Thread: Pushing back a little further

So this trip didn't happen too long after my last outing. I decided to camp the night on the tops in the Lewis Pass again. Instead of thinking 'easy access' I tried to get off the beaten path a bit more. All up I walked for a good 7 hours ( it was fairly steep in some places so a few hundred metres took quite a while! ) I arrived in fairly good time so found a good camping spot, ditched the gear and went for a water run. I ate early and then headed for what looked like a good spot to sit and wait. I couldn't believe my eyes when I snuck up and over a ridge to find a stag out feeding quite early. I ranged it at 150m which I was comfortable taking a shot at but while getting myself prepared managed to talk myself out of shooting it! It looked quite young and was still in velvet. I counted at least 4 points, maybe 6. While it would have been nice to pull the trigger and finally get my first public land animal I wasn't desperate for meat and who knows I could be the lucky one that bags it when it's bigger. The photo is pretty rubbish sorry, the iphone 8 doesn't take the best photos. It gradually fed over the ridge and out of sight.
The next morning I was up at about 5:30am and started by scanning the nearby faces near the tent. With nothing seen I slowly made my way to where I'd seen the stag the night before, if there's one there had to be more. Sure enough as I got close my eyes darted to a movement, a hind was looking straight at me. It stood there for so long and even when I spooked it, it didn't go far. I assumed it had a fawn nearby so let it be. The positives for this trip were the fact that I located some animals but even better had the opportunity to have a go at both if I chose to. This was a place I would most definitely be back to and soon!

Nice bit of country, well worth the long walk in.

Good read thanks

Good stuff, won’t be long now! Don’t worry too much about leaving them to get bigger - no one is going to begrudge a new hunter bagging their first.

Well done on your find.Just trimm yr photos down about.Dont give away your hard earned spot to easilly.

Good yarn! Few deer around this spot, +1 crop your pics a bit haha.

Appreciate the comments and advice. To be honest I pushed on a lot further than the landscape pics suggest so I'm not too worried. I will definitely take the advice in future posts as I don't want every man and his dog turning up thrashing the area!