"Excuse me, are you Ron Simmons?" the Alaskan Air Representative inquired.
I said "yes", immediately fearing the worst. Could it be we were now at war someplace in the U.S., and I would need to cut my hunt short? In only a few seconds I came to discover that was not the case and the actual problem was much more serious.
The representative lowered his head slightly and said in a deep somber voice, "I'm sorry to inform you but your luggage is still in Anchorage."
Oh great, here I am with three hunting associates in Petropovalsk, Russia in route to a scheduled 10 day hunt for the Kamchatka brown bear. To make matters worse, which may seem impossible, my luggage contained, not only my clothes, but also the ammunition for myself and one of my clients. In a few quick minutes I was skillful enough to transform myself from a premier hunting consultant to a mendicant going about the small airport in search of a few bits of clothing and more importantly bullets for our weapons.
Fortunately, there were about twenty-five other hunters who arrived at about the same time, so digging up a few clothes was actually pretty uncomplicated. The ammo...now that was another story. I shoot a 375 H&H which is a much more common caliber than that of my hunting partner who was shooting a 416 Rem Mag. After going from hunter to hunter, I found only one person that had 416 ammo and he had just 40 rounds. I asked if he could spare a few, and after careful consideration, he felt he could give me 2 rounds.. but that would be it. I figured if he needed 38 rounds to kill one bear he just might need 40 so I declined his most generous offer. With the exception of that one individual all the other folks were great and in some cases offered me half the ammo they had brought.
Mike, Robert, and Dwight had gone to the hotel with the interpreter and a few of the other hunters, while I worked the crowd at the airport. Finally, with 30 rounds of 375 ammo and NO 416, I to was off to the hotel trying to figure out what I was going to tell Mike. I came to the conclusion I had but one option, and that was to graciously hand my weapon over to Mike along with the ammo I had scraped up at the airport. After he harvested his bears, I would then hunt for my trophy, if time permitted. The sacrifices a hunting consultant must make puts us close to sainthood...yeah, right!
Now, what do you think would be the odds of Mike being on a bus sitting next to Max Ladd. You might ask, "who is Max Ladd?" Well, Max is a guy who shoots a 416 Rem Mag and also happens to do his own handloading. Now, what are the odds they would be exactly the same bullet weight and powder load that Mike normally loads himself for this type of hunt. You guessed it, Bingo, a perfect match! They say even a blind hog finds an acorn every now and then.
It was 6:30 when I arrived at the hotel just outside of Petropovalsk and was directed to the dinning area where my friends were finishing their dinner. It was the first trip for all the hunters gathered in the hotel and you could sense that each hunter had some reservations. Unlike Americans, I found thtat the Russian people do not verbalize long range plans with the clients. They want you only to know what is to take place in the near future. The near future to them is 1-2 hours. As you know , we (North American Hunters) like to plan at least 10 years in advance. I felt almost blindfolded, but once you accepted the fact that our host had everything under control it became easier to relax and go with the flow.
The Kamchatka Peninsula is divided into hunting blocks, each with its own quota. I was told that approx 14,000 bears inhabit the peninsula and each spring 200 foreign hunters harvest between 275-300 bears. I had heard rumors regarding the overshooting of the bears by local hunters. I can attest first hand that if the brown bear has been over harvested, it wasn't in the areas we hunted. The first day I saw 5 mature boars before shooting the 6th bear early that afternoon. I am getting ahead of myself. We spent the first evening in Russia at a hotel which was located within a 100 yds of a pool filled by natural hot springs. After spending 9 hours in the air as well as 4 hours in airports they didn't need to ask me twice about relaxing in the warm soothing water. As I sat there relaxing, I reflected on the adventure to this point and looked forward to what lay before our group. To enjoy traveling and the sport of hunting to the max., you must accept that it is part of life and life is what you make of it. It has been said many times that there are very few guarantees in life, so don't expect it to be any different because you're hunting. More than once I have spoken with hunters that shared the same camp with some having positive memories, while the others had only negative comments and remarks. The bottom line is, it's the responsibility of each of us to make the best of the hunt. Enough said, let's move on.
