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Opening morning started off about 4:15. Had to load up on the coffee before heading out into the woods. My one year old son is fighting off a cold and some pretty bad congestion so he was up a few times throughout the night. Between checking on him and thinking about the opening morning sunrise, sleep was a bit hard to come by. We left about 4:45 so we could hike and get into place about well before sunrise. We did the hike with our headlights on dim and got right into the spot we wanted. About 30 minutes before sunrise it was light enough to start glassing the ridges. We still had a rough time seeing well but we ended up seeing headlights making their way through the dark about 1000 yards away. Darn. Public land hunting. We just hoped they would stay a couple ridges over and thankfully it looked like they settled in a good distance from us. I glassed a ridge to the north about 900 yards away and spotted a big tan patch. It was still a little hard to make out but as soon as the patch moved I knew—bull elk. He was walking slowly so I made a note of where he was and figured I would find him once the ridge was a little more lit from sunrise. And usually where there is one there are more, so I started getting excited. I went back and told my buddy and brother I saw one. Unfortunately it wasn’t looking like the bachelor group we’ve often seen in this canyon was around. We glassed three ridges and no sign of elk on any of them. So I started looking for the lone bull on the far side of the canyon. One pass through the binos: nothing. A second pass, nothing. A third, also nothing. Same result for my buddy and brother. I was confused. I knew the bull was walking but I figured he was slowly grazing. My brother went up ahead and came back with some bad news. Another group of hunters was posted up opposite that ridge. They must have come in right at daylight and pushed them out. Double darn. Well with two other groups in there and being two hours after sunrise, we decided to head out and check out a new area just to kill some time before lunch. The newer area seemed nice but we did more driving than hiking since the road was bad getting in there so wasn’t a whole lot of hunting for us at that spot. Overall, a nice first morning and as always just happy to be out in God’s creation. We’ll see what the afternoon/evening hunt turns up!

I ate 2 full turkey meals today, breakfast and lunch. Decided a change was needed. Grilled a ribeye with blue cheese crumbles paired with grilled garlic and parmesan asparagus and mashed potatoe with some cheddar cheese.

Evening hunt update: We put some miles on the boots tonight—ended up doing about a 5-mile loop through a mix of thick pines and open pockets. Afternoon action started pretty early when we glassed a group of cows with a spike and a little raghorn hanging back. It was nice to get eyes on some elk, even if it wasn’t quite what we were looks for. We pushed deeper in and ended up bumping another group of cows. They caught our wind right as we crested a bench and slipped out before we could get a solid look at what was with them. The wind was terrible tonight, it was constantly swirling so we really couldn’t even work with it to get into any one specific area. Near the end of the loop we saw our last group of the night. Two cows traveling with roughly six spikes. We’ve got an unspoken opening-day rule: no punching a tag on a spike. So no tag filled yet, but the way the elk were moving tonight was good. And it was nice to lay some eyes on. If we can’t find anything over the next few days I know where we’ll be on our last day out. It’ll be another early morning tomorrow back after it. Elk are around—we’ve just got to get our eyes on the right one. I’ll keep you all updated!

The wife and I moved to Colorado a couple of years ago now, but we are back in Arizona—and for a pretty special reason. My buddy drew his first elk tag! It’s something we’ve both been looking forward to for a long time. We packed up the little ones and made the trip south over the past few days to help him out. We spent last night talking strategy and catching up with his family. As we celebrate Thanksgiving, its times like these that I am very thankful for. It’s nice to be “home”. This morning we were out early to finalize some scouting before the holiday cooking began. We checked out a few new spots, glassed some ridges, and got a feel for how the elk are moving. It was nice being back in a familiar unit, getting boots on the ground before opening day tomorrow. For those who have seen me post over the years, it’s been somewhat of a tradition for me to do a semi-live hunting thread whenever we’ve gotten drawn. I’m excited to do another and share our experiences as we get started on this year’s late hunt! Happy Thanksgiving to all, and I’ll be updating this thread daily. Thanks for following along!

Only two deer we saw were trophy bucks. We were very fortunate to take this one.

Buffalo tomahawk steak, over charcoal and applewood, whatever dry rub seasoning we had laying around. One of the best steaks I’ve ever had.

Used to shoot barnes exclusively. Have killed a pile of Critters with them and I've never had a bad experience. My son just put three, 120s through a cow elk in October and they're still going as far as I know.

A lot of trees in the back of trucks on the beeline on our way home from our late hunt. Good luck, enjoy this beautiful weather!

I will take it

Seekins Precision Havak Element 300PRC rifle topped with a Swarovski Z5 3.5-18x44 scope. $2,000.00. The rifle on its own sells for more than this new. Great deal for someone looking for a very light rifle to pack in the 300 PRC caliber! The gun and scope shoot great and are in excellent condition as I used this gun on just one trip. Very light rifle at 6 pounds. Trigger is fully adjustable and I added an outdoorsman custom turret to the scope and I also added scope covers. I still have the stock Swarovski adjustable turret if preferred. The scope reticle is the Swarovski 4W. The barrel on the gun is 22 inches and fully threaded if you wanted to remove the muzzle brake and add a suppressor. If interested contact Dave via text at 480-849-0609 I am not interested in any trades or low ball offers. Thanks for your interest!

Impact velocity needs to be up in the 1500fps to 1800 fps for proper expansion. Most are running lighter bullets fast. You might be at the limits for Impact velocity and expansion. We usually have clean kills and no bullets recovered as there's a entry and exit hole .

Made it in to pull blinds today. It's like driving thru a stream into a lake to get in. The blinds in two spots were almost in the water! It's bad lots of rain ,snow Picture from my dad's blind . All bulls!! Dad had a cow tag. Lots of guys were looking for bulls were only needed a cow. No luck this year just good memories with dad!

I'm sorry but trying to see if you can hit an animal at 750 yards is not ethical. If you cant sneak within 3 or 4 hundred yards then why are you hunting? I know I'll get a lot of pushback on this but show a little respect to the animal and work to get a clean ethical shot. Obviously you weren't skilled enough to do that the first time. This is what gives hunters a bad name.