First Kaibab Hunt

by Tim Steinmetz

Last year Louie (Louis Urquides, AZOD's Hunting Editor) told me he was going to the Kaibab to help a friend of Rick Williams (Arizona Wilderness Productions) with his first Kaibab deer hunt.  You have to understand that Louie loves to hunt, even if it's not his tag he's in the field and that's what matters.  That's why he's our hunting editor.  Louie is a genuinely great guy, he knows and loves hunting, especially in Arizona.  This is a story written by another really great fellow by the name of Tim Steinmetz.  Tim works for APS and also loves to hunt.  So without further ado here is Tim's story.   Robert Willis, AZOD Editor

First Kaibab Hunt

  I’ve been telling AZOD that I would write this story for almost a year now.  Well AZOD, here it is.  

  I drew my first Kaibab tag last year and it was for 12A-East.  In making my preparations for the hunt my wife asked who would be going with me as I am in the habit of applying for the draw by myself.  My wife normally isn’t a worrier but after I had a run with a less than savory character on an elk hunt a number of years ago she requests that I don’t go on long trips alone.  I told her not to worry a friend of mine, Rick Williams, of Arizona Wilderness Productions told me he wanted to catch the hunt on film.  Unfortunately Rick's schedule changed at the last minute and he was unable to make the trip.  He did arrange for a friend and associate, Louis Urquides (AZOD Hunting Editor), to go in his place.  I was leery at first.  I did not want to be stuck out on a hunt with a perfect stranger who was going to try to direct my every move.

   I talked to this fellow, Louis Urquides, a couple of times before the hunt and we seemed to hit it off right away.  We met on the road on the way up to the Kaibab and stopped at Flagstaff to gas up.  Of course, no hunting trip would be complete without some sort of unexpected event to get it started.  That took the form of me locking my keys in my ’89 Cherokee.  So, we ate breakfast at Denny’s and swapped a number of hunting stories while waiting for the tow truck to come and retrieve my keys.  Kind of makes me think of one of those commercials:

     Tank of gas: $18

     Breakfast at Denny’s: $16

     Locksmith to retrieve keys: $45

     Back on the road to go hunting: PRICELESS

  We got to the Kaibab and found that I would be hunting in the snow.  There were 6-8 inches on the ground and it was looking like there was more on the way.  We topped off our tanks at Jacob’s Lake station and set out to set up camp.  A stalled truck was blocking the road to where we wanted to set up camp, and we spent an hour or so trying to get their truck running.  Louis ended up towing them “just across the highway” (21 miles!).  I went ahead, set up camp and wait for Louis to return.  I thought it would only take 45 minutes to an hour for him to help these guys out of their predicament.  After about two hours I got a little worried and went looking for Louis, making the required phone call home while out on the highway.  In the meantime Louis had returned to camp unloaded his quad and headed out to find me, deer and maybe both.  When I returned to camp and saw Louis's empty truck I realized where he had gone and decided to go to a location we had talked about that looked good according to my topo map. AG&F had also told us that this area had been known to hold a fair number of deer.  I had no more arrived at the site and stepped out from my Jeep when Louis came up the road.  He had found a nice buck with a herd of does not too far from where we were.  I followed him to where he had seen the small herd, we unloaded and headed out to track them down.   That afternoon passed without seeing any deer (something I had grown used to) we headed back to a warm camp, good food and conversation.

   The next morning woke us with 20-25 mph winds, 3-4 inches of fresh snow (not the stale snow that has been known to fall in places like Chicago) and it wasn’t showing any signs of letting up.  We went back to where Louis had seen the deer the evening before but there was no fresh sign.  We had a point we wanted to try to glass from and were on our way there when we spotted a nice 3 point buck with half a dozen does.  My first shot cleanly missed the buck (I think it was a warning shot).  I chambered another round and placed the 145 gr. 7MM Rem. Mag. slug where it needed to be.  The deer went about 80 yards before he expired.  Louis helped me field dress the buck and get it back to camp.  I felt as though I was blessed.  I had meet a new friend and harvested a beautiful Kiabab buck, not to mention just being able to just spend some time in such a beautiful place. 

Congratulations to Tim from Team AZOD

 Be sure to look for the story of Tim's 10-year-old daughter and her successful 2001 elk hunt.  Tim is working on the story and should have it to us soon along with the pictures.  Well hopefully before next season.  Just kidding Tim.  AZOD loves stories like this.  They are the real ones, written by regular guys and gals.