On the Adventure Trail

by Ken Nowicki

WOULD YOU RESCUE ME Would you rescue me? Would you get my back? Would you take my call when I start to crack? Would you rescue me? Would you rescue me when I’m by myself?*

*Song by OneRepublic

“H ave you hunted in the Willmore?” I asked. “Cause I just got back.”

“Of course,” said Packtrain MacNammee. “Who hasn’t?”

Who indeed? Is there any single area in North America that is more famous for sheep hunting? The list of hunters would include many of the icons in the hunting world and the outfitters and guides would count in the dozens and include the legends of the fall. The history of the People & Peaks is set out in the book published by the Willmore Wilderness Foundation*. It is a must-read.

At one time, the huge area north of Jasper National Park was roadless wilderness—a wonderful remote and beautiful country with access only by horse. But gradually the mineral extraction industries began explorations into the Rocky Mountains from the Montana border all the way to Intersection Mountain. Bulldozers started carving roads and trails into the high country all over Alberta. Thankfully, the limestone formations held no gold or precious minerals in quantities worth mining. The oil and gas reserves were poor in the area west and south of Grande Cache.

Today there are scars on the land, but the roads that were carved into the mountain valleys make super horse and hiking trails. Still, there is a lot of rough trekking into the side valleys where outfitters sneak hunters into the cirques to snipe fine rams and other mountain game.

Jack O’Connor describes his two hunts in the area as including “one of the great experiences and most successful hunts of my lifetime” and a later hunt in 1961 as one of his worst. The difference was a road carved into the Big Smokey. I walked that road myself in 1978 and shot a goat an even twenty miles from the truck. Oh, those were the days.

Where O’Connor had glassed “thousands of goats” and at least 35 mature rams and 33 grizzlies, and caribou by the hundreds and bull moose and mule deer and black bears, I found the game depleted and goats were on the draw, but it was still magnificent country. Back in the 1970’s you could still run a jet boat up the Smokey but who had the money for one of them?

It was then, as a wilderness park created by law in 1959 and pushed by a visionary Alberta legislator named Norman Willmore, a place healing from the scars on the land but still replete with game.

I have made a bunch of trips into the Willmore on shank’s-mare, hunting grizzly back when that was still possible, goat hunting and sheep hunting. Most of these hunts originated at the Sulpher Gates trailhead just out of the Cache. It was not until 2022 that I planned to participate in a full-fledged horseback expedition.

We planned to stage at Rock Lake on the south end of the Park. It was late September. Our Party of three consisted of Jesse, a longtime Outfitter and consummate professional, Dave, in his late 60’s, and a rancher who was weaned on horse milk, my son Glen, all legs and full of testosterone in his 20’s, and me, the chief cook and bottle washer, and the weak link on the pack-string, sucking the hind-tit as the farm boys would say.

We started with a rodeo right at the get-go. Pulling the two horse trailers over 16 hours over two days to get to the parking area, I was not surprised. Can you see a three-year-old horse stepping out of the box with some attitude? That little mare had no intention of carrying the pack saddle, let alone the bright red panniers.

We had a little shakedown cruise the night before the first push up into the park and I watched in awe as Jesse stepped into the iron corral and started to tame that horse. It put on a display that would rival the best in the

Calgary Stampede. I stood with my mouth gaping, but Dave just chuckled every time the horse bucked. I noticed the other horses seemed to look on with amusement as well.

In the morning we had another session with plenty of excitement, but Jesse used dulcet tones and the occasional epithet, and in short order we got the pads and saddles and packs lashed on every horse. Every pannier and top pack was stuffed and saddle bags too, and even my pockets. We were taking off heavy.

Things settled in. Plop plop plop, we went down the trail, into the golden aspen as we headed up the Rock Creek towards the Eagle’s Nest Pass. One hour down the trail I started to get comfortable and the nerves were settling down. I let my mind drift.

“George Kelley went everywhere in that country. Every hunter that went with George raved about his skills in the bush,” Packtrain told me. “He was a top hand with horses.”

I started to feel like a top hand too. I recalled George’s laconic facility with words and his incredible sense of humor. I day dreamed. It was my estimate that we were making three miles an hour and the trail was a breeze—high and wide with only a few muckholes. You could not imagine a better day for riding, and most of the yellow jackets and flies were already frozen by frost. Not a cloud in the sky, and a picture perfect day. I loosened my grip on the saddle horn and started to really enjoy things.

Around two hours in, the gray horse (I had a difficult time with names throughout the trip) but it wasn’t the Bay Horse or the White horse or Palomino or Sorrel. They had nice names—some descriptive. Like, I rode Leroy, and Lola was the young packhorse and also we had Spitfire and Nico and Frida and Gray Bitch and some others. It was Gray Bitch that reared and pulled back the slack and caught Dave by surprise.

I was following behind, and didn’t really grasp what happened, but I saw the ruckus, and then the aftermath. As quick as you can tell it, it was over, and Dave was standing there with a broken pinky. Well, that’s not the right description. It was a bleeding mess with bone and blood bubbling out and something you don’t ever want to see. Apparently the lead rope caught his hand and when the Gray Bitch pulled back, the finger got the squeeze.

Dave is an old time cowboy and has a lifetime of experience roping and riding. He was pretty upset at himself. Jesse and Glen and I were horrified at the obvious need for medical assist, even as we were impressed with Dave’s humerous take on the situation. “Just cut it off,” he joked.

