Well, to get right to it, the hunt was, as
@sab said, unsuccessful, but successful. We hunted the mountain in my last post for 3 days before moving to other areas. It was hard hunting. The first day we essentially scouted, and walked about 5 miles up and down mountains and ravines. There was some great sign, but no sight of actual deer. We hunted the entire legal shooting hours, which was from approximately 0630 to 1730.
The rest of the days was split between a small patch of state land that was absolutely covered in Coues sign, but it appeared that they were only on it during the night, so we never saw them. It was about a square mile that appeared to be a pass through from private lands to the east to another hunting unit on the west that we did not have legal access to. That's the gamble you take when hunting a section of boundary land.
We spent the last two days hunting a large section of National Forest Service land that was heavily used by Coues. We kicked up a total of 5 Coues and several Mulies. 4 of the Coues were does, and we harassed them for 2 solid days, hoping that this close to the rut, a buck would be around showing interest, but one never materialized. Probably just a week too early. It was also a full moon and it rained for 4 of the 7 days we were out there, making the hunt much harder.
The one buck we kicked up we saw about 10 minutes after legal taking hours on (I believe) the 2nd day. He was on an old Dept. Of Defense property that we had to pass through to get to legal hunting grounds, but he was a beauty. Unfortunately I was unable to snap pics of the deer.
All told, I walked about 15 miles over rough terrain. My buddy (who I'm not convinced isn't part goat) covered probably twice that. Our hunting styles are a bit different, and his lends to a lot more walking.
I saw some amazing scenery, stalked game, drank Guinness and Yuengling, ate great, and slept warm. I also drove Ol' Double Tough a ton, and covered some rough terrain. The TJ did great, and had zero issues.
The hunt is over, and it's time to wash the Jeep, but the memory of it will carry me till next year. Maybe I can draw an Antelope tag next time!