him we should be leaving to hunt each day at day break not at 9 a.m.  He said we shouldn’t come back for lunch and in fact shouldn’t come back until it was too dark to hunt. Up till this time we had left at around 9:00 sometimes ate lunch in the field and sometimes came back for lunch but in either cage.  All of us went back to camp way before dark because supper was served at 7. Before I knew it, at 11:15, Don, Charlie (an older guide) and I were on our way in the boat across choppy water to hunt a new area.  We didn’t stop for breakfast and we didn’t stop hunting till dark.  We missed supper with the group but there were plenty of leftovers, the cook saw to that.
            We left before daylight the next day and it wasn’t long before we spotted a large group of caribou going form our right to left.  It was deep inland from the lake and far away.  We could tell it had several bulls.  We swung way left and kept eskers between us and them to keep them from seeing us.  When we felt we were almost in position, Charlie and Don stayed back and I continued on.  I spotted the tops of several antlers so I began to crawl the last 500 yards.  If the caribou continued in the direction they were headed, I would barley cut them off but only if I ran on my elbows and knees.  I spotted the heard of caribou and they had bedded down to my right about 200 yards away.  One bull and 2 cows were still feeding and it appeared as though they might come on through the gap and give me a shot.  I decided the bull was nice enough to take so I began to survey distances with my range finder. 
After my survey, I found the gap to be 150 yards at its farther point and 50 yards from me at its closest point.  As the bull and cows fed toward me, it became apparent the bull was going to be the closest.  The bull must have found a sweet spot because he stopped and began to feed around for some time.  I took a distance reading and found him to be 97 yards.  He finally had fed enough and decided to go back to the group and bed down.  When it became apparent he wasn’t going to get any closer, I decided to take a shot.  Keeping in mind how much I led the other caribou and still shot behind, I led the bull about 4 feet.  As the arrow sped toward the bull it was as though he knew it was coming, he abruptly stopped as I watch the arrow barely miss his front shoulder passing 3-4 inches in front of him.
            When the arrow hit the ground, it caused all the caribou to stand.  I had hoped they would all come through the gaps but because this bull was coming back to the group from my direction and now at a pretty good speed, they all began to turn and face the opposite direction.  After about 5 minutes of checking things out, all the caribou bedded back down.  They were now facing the wrong direction and I was fearful that after they chewed their cud, they would leave going away from me.  I backed up on hands and knees about 300 yards and circled right and up the esker they were bedded on.  On hands and knees, I topped the edge to see the caribou.  There were over a hundred of them.  The closest to me was 47 yards and it was a cow.  These two were bedded close to each other, one to my left and the one to my right.  I took a distance reading and found both to be exactly 90 yards.  I scoped them both carefully with my binoculars and found the one on my left to be the most desirable.  I drew my bow, put the 60 yard pin right behind the shoulder, looked to where my 30 yard pin was pointing, found a spot on a rock and raised the 60 yard pin to that spot.  I held solid and squeezed off the shot.  The arrow seemed to float in slow motion as it appeared to be headed for a direct hit.  My heart got excited only to be disappointed as the arrow just missed the top of the caribou’s back.  All the caribou got up and circled where they had bedded.  It reminded me of my dog before she lies down.
