(Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne)
January 30, 2025
By Nick Trehearne
“We aren’t going down the same way we came up, are we?”
“No...it's steeper this time,” I responded, trying to hold in my laughter.
I could tell Henri wanted to strangle me. He was from the flat, Canadian agricultural province of Saskatchewan, and here we were, halfway up a mountain in some of the steepest coastal mountains that exist in North America in pursuit of the mountain goats that call this region home.
Up! (Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) The hike into the area was, by most people’s standards, short—like four and a half miles. That’s nothing when you think about an elk hunt in Colorado. But it was steep. Six hours into the hike, we were only three miles in, and having been up there in prior years, I knew the next stretch was the crux of the entire hike. It was a steep, nasty chute filled with devil’s club. For those of you who don’t know, the reason it’s called devil’s club is that the thorns on these four- to 12-foot-tall plants will make you bleed and tear your gear apart. They’re truly the devil.
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“You up for a bit of a gamble?” I asked Henri, knowing full well it was a rhetorical question since he had no idea where we were, and I was ultimately calling the shots. My question was met with a look of both curiosity and disgust.
I had a plan—or so I thought. If we went up this other chute, there’s no way it would be as bad as the devil’s club route. Well, in theory.
(Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) The next several hours were spent bushwhacking some of the thickest undergrowth imaginable and coming to a dead stop with cliff after cliff. Exhausted after an already long day, I could tell Henri was ready for this to be over. In addition to the hell hike, the skies fully socked in and started raining on us—an unappreciated cherry on top. In all honesty, I was ready for a break too, but I didn’t share that information verbally.
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“Man, this sucks—now it’s pushing us over rather than up.” said Henri.
The “over” that Henri was talking about was straight into the devil’s club chute. Not only did we waste hours on this futile attempt at an easier path, but we were still going to have to take the route we were trying to avoid. Great. If we had just done that in the first place, we would’ve been at camp by now.
Opening Day Adverse weather is almost a guarantee when hunting the alpine regions of the far North. (Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) There’s excitement in the early hours before dawn for the first light that’s soon to follow. That excitement was crushed within minutes of waking up when the sound of raindrops tapped on the tent. Within seconds, it was a torrential downpour.
“You’ve got to be freaking kidding me!” I heard from Henry’s tent, as he woke up to the loud rain pounding on his tent fly.
(Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) When you’re hunting the coastal mountains in British Columbia, rain almost always equals limited to no visibility. There’s not really such a thing as a high ceiling. Short version: Optimism was low for opening day.
I was torn. On one hand, I don’t like to hike around when there’s no visibility for fear of bumping animals. On the other, I could tell that Henri was mentally beat from the day before and now frustrated with the weather.
“Let’s just have a coffee and take our time, and then we will punch up to the ridge I like to glass," I said to a frustrated Henri. "Hopefully it clears.”
And Then There Was One (Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) It turns out that in the several days of us being in the alpine, the weather only cooperated for about seven hours. Total. And when I say cooperated, I mean the sun appeared out of nowhere, let us see more than 100 yards, and then vanished into the clouds as quickly as it appeared. But that didn’t matter. We hiked up daily and when the weather did roll in and out, as brief as it may have been, we were up there and ready.
“Does it always suck like this?” Henri jokingly asked.
I laughed to myself. I thought back to the dozens and dozens of days spent stuck in a tent or under a tarp over the years, contemplating all the world’s problems or listening to a podcast on repeat because I can never seem to remember to download enough ahead of time.
(Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) “Yeah—this isn’t even that bad” I replied, laughing out loud.
The clouds blew off once more and almost immediately, I locked onto a white speck a thousand yards below us, feeding up from the timber below. I scrambled for my cameras as I tried to formulate the sentence, “Get the spotting scope; there’s a goat below us.” Unfortunately, Henri heard something more along the lines of “get…. scope… us…” since I was moving away from him to get the photo, while trying not to be loud and talk simultaneously.
Looking at me dumbfounded, I couldn’t comprehend why he wasn’t getting on it? Now, too far away to speak without raising my voice, I pointed at my eyes, made two horns with my fingers, and pointed down the mountain. You would’ve thought I lit a fire under Henri—I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone move that fast!
Billy or Nanny? (Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) You could see the excitement build but also the frustration, as Henri continually looked from the spotter to me and back to the spotter. This guy from the prairie had no clue what he was looking at. It could’ve been a 10-year-old billy or a two-year-old nanny for all he was concerned.
I crawled over, looked through the scope and immediately called it a billy. Then a nanny. Then back to a billy. He had length, he had gradual curve, but through the spotter, it was just hard to confirm mass (one thing that all billies have over nannies).
Phone scope on, we snapped pictures and movies of the unsuspecting mountain goat before finally confirming that we wanted a closer look. As fast as Henri moved when he realized there was a goat, he was packed up and flying down the hill to get closer. It was perfect. Almost the entire stalk was out of sight and we were going to pop up within 100 yards. Upon closer inspection, it was confirmed we had found our billy goat.
The shutter on my camera was going crazy as Henri popped over the rise, settled his crosshairs on the animal, and squeezed the trigger.
(Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) “Holy crap—did you see that? He was going for the chute, so I shot him!”
In all my years of goat hunting, I’ve never had a goat die on a nice grassy bench, so when this billy dropped where he did, it was a welcome sight. Usually, I’m tying the goat off with rope just to cut it up.
(Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) My shutter continuing to go off, I captured Henri walking up and seeing his first billy up close, putting his hands on it, soaking it in. You only get one first, and this one he was going to remember.
Insert: Useless Friend Once the trigger is pulled, the arduous task of caping, quartering, and boning begins. (Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) Back at camp, we rested, regrouped and prepared ourselves, physically and mentally, for the long 4.5 mile trek back to the truck.
Now, just to be clear, on every hunt I like to pull my own weight when it comes to taking part in the hunt. The problem here was that I had tweaked my knee getting the goat back to camp from where it died. My knee was so swollen that it barely fit in my pants—it ended up being partially torn MCL and LCL ligaments, I later found out.
With the author out on injury reserve, Henri was left to haul the cape, meat, skull, and gear out on his own—making for a grueling pack out. (Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) Henri, legitimately concerned if I would be able to hike down the mountain, took one look at my knee and offered to carry the whole goat down. I could tell he didn’t want to do this, but he knew I’d be lucky to make it off the mountain with just my backpacking gear.
I took some of his gear, to say I tried, but when I watched him try and stand with that pack, I knew he was going to be hurting. I was simultaneously grateful and felt horrible.
"We never did weigh Henri’s pack, but he had to be hauling 140-plus pounds." (Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) Remember how I said on the climb up that he was going to have a memorable “suffer fest” for his first day of backpacking? Well, that was a walk in the park compared to the pack out.
We never did weigh Henri’s pack, but he had to be hauling 140-plus pounds. Somehow, he appeared in better shape than me and my gimp knee by the time we hit the truck. But we made it.
Never Again The pain of a heavy pack is long forgotten after a successful hunt. (Photo courtesy of Nick Trehearne) Anyone who’s been on a challenging backpack hunt knows you often question your sanity when in the thick of pain, sweat, and misery. But to this date, I’ve never had a trip where, by the time I hit the truck, I’m not scheming up the next one.
Thinking I wouldn’t be alone in this brainwave, I asked Henri on the drive back if he wanted to come back to the same area for another mountain goat next year. The question was met with a long pause.
“No chance in hell—never again.”