The next morning our bus departed the hotel for the regional center where we would complete the final leg of the journey by helicopter. We left under a beautiful blue sky which stayed with us for the entire 9 hour ride. Most of the ride was on a well maintained gravel road. Time passed quickly with the striking beauty of the countryside mixed with story telling amongst the hunters and guides. Along the route our driver would stop occasionally giving us the opportunity to stretch our legs and take a few pictures. All was going quite smooth, we had very little hassle getting through customs in Petro, nice clean hotel last evening and good meals and now here I am on a fairly new, clean, comfortable bus. The question looming in the back of my mind is the condition of our air transportation to the camp, namely the helicopter. I had heard the horror stories about the old dilapidated military choppers. As the bus pulled up to the regional center I realized that the stories on the old military choppers being used were probably greatly exaggerated unless the Russians Air Force was using helicopters that were bright orange.
As the sun sets somewhere around 10:00 P.M. we had plenty of time for the flight into camp. We started loading the helicopter at 5:00 P.M and at 5:25 we lifted off. The flight into camp took 1 hour and twenty minutes. I now have a different perspective and understanding of the word remote. The chopper sat down in the middle of a snow covered peninsula. During the entire hunt I did not see as much as one scrap of litter. Trust me that was a first. I have been to many different places in the world to hunt and usually sometime during the hunt my eyes will focus on a pop can or papers from a candy bar or some other sign that some slob has come before me but not this time (Of course the five foot of snow could have had something to do with the clean landscape). As we stepped out of the big bird we were met by our guides pulling our sleds behind their snowmobiles. Due to unusual weather conditions (blame it on El Nino~)and a late spring it was decided that instead of putting all four of us in one camp we would divide into two camps. In addition to winter refusing to leave on time, we were also hampered by a reduced number of hunting days due to the flights in and out of the country. In early spring, Alaskan Air fly's only once a week and then in the beginning of May they had a schedule change, with the bottom line for us being only eight days to actually hunt. Henceforth Robert and Dwight stayed on board for a short flight of 20 minutes to their camp located on the other side of the river. We would not see these guys until the end of the hunt. In fact we weren't sure for a while if we would ever see Robert again, whoops I am getting ahead of myself again.
Each camp consisted of three tents and a small cabin. Two of the tents were for sleeping with the other for dinning. The cabin was reserved for the cook and also housed a radio that would keep the guides in touch with the closest community which was approx 5 hours away by snowmobile. Each night we would sign on and give/get a report to/from the next camp down the line who in turn would then forward it on to the next camp and so on until it finally reached the tiny town of Taiga. It was nice to know should an emergency arise we could get a message to someone who could then get a chopper in the air. The first morning we arose to temperatures in the teens. After a quick breakfast of ham and eggs we were off. My guide led the way with Mike following close behind. It was decided that we would head out together and then split up with each of us taking a different valley to glass looking for the big boars that come out of hibernation at the end of April.
We hadn't traveled more than a few miles when we started to see signs where a bear had torn down some trees and made a general mess of the area. Less than a minute later my sled came to a halt, which I assumed was caused by the stopped snowmobile located directly in front of my sled. My intuition was correct my pilot/guide had picked up a limb from the area of the bear devastation and it had become wrapped between the track and the pulleys or whatever you call those round wheels under the snowmobile. This gave Mike and I a few minutes to thaw out our faces while they worked on the machine. Mike thought it would be a good time to check out his Swarovski 10 x 42 to see if the blowing snow or cold temperature affected the optics. Mike had the glasses to his eyes for about 20 seconds when he yelled that four letter word "BEAR!" I thought the damn thing was on a full charge straight at us, but instead it was sitting on the side of the hill about 175 yds away. It didn't seem to even notice us even though we were in clear view sitting on an orange snowmobile with a yellow sled behind it. We had plenty of time to look at the bear and decide if it was one that should be taken. After a little conversation Mike decided that he would take this as he had two tags. The bear never new what hit him. He was dead when he made the first roll down the hill. The 416 Rem Mag AND Max 's ammo did the job!