            After they had all circled a time or two they began one by one to re-bed, pretty much in the same spots.  I took a new distance reading and found the bull of choice to still be 90 yards.  I drew back my bow, took aim in the same manner as before, only this time I aimed just a little lower.  Just as I squeezed the trigger, a gust of wind blew from my right.  It pushed my arrow left about 4 feet, but it missed the bull’s rump by inches.  Again the caribou stood and went through the circle ritual.  I could have continued this game but I was down to two arrows.  Anyway, the caribou was now facing the gap again.  I crawled backwards down the esker and back around the gap.  As I was approaching my selected rock, I noticed a small group had stood up and fed down the gap and was just passing my rock.  I had learned from observing the caribou for the past week that they don’t look as though they are migrating.  I decided to get on the opposite side of the rock from where the rest of the herd was still bedded.  I was going to let them walk past me and draw on them as they were walking away.  This put me on the same side of the rock, the left side, as the small group.  This would not have presented a problem except that the small group decided to start feeding.  While they were feeding, most like all grazers, they turn in all directions.  After 15 minutes of feeding, several caribou are now facing my direction, not to mention that the wind was blowing from me to them.  After winding me, one of them finally spotted me.  Instead of running away, they all ran back to the main group as if to worn them.  They circled wide but none the less back by me to the main group.  I don’t know how they communicated but all of them got up and migrated out right over the small rock I was laying behind when I took my last two shots.
            By the time I found my 3 arrows, it was almost dark, so we decided to head back.  It was very dark by then.  I suggested to Don that we look at the map and find a spot where the lake pinches a small gap between it and a steep esker.  Once we found such a spot, I suggested we get behind a rock and wait.
            Since tomorrow would be my last full day to hunt, Don was reluctant to try this but he finally coincided.  After we looked at the map, we decided on a place they called the rapids.  We left the next morning before breakfast and didn’t take a lunch.  I wasn’t set up long when a group of cows passed.  They were about 100 yards away so when they got out of sight, I moved in their direction 50 yards.  I was now covering 2 trails; one was 50 yards to my left and the other 60 yards to my right.  After about an hour, another group appeared over the esker.  It took them about 30 minutes to close the distance to me.  During this time, I determined the group to have one bull.  It wasn’t a monster.  Besides it was the last full day and I still had two tags.
            When it became apparent they were going to take the path to the right, I got ready.  I found the distance on the first two cows to be 55 yards. The bull was right in the middle of all those cows.  He had them on the left, on the right, in front, and in back of him.  Some of them were walking at different speeds so they were swapping position like a car race.  I drew my bow anticipating the bull was literally surrounded.  There were two cows between me and the bull walking right beside him.  The middle of the body of the cow was even with the right rear leg of the bull and her front legs were overlapped by the rear legs of the front cow.  The front cow’s front legs were well in front of the bull.  The bull was completely covered.  I said a short prayer and both the bull and the back cow sped up.  The back cow was now walking a little faster than the bull and they were both walking faster than the first cow.  Timing was critical but I could tell there was going to be a gap about 2 seconds after the back cow passed the front cow where the bull was going to pass between the two cows.  I took aim holding the 50 yard pin high and remember to lead about 3 feet at this distance.  I squeezed off slowly.  I couldn’t tell where the arrow went; however, the bull did knock it up a notch.  They were now passed me so I turned around and took a distance reading.  I keep the range finder around my neck for quick readings.  They were traveling at a slight angle from my left to my right almost parallel.  They were now 62 yards away but moving fast.  I knocked another arrow and took aim, lead four feet and squeezed.  Again, I lost sight of where my arrow had gone.

            The bull ran down into a dip, turned and started toward me.  He topped the hill and I took a reading to find him at 45 yards.  I drew my bow took aim and just before I shot, he did the backwards death shuffle.  I let my bow down and watched him hug a large rock as he straddled it and expired.
            Don took several pictures of me with my caribou than began to cape and quarter him.  Once we were done, we put it all aside and continued to hunt.  Later that afternoon, I had 6 bulls come by me all of which were slightly bigger than the one I shot but not by much.  I still had a half-day to hunt tomorrow, so I decided to pass on the 62 yard shot they gave me.  We hunted till dark, then loaded the caribou in the boat and headed for camp.  Dennis was waiting at the beach and was elated to see I had a successful day.  Everyone congratulated me time and again.  Although they had all had supper, they stayed in the kitchen while I ate to hear the hunt story detail by detail.
