Hunting up North. Turkeys Won Again. D'oh!

The Jeep is ready to roll up the mountain. Full of chains, Handyman Jack, ropes, snatch-blocks, shovels and axes. My plan was to get as far up the mountain as possible, in spite of mud, ruts, rocks or snow. Well...within reason. Got the knobby tires on too. Nothing gonna stop us! Even took my biggest chain saw.

Well, nothing but the road totally washed out from the spring run-off. This was at LeClerc Crick. Google it! It was bad, not even the trusty Cherokee can climb a nine-foot wall.

The cool thing is, this road continues up the mountain, and over a ridge, where snow still blocks the roads at higher elevation. Since no one has been on the road since last year, I fired up my foot-mobiles and had the rest of the mountain to myself.

LeClerc was running strong though, here it is at the same place. The mountains sure spit out a lot of water. Below is Mineral crick. Last year it was going stronger than this, at the same time. There is so much water up there right now, I felt kind of silly packing my canteen. Even late summer one isn't going to die of thirst up there. Grizz or Moose might get you, but you can always find water.


Coffee time, of course. My weapons of choice, the AirLite .22 and "Bloody Nose", Grand-dad's shotgun again. I was looking for Turk, and being grizz country I can put a round-ball shell in the right barrel, and a shot load/turk load in the left. My ball load 110 grains of Swiss under a .690" ball, and buffering compound. Grizz wouldn't like it. I had a strange experience with the AirLite, I hiked up the mountain about five or six miles, and when I turned back I decided to pop a beer can a few times that some BOZO left on the side of the road. Dang, I had five miss-fires out of eight rounds. One went off after two strikes, the others not at all. So I reloaded with fresh rounds, and they all fired fine, all 16 of them. The ones in the gun had been in the gun for six months or so. Why did they "go bad"?? I don't leave my chambers sloppy with oil.

Well, I thought I had run into Grizz, and was glad I had that ball load, but it turned out he was just printed on this sign. The sign is lucky I did not put a big giant hole in it! I expected to see some bear, but didn't see a thing, including turkey. But is is bear country. Lots of blacks, and a few Grizz.

Back at the Jeep, long hike back! But all downhill. I chowed down on the food I brought, and steeled myself for the long drive (86 miles) back home and through Spokane. Can't get up North from my house without driving all the way through Spokane. Halfway through it West on the freeway, and all the way North on city streets. Dang. Those knobby tires really sing on the highway, it was starting to bug me, although I usually like to hear aggressive tires "sing".

Yeah...I snuck through the road-block so I could park in the shade. Don't tell anyone. The AirLite, Bloody Nose, and the Jeep say: "Thanks for listening". !

troy fairweather said:

I think you could have made it across lol, really miss the old international scouts my dad had when I was kid, nothing would stop those things. His gladiator was pretty good to.

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I had a Scout way-back in the day. !!! I loved it. That 4-banger (half of a 304 V8) never ran out of power in low-range. Low range was really low, like rock crawler low, unlike more modern or recent 4-wheel drives. Of course top cruising speed in high range was about 45mph. Even low range in my 1973 Power Wagon is not near as low as the old Scouts and Jeeps. ! My 1998 Cherokee is an exceptionally capable off road rig, but again low range in it is nothing like low range in the old Jeeps and Scouts.

CoalCrackerAl said:

Beautiful pics. Our spring gobbler ends this month.

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Ours ends the 31st, so I'll make it out one more time here on the State Land.

The 345 was a heavy hunk of metal for sure, but a real low revving torque-monster. Had one in a ex-hy-rail 4X4 crew cab. That was a go-anywhere truck, had a crazy-low first gear. But, it had a 15 gallon tank, and got about eight miles to the gallon. ! Should have put a rack in the back for four or five five gallon cans. !!! But too young and dumb to think of that. Going up North I'd have to fill up in Spokane, fill it up again North of Spokane, and then fill it up again at about the halfway home point, and be low on gas when I got home. Dang!

Dinosaur1 said:

Did you happen to rub the revolver with any penetrating oil? That kills rounds after a short time. Doesn’t take much to do it either.

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I suspect that I did leave some oil in the cylinder. Lesson learned!

Oh you lucky dawg! I sure love the double hammer guns. What make are yours? We had a J.Manton for a while, in ten gauge, that we got from a cousin in Iowa, but a family member who I will not mention decided to cut it down into a "coach gun". Didn't do a "great" job. Used JB Weld to replace the rib. Dang. My Grand-dad's is a Janssen and Sons, and I have another I found at a gun show. It's a coach gun, but it was well done.

Someone gave me an "American Arms" (or something like that) double 12 hammer gun, with a busted stock. I actually found a stock maker with a pattern for that stock and got one, "90% inletted" but I don't have the skill to fit it that last 10%. That's a BIG 10% for me. But the gun it's self, the action, barrels, etc. are in very excellent condition. Locks up TIGHT. There's a good gunsmith in Idaho not far from me who I think could/would do it. (Mel Doyle) Don't know of any in Spokane that work on anything other than Glocks and ARs.

Well I wish you was there. I think you'd be impressed with my mountains. It was a good day. Pine, fir, cedar and tamarack. I know where there's some old-growth cedar too, only three or four of them. Have no idea how they survived the logging of the 1910-1920's era.

My dream double would be a percussion 10 or 12 gauge, with the left barrel sleeved to .62 caliber and rifled. Of course then my Jeager and Musket would get neglected, so I don't follow that dream. But that is...the holy grail for sure.

troy fairweather said:

I nearly picked up one of the pedersoli mz sxs rifles many years ago now back when they were pretty well priced then they got pricy, New York's funky laws would have about made it useless for for hunting and turned me off to one.

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Yep, I hear ya. One of those things I should have got/bought back when they were more affordable. I'd still like to pick up a nice light 20 gauge, and just leave as-is. Again, don't want my musket and Jeager gathering dust. I think Pedersoli made those in 20 gauge. Don't know what they go for now. In a month or so I'll be able to skim some $$$ of some investments I'll be juggling around. At first I thought I "needed" a cartridge conversion replica, then I was set on a small caliber ML rifle, now maybe a SXS ML? Oh woe is me, my wants and "needs" just change too fast. !!!!

Armored farmer said:

I have a Navy arms 12ga sxs caplock. It is fun to shoot. I have taken 2 turkeys and an unfortunate coyote that came to my call. (He must have thought I was a wounded hen)
One thing that is a surprise is how easy it is to clean compared to a BP rifle. Those rifling trap a bunch of fouling. Just wipe the bore a couple times and the patch comes out clean!
It makes me want a smoothbore trade gun!
C'mon Jim Kibler!

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Truth, a musket/smooth bore cleans up much easier and faster than a rifled bore. Just another reason to love my Brown Bess. !!!