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« Last post by CNELK on Today at 04:22:06 PM »
Feeling a little defeated after my botched attempt on William 1, I spent the rest of that evening reflecting on my decision to make a push after him and not just wait another day. But that is just how it goes with hunting sometimes. I definitely learned from that experience and need to be more patient. God led me to this opportunity; he will definitely see me through it.
The next morning, I felt more at peace with what had played out the evening before. That morning was way better than the day before as far as the weather was concerned; there was no rain or bad fog. We decided to divide up and have a guy go down the trail to see if he could turn up a goat I had seen before, but never got a good look at. For the rest of us, we would return to our glassing spot to watch the goats across the canyon in no man's land. After a short period of time, my buddy would return and tell us he saw a few Billys and possibly a good-looking William. The goat in question was the goat I had seen before, but my buddy couldn't tell how good he looked. We all gathered up our spotting scopes and hiked the trail out to see if I could determine if this goat was worth making a play on. But when I got to the spot where we could see the goats, I didn't see the goat my buddy saw just a few minutes before. But I was interested in exploring more areas, so we returned to camp and gathered everything we needed to trek out and away from camp for the day. But this time I would bring my rifle and leave my muzzleloader behind.
On this day, it was also the last day one of my buddies could stay and had to head back down the mountain that afternoon, and the following day would have been my dad's last day to be up on the mountain as well. Not that I felt any pressure to tag a goat that day, but God willing and given the opportunity, I was praying I could. These guys sacrificed being away from their families and using vacation time to be with me on this hunt. Not to mention, they were a massive support for me post-diagnosis. It would mean the world to me to share my once-in-a-lifetime moment with them all present, and tag a William.
As we hiked down the trail, we were all in the same spot moments before we decided to hike back to camp to gather our things. That's when I spotted the goat my buddy had seen earlier. He had met up with another smaller goat as they walked up the mountain to their beds. From a quick glance at a distance, he looked to check most of the boxes I was looking for in what I would call a William. Mature face with a Roman nose, large body, great mass at the base of the horns that carried up, and a decent winter coat. He was well worth the effort to close the distance to get a better look at him. As we hiked the trail out and found a drainage to make our ascent up the mountain, we closed the distance to 1200 yards, and I found both goats bedded. Although we could cut off quite a bit of distance, he never would move his head enough for me to get a good judge of the length of his horns. Regardless, he got me excited at this point, and I was committed to getting in close and seeing if I could make it work this time.
We worked our way out of sight from the goats and sat down for a coffee break, a snack, and a few laughs. Taking the time to slow down rather than push myself to make things happen helped calm my nerves before we stalked in closer. Being entirely out of view from the goats, I had made several attempts at a shooting spot. Once I found the perfect place, I set myself up in a comfortable prone position, had my ranges set, and waited for them to stand up. I don't remember the exact time we waited, but it was a few hours, and I was beginning to doubt that they were still there. They were just on the other side of the ridge, out of view, and could have gotten up and walked down and out of view from us. I was getting cold after lying on the ground and getting rained on briefly, and in the wind, I had to get up. No sooner than I get up and away from my rifle, the guys start quietly yelling at me, GOAT! When I turned around, I saw a neck and a head of the small billy looking over the ridge right at us, and as quickly as he appeared, he vanished out of sight. I quickly got behind my rifle, and the small billy did the same peek-a-boo look over the ridge again. For whatever reason, I don't know because our wind was good, but they had us pegged, and they were heading out! One of my buddies said they are heading out to the left, and I found them in the scope. It was evident that William was in the front and the Billy was in the back following, but I still asked, and they all quickly replied yes, and with a range, which I believe was 400 yards. I got my composure and slowly squeezed the trigger, and as fast as the bullet left my rifle, the goat hit the ground hard! As exciting as it was to see him hit the ground, that feeling quickly left, like a scene from a Transformers movie. The goat was back on his feet and heading up the mountain as if he hadn't been hit at all. After a couple more quick follow-up shots, he was down!
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