'Seeing the massive ram up close practically took my breath away'

After locating a couple hundred white rocks while glassing miles of ridges and draws, we finally located an actual live sheep. We set up the spotting scope and saw it was a nice full-curl ram, about five or six miles away. Later, as we were setting up base camp, a quick glance through the spotting scope caused some serious excitement. Out from behind a rock, right next to this full-curl ram, came a "way past" full-curl ram. Our best guess at that distance was 41 to 42 inches.

That discovery was not helpful in trying to get a good night's sleep.

We got up at daybreak, coffeed-up, packed up and took off. We guessed by the direction the sheep took the night before that we might find them in the next valley. It wasn't that they were simply five miles back, these rams were way up there and over some of the steepest terrain I've encountered.

On the way up, we came face to face with a grizzly about 50 feet away. We thought we might be close enough to the rams that a shot meant to chase him off would be all the rams needed to leave the area. Even though we had a tag, our goal was not a grizzly. Fortunately, he was not particularly interested in us other and he ran off.

We topped the ridge around 2 p.m. Nothing but a couple ewes and lambs. After lunch we patrolled the ridge top for a while but couldn't find the rams and, equally as disappointing, couldn't figure where they might have gone.

While on our second ridge patrol and totally exposed, we spotted them. They hadn't gone over the ridge as we anticipated, in fact, they came down the mountain toward us. Although a few ridges over, we had walked past them. Both were sitting out in the open on top of a long sloping ridge ending on a 50-foot cliff with a 360-degree view. The closest we could get to them without being seen was 800 to 900 yards. Now we were able to study the ram and our new estimate has him around 42-43 inches. Trust me, when you see a world-class animal like this one, patience is not easily acquired.

It was 4 p.m., still early, and we elected to wait them out until they moved. By 5:30 they were still there and from all indications, staying there. We decided to split up; my dad would go below the rams and try to push them up toward me.

Eventually it got too dark and we had to give it up and head back to camp. Knowing the grizzly we chased off earlier was in our area, my blood pressure was no doubt raised substantially as we came down through tangled alders in the dark. We reached base camp around 11:30 p.m., drenched in sweat.

The next day, we had a pretty good idea where the rams might be. We climbed to a number of pretty good vantage points, glassing the entire area over and over but couldn't seem to find them. About three-quarters of the way up we reached a massive rock and we split up. I went to the right and my dad climbed way up to the left.

When I came around the rock, I saw a number of these little draws. All of a sudden, there they were, both rams, about a half a mile away. Both were looking away from me.

It occurred to me that on all my hunts, my dad is usually with me. I didn't know where he was so I made an executive decision: time to take the training wheels off and make the stalk on my own. I faced about 50 yards of complete exposure down some shale rocks until I would reach cover from a small ridge ahead of me. I studied the rams for several minutes to make sure they showed no interest in my direction.

I had to make the decision: "GO!" My adrenaline kicked into high gear as I rushed down as fast and carefully as I could over the sketchy terrain until I was out of sight. Since I was only paying attention to the placement of each step, I had no idea if the rams heard or saw me, and as most sheep hunters probably know, it's difficult to walk stealthily on shale.

I reached the base of the ridge. I dropped my pack a few yards from the top and inched my way up. It had been about 15 minutes since I saw them last. I half expected them to be long gone; several of my steps were far from quiet and I was almost certain I'd blown it.

I peeked my head over and there they were, as relaxed as when I last saw them. Seeing the massive ram up-close practically took my breath away. Here I am on my seventh sheep hunt and I have only seen a 7/8 curl at best in all these years. And now I haven't any idea how I'm going to be able to calm my nerves and take a successful shot.

I lay on my stomach on a grassy part of the ridge and put the ram in the center of my scope. I am at an uphill advantage maybe 450 yards away, my heart is pounding so hard that with every beat my scope dances all over the ram. I have never fired on an animal anywhere near this distance. I am not going to gamble this opportunity away, so I decide to pull back and work my way to a lower part of the ridge for a closer shot, once again running the risk of being heard.

Patience is in short supply. On the up side, they still hadn't spotted me. One lifetime later, I gained another 100 yards. The last 50 were a belly-crawl up a shale slide, during which a nosey little half-curl popped up out of nowhere and just about blew my cover. I was frozen in place about five feet from my destination, completely exposed to this small ram grazing 100 yards from me. If he had raised his head up once in my direction it would have been all over, but he never looked up and eventually faded behind a hill.