My guide and I spent the rest of the morning looking at bears in the 7-8 ft. range. Good bears, but I was looking for a sure 8' or better. I had plenty of time and after seeing so many bears the first morning, I didn't feel it was necessary to rush. At 1:00 that afternoon everything changed. Earlier we had time to look at the bears and discuss the options. Now I'm maybe 25 yards from the biggest damn bear I have ever seen and it's running from left to right and I am not so sure it may not veer off just enough to slap me up along side my head. Our conversation was reduced to my Russian guide saying, "shoot, shoot!!" As they say, in a twinkle of an eye it was over and the work was about to begin. It took a few minutes to force my heart back down into my chest, as it had become lodged in my throat. My pants were wet, but thank God that was truly from the snow which was waist deep and beginning to melt just a bit from the warm sun. I was lucky with my shot and lucky the bear was the 8' I had been seeking. That night Mike and I relaxed around the woodstove in our tent. I was all through hunting, but Mike still had another tag to fill. That night we discovered during our nightly radio communication that Dwight and Robert hadn't taken a bear and only one of them had even seen tracks.
Day two started without Mike and myself, we had elected to sleep in, as we had our two bears on the ground. After a much needed sleep we spent the day relaxing and reading between trips to the cook tent for meals, conversation and coffee. More than once we supervised our guides, who were hard at work fleshing our hides. They worked meticulously and when the hides were finished they covered them in salt. You would get the impression that they may have done this a few times in the past. It was my understanding through our interpreter, Sergi, that these two particular hunters had been hunting and trapping this area for the past ten years. In contrast in our country many times you are with a guide who has only a few years under his belt (only an observation on my part and not intended as a criticism). In addition to the skin, they also tended to the skull which was boiled and cleaned. Mike and I gave them a 10+. The weather was changing from blue skies and no wind, to cloudy with a breeze. Temperatures were in the 50's during the middle of the day and dropping to the teens at night.
Day three Mike was out after his second bear and I continued with my resting, reading and writing. Late that afternoon we heard from the other camp and Dwight had scored on his bear but Robert was still looking. Actually they were getting a bit concerned because everyone should have been back in camp by 2:00 that afternoon because that was the time the snow started to melt making it difficult to travel on the sleds. Oh well, they figured Robert must have gotten his bear and they were getting it skinned and would be along shortly. Robert didn't make it back that evening. We were all concerned, but there was little we could do but wait. Contact was made with the village and should it be necessary, a helicopter would go up in the morning to have a look. The next morning the weather turned terrible and the chopper was unable to move. By noon still no sign of Robert and the two guides and also the cook who joined Robert over 24 hours earlier for what was to be a one day hunt lasting about 8 hours. We started to fear there must have been an accident and someone was hurt or worse.
So many thoughts go through your mind and most of them are not good. After almost 30 hours they came back into camp with Roberts' trophy, which turned out to be the largest one taken in our group with a skull measurement close to 27". We came to find out that he had made a long stalk late in the morning. This particular bear had decided to absorb as many rounds of ammo as possible before expiring. It also put Mr. R. in a position of returning back to the sled for additional rounds. As you probably could surmise the sled was directly above the location of the bear, forcing an uphill march in waist deep snow. I can speculate that it was not a walk in the park. When it was over the bear was further down the hill and the snow was much heavier making it impossible for the sleds and snowmobiles to get down to the bear. Bottom line, overnight camping with limited provisions. The next day after the bear was skinned they still had to get it back up the mountain to the sleds (notice how the hill became a mountain). No doubt a bear and a hunt to remember. In addition to that excitement, Mike got his second bear that same day which brought our hunting expedition to a close. We spent the remainder of the time relaxing and swapping stories. The other good news was when we arrived back in Alaska my bag was waiting for me and none of my clothes needed to be cleaned and I had plenty of ammo for my next trip. Thanks Alaskan Airlines!!!, you made my trip all the more memorable.
Note. Listed below are the members of the hunting party that made this story possible. Please feel free to contact them should you desire additional information on this hunt or give me a call at 1-540-459-2247.
Mike Tomarchio 703-494-4747
Dwight Moser 301-371-5235
Robert Grooms 804-749-4805
Huntingly Yours,
Ron Simmons
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