            The next morning Don and I left before daylight.  We went back to the rapids.  About the time we got set up, it was breaking day.  It was very foggy.  You couldn’t see more than 200 or 300 yards.  Everything was still.  The plane was scheduled to pick us up at 12:00 so we decided to hunt till 11:30.  By the time 11:20 had rolled around we had only seen one group of cows.  They had gotten within 20 yards but no bulls.  The fog was lifting but it was time to head back to camp.
            When we got in the boat, Don told me I was the first hunter to even hunt in this camp without shooting 2 caribou.  I felt terrible to hear I was the one to break such a significant record.  As we traveled back to camp, I glassed every inch of the way.  Don realized how bad I wanted to take that caribou.  When we got back to camp, Don knew how late the plane would be because of the foggy morning and decided to try one more place.  We turned the boat around and headed to the valley where Dennis killed his second caribou.  Don asked me to help him listen for the float plane and then we would have to hurry.  After we beached the boat, we ran to the top of the esker.  We glassed the valley to find a disappointing sight.  No caribou.  We glassed across the barren ground toward the direction of camp to see a group of 7 bulls about 6 miles away headed in our direction.  Although we were in an ambush position, we didn’t have time to wait.  Don glassed the lay of the land and we were off.  We ran to the boat, sped down the lake into a cove about 4 ½ miles away.  We beached the boat and ran to the top of the esker.  The caribou had been to a gap between two eskers where we now stood.  No caribou.  We glassed high and low.  No caribou.  Don glassed in the direction we had just come from and there they were, about 1,000 yards past us.  They were moving faster than we had anticipated.  We ran down the esker into the boat and backed up the lake about 2 ½ miles.  We beached the boat and began to run up the esker.  I slipped and fell on my bow and broke my quiver in half.  Don was ahead of me by now, so I grabbed my arrows and ran after him.  Just before we reached the top of the esker we both saw antlers and hit the deck.  In our haste, I had left both my binoculars and range finder in the boat.  I asked Don to scope them all out and see which one was the biggest.  I had determined that the closest point of travel half way down the side of the esker was about 75 yards.  I kept my eyes on the last caribou with my bow at full draw, anticipating the point of the closest travel.  Don was re-scooping the front caribou as they came closer just to make sure.  What he didn’t notice was the last caribou sped up and overtook the next to the last one and was now holding that position.  These caribou were migrating faster than most and I lead my shot by about 7 feet.  I gently squeezed the trigger and at the strum of the bow found my arrow flying toward its mark only to lose sight of it.  Don was watching the whole time through the binoculars.  He shouted, “You missed!”  I didn’t see the arrow hit and I didn’t see any blood.  Still following the caribou through the binoculars, he pointed him out to me as we both watched him run out of sight, hoping to see him stagger or give any indication that he had been hit.  Don said he had heard the plane land while I was shouting at the caribou and said we needed to hurry back to the boat.  He handed me the binoculars as he started for the boat.  I glassed back to my right in the direction the bulls had come from to see if there were any stragglers.  There was nothing.  As I was panning from left to right to get one more look at the bull group as they topped the last esker, I spotted an antler to my left about 100 yards away.  It was sticking up from the ground.  I called to Don to come take a look.  He grabbed the binoculars and stared about 30 seconds.  He asked me “where did that come from?” I said that I shot him.  The caribou I had shot ran less than 30 yards and expired.  In the chaos after the shot, we were following the wrong one.  I was only seconds from following Don to the boat and heading home with only one caribou thinking I had missed with my last shot when I spotted the antler.  We took some quick pictures and processed the caribou as quickly as possible.  At camp there was no plane.  We found out that Don had heard a lost plane looking for another camp.  The entire camp was excited to see and hear of my 2nd caribou shooting.  I really felt like someone special the way everyone was congratulating me and taking my picture.  We went in to have lunch and give details step by step of the successful hunt.  This hunt was one of the most successful hunts and memorable hunts I had ever gone on.  God has created a magnificent world and life is good.