Now in a much better position, I figured this was it and propped the 300 on this little rock as best I could. I can't explain how bad I was shaking. The ram was oblivious. I guessed the distance at about 350 yards. I took a deep breath, exhaled slowly and fired.

My shot exploded on the rocks over the ram's shoulder. Panic shot through me as the two rams jumped up and headed up the mountain. Racked another round and fired. Again the rocks just above him exploded. This time I rose to one knee, racked in my final round and fired. Rocks again blew up inches over the ram. The rams disappeared behind a short ridge and I made a mad dash toward them. I got about 20 yards closer, dropped to a knee and loaded three more rounds into my rifle. The ram popped out from the ridge and I fired my fourth shot, then the fifth. More rock explosions. Racked my final round once again and fired.

This time no evidence of where my shot landed. Did I hit him? He dove behind another small ridge. I reloaded my gun again and had to clear my head and calm myself down or else I might as well have been shooting from the hip. I propped the gun back on my knee and took several slow, deep breaths and focused my scope on the ram's only exit.

The ram popped out and held a perfect broad-side pose as he looked around. Fired my seventh shot. This time the shot was followed by a shout of victory as I saw the animal's legs give way. He dove head first off a 40-foot cliff and disappeared behind a ridge. I rushed over and couldn't believe what I saw.

This was not like any ram I have ever seen mounted, like the several at my parents' house and the houses of other hunters. No, this was truly a trophy ram. A ram of a lifetime, an honest curl-and-one-quarter.

I walked around a couple cliffs and signaled to my dad, who I spotted sitting way up on this ridge. We didn't have a tape measure with us but we guessed about 42 inches.

We were running out of time to get it field dressed, caped and meat on the frames. We finished a little after 8 p.m. We decided to take a different route down. Even though we would have had to pack him back up the mountain, we knew the route was passable back to camp if we had backtracked. Instead, we chose a canyon directly in line with our camp. Big mistake.

By 10 p.m., we had scaled down three waterfalls. My dad had made two unsuccessful attempts to rip his kneecaps off by falling in the creek bed and I had torn a complete leg off my rain pants. Now we were facing a 45-foot sheer-cliff waterfall. It was pitch black and we were both using flashlights. We couldn't go back up the waterfalls so our only option was to head straight up the side of the canyon, which was solid alders, and hope to land in the next valley, which was also in line with our camp. The alders were so thick we traveled maybe 100 yards an hour.

There is a point when the perfect storm of events makes for seriously poor judgment. Mix these nasty alders with two 80-pound packs, 17 hours of physical abuse, exhaustion, fatigue, dark, disorientation and borderline hypothermia. Not the best time to be deciding anything.

It was 1 in the morning and we couldn't move 10 feet without taking a break and collapsing in complete exhaustion, so we had to make the painful decision to drop the packs. We had the presence of mind to put the packs near some sort of landmark where we could locate them the next day. We found a large mound of rocks to put the packs against and called it good. After another hour of walking blindly through this alder nightmare with no sense of direction, we finally reached the creek bed of the next valley. Two hours later we reached camp. Exhausted, fatigued, tired, beaten -- these words barely described the feeling as we crawled into our bags.

The next day, all we had to do was walk up, pick up the packs and walk down. We left camp at 8:30 a.m. and didn't get back until 10:30 p.m. No matter how much you prepare for these sheep hunts -- for the walking, the running, the climbing -- you are never quite prepared for how tough they can be.

It took us another day to get out, but it was worth every bruise and all the sweat. Our unofficial measurements at camp had the ram at 11 1/2 years old and the horns at 45 inches with 14-inch bases. We had the official measuring done by a Boone & Crockett representative -- 44 5/8 inches by 13 5/8 inches with a total score of 173 4/8 inches. We'll have the final official measurement taken after the 60-day waiting period.

Where you rank in the record book is less important than being in the book. Hopefully this ram will be in the top 150 of the largest rams ever taken. Not bad.

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Bryce McGough, 27, is a lifelong hunter and a maintenance worker for the Anchorage School District. He lives in Chugiak. His dad, Mike McGough, 67, lives in Eagle River and has been a hunter for more than 50 years.