A lone Rocky Mountain goat in the Eagle Cap Wilderness.
raged in the Columbia Gorge,
sending smoke in our direction
creating beautiful sunrises and
sunsets.
Spirits and anticipation
were high after a dinner of fried
chicken and potato salad. Over
dinner we discussed plans for
the next day and what size
billy Lonnie hoped to harvest.
Dan and Lonnie had expressed
that the goat should be just a
good representative of what is
available in the state. Wes and
I knew that the unit held good
goats and had seen some very
big billies during our summer
scouting trips.
The next morning, we woke
early, ate breakfast and started
up Polaris Pass. This took about
an hour hike to reach the pass.
We worked our way up a shale
rock ridge where we would
start glassing the backside of
Sentinel Peak’s sheer vertical
slopes. This was going to be
spot and stalk as there are very
few other options mountain
goat hunting. Finding a place
did not take long and our po-
sition had a great view of the
slopes of Sentinel Peak. Joe
made the first spot of two nice
goats at 1,000 yards and we
quickly set up a spotting scope
to see if they were something to
go after. They were bedded up
against a rocky knife-ridge run-
ning down from the peak. They
were both good billy goats and
both were shooters. Now we
needed a plan to get to them.
I hiked down to a bench on a
finger ridge to get a better look
at the side hill we would have
to traverse. Joe came down first
and he and I went over possible
routes to get to a shooting spot
within a reasonable distance.
We had figured out a route
that would keep us close to the
same elevation as the goats. It
was going to be a tough hike at
best, across the very steep and
loose shale slope, but there was
no better way to get to them.
We pointed out a likely shoot-
ing spot to the group about
600 yards away and everyone
agreed it was a reasonable
plan. It would put us close
enough for a good shot and for-
tunately Lonnie had practiced
shooting at greater distances
during the summer.
We all dropped off the
bench and started side-hilling
on the steep rocky slopes to-
ward the goats. When possible
we tried to stay on old game
trails but, that was not possible
the entire way. When we were
about halfway to the shooting
spot one of the goats got out
of his bed, climbed up on the
www.westernhuntingjournal.com
63