Mindful of every minute, we hit the panic button on the In-Reach and wonder of wonders, the reply was swift and a helicopter dispatched. We rounded up the ponies and tied them to trees and built a fire and kept Dave talking and waited the agonizing 90 minutes for help to come. Luckily there was a meadow where we could chop out some brush and make a decent place to land.

Help was in the shape of a 13 million dollar whirlybird and fully five paramedics in jump suits swiftly went to work giving Dave a shot of pain relief and professional care. In minutes they were gone taking him to Edmonchuk for surgery.

Then we went to work with Jesse stripping packs and hobbling horses and making camp. It was another surprise to find Glen is allergic to horses or hay or both. He started

sprouting hives and hacking like he had the Covid convulsions. When we settled in for the night it was a time to reflect on the miracle of these modern communication devices. In the clear night sky we were entertained by endless spacegazer satellites streaming past.

I remember well the helicopter that rescued me in the Mackenzie mountains nearly 40 years ago where the ELT (emergency locator transmitter) and the Sarsat system saved the day. The signal was picked up by a passing jet and they dispatched a huge Hercules which passed seven times in the night dropping flares through the falling snow. The system was imprecise in those times and a mining helicopter had to do a bunch of checking up and down the river to find the plane the next day, but he saw my smoke signals. The sound of the chopper was beautiful music for me that time. Later, when I crashed with my good friend Phil Spano, and Phil was killed in the wreck, I developed some trepidations about riding in a rotory-powered conveyance. But when you are hurt, there is nothing quite like the whopping sound of spinning blades.

The amazing moccasin telegraph or maybe it was social media played a hand, but I was surprised to see Kyle, a modern day mountain man, who rode for 12 or more miles in the dark to find us. His concern for our condition and his quick reaction exemplify the finest tradition in the sheep hunting community. He went above and beyond to come to help. He had our back.

With Kyle’s help, we put on the packs in the morning and I just about fell off my steed when proffered the lead rope on one of the pack horses, but I was relieved when I found they were kidding. I had been relegated to dude status, and I was just fine with that. But those of you who trail in with an outfit know that the rear end of a string of horses is not as much fun as you may think.

“The horse at the back keeps jigging up to catch the others,” I moaned to Packtrain. “My butt was tattooed on the saddle and my teeth were rattling every time he hit a trot.”

“You should be able to sit in a saddle,” snarked the old Outfitter. “All I ever seen you do was set in a chair.”

“Not a rocking chair,” I retorted, “And not one that lays ears down flat and turns and bites.”

Without further incident we crossed the Eagles Nest Pass and over into our chosen timbered hillock where Kyle had stopped and built and comfortable camp. He is a member of the Rocky Mountain Wilderness Society, a group that volunteers each summer to clear trails and spruce up camps. It is yeomans work they do, and I never saw a gumwrapper on our entire hunt, covering some 20 hours in the saddle.

We hunted hard, and the first thing each day is looking for horses. How they can hop along with hobbles on is a wondrous sight to see. How they can sit still with bells on and still feed up a belly full of grass is exasperating. I made the chop on a fire and propane stove, one of the luxuries of horse camping, and we ate like kings, with coq au vin grouse supplied by Colter, who was Kyle’s son and on his first sheep hunt, but his skills on horses and with gun belied his youth at 12 years old and counting. Some day he will lead his own packtrain into the mountains and already he has had days in the saddle helping with the society working on the trail systems.

We saw sheep, but not many rams. The neighboring camp took care of them just before we arrived. But there were more we knew, just not the time to find them. Our tally on grizzly and moose and goats and black bears and caribou did not match those seen in the halcyon days of yore as reported by O’Connor, but I am not so sure the Wilmore isn’t still the very best place there is to hunt for bighorn sheep.

Coming out, those horses were really travelling. The little mare that created excitement on the first day was a seasoned horse and no trouble at all. I sounded like a castanet with my backside bobbing in the saddle. Colter offered me his big high stepping horse Freda and the crew put me in the lead. It was smooth sailing at the head of the line and I expect they gave me the honor in recognition of my culinary skills during the week. I plan to return to the Wilmore again if I have to crawl my way in. WS

Editors Note

Nowicki says people think of Wilmore sheep as small but reports the legendary Charlie Stricker told him some huge bases and heavy horns are sometimes found in a small area south of the Smokey River. A hunter took a ram of this type that scored over 190 inches guided by another outfit in later years. Nowicki and his son Blake lucked into an old ram in a distant basin 15 years ago. The horns are configured in a very distinct style. The vast area in the Wilmore is checkered with historic importance. Names like Eagles Nest, Big Graves, Blue Grouse, Summit, Hardscrabble and Persimmon evoke a storied past. But Nowicki believes there are some parts of the Wilmore that never get hunted and he is arranging another expedition to an area with deep cut canyons falling out of high summit glaciers. Information obtained from a trapper indicates the area is replete with fur and wildlife, including rams with deep curls and waffle cone applique near the bases. High winds make the area nearly inaccessible for aircraft surveillance and a hunter willing to risk entry into these dark gorges will be on his own with no support available should a disaster strike on the trail. A report on the expedition will be forthcoming in Wild Sheep® magazine. Dave is recovering the use of his finger and is in fine fettle.