Rocky Mountains: Surviving Off The Land | Sasquatch Mountain Man | TRACKS

something hunts these mountains shaped for myth formed by the spirit of the mountain man he lives by the way he hunts [Music] born of the mountainous blood of the indian he survived by hoffman and longbow he's alone he's free he's forged by the elements journey with the last of a breed sasquatch mountain man [Music] a journey begins across a wilderness spanning time as much as distance the one they call sasquatch is retracing the steps and reliving the sagas of the mountain men he is the natural-born heir to beneath his feet lies the same land the free trappers once walked upon and ahead for sasquatch lie the same adventures and the same deadly perils of all the dangers this wild territory holds the potentially greatest threat lies in the one that looks the purest and gentlest but hidden in its soft touch like a straight razor in a lady's glove is the fate known as white death for laramie sasquatch miller white death is just one of the challenges of where he carves out a hard true life i live in the middle of nowhere in the rocky mountains you look around this is my home i was born and raised in the mountains [Music] brought up living off the land learning all the ways of mother nature [Music] my horse is my best friend i'm a sucker for a challenge you can drop me off 100 miles from civilization and i'd be tickled pete [Music] i've got the same instincts in the same blood as 100 years ago [Music] like they say i know jeremiah johnson rocky mountains is the marrow of the world sasquatch's dna is not of a mythical creature but of the legendary trappers and hunters called mountain men in the wake of lewis and clark's discoveries enterprising young men with rifles traps knives and a sound horse or two pushed into the unmapped far western wilderness seeking their fortunes in beaver pelts boss lopers is what they called themselves and at their peak in the 1840s they numbered over three thousand but many never returned from their adventures falling to the war arrows of indians the grisly or the most silent most ruthless of all the killers white death winter in the rockies today laramie faces many of the very same dangers deadly weather is still the worst he can take comfort though in having a fine hawking rifle a gun first built in the 1820s by the brothers hawking of saint louis missouri and prized for a generation or more by the mountain men who hunted the shining mountains [Music] [Applause] [Music] for the mountain man survival depended on not just what he shot with his hawking but on food taken in every way including the most primitive [Music] [Applause] see if you look in there there's a little piece of meat attached to the top of the trigger what's going to happen is that mouse or pack rat or squirrel is going to come around here he's going to see that and say oh there's dinner he's going to go in there to grab it and it's going to trip that trigger the branch is going to swing back pull this out from underneath and it's going to squish it so like this [Music] voila [Music] [Applause] [Music] here is the true and original american melting pot mountain men hunkered down beside fires just like this using their side poor dippers and molds to cast their own silver sheen bullets from molten lead that's my 54 caliber bullet capable of taking any game down in the world gives a man a sense of accomplishment and confidence knowing he can make the bullets he needs whenever he needs them even with the ability to make them bullets were always a scarce commodity to the mountain man and if he could find a meal without having to use any precious lead then it was worth the effort [Applause] what do we got here we got a mud seasoned red squirrel it's gonna be red squirrel pancakes tonight but it's better than no pancakes [Music] [Music] the sasquatch weighs never easy and for laramie it's a point of pride that even loading his rifles a work of skill and art to be done perfectly because he'll only have one chance at the shot of a lifetime we're in sasquatch country we're in the farthest northwest corner of british columbia we're after huge canadian moves biggest in the world four out of the top five in the record book have all come from around here that's what we're after so i squash to come out here and mingle with the bears and the wolves try to give me a big moose [Music] in the giant moose country of british columbia a man called sasquatch walks in the footprints of the mountain men he uses traditional skills to honor the spirits of the ones who came before him while blazing his own unique trail [Music] speaking in the tongues of wild animals is one of the skills the mountain men knew learned from the indians with whom they hunted and traded [Music] there's a bull grunting right over here there he is grunting again there's two bulls i can hear two different bulls grunting over here there must be a cow somewhere in the area get up here on this ridge see if we can't pull that big boy back over here [Music] [Music] you know all these old the old mountain men back in the day they used to uh wear lots of furs lots of buck skin because rubbing up against this kind of stuff it helps keep them quiet it's actually fairly waterproof and it helps keep your scent down [Music] for laramie as for the mountain men before him wilderness is the ultimate mystery to solve bigger than him bigger than his life we've been having a lot of weather we've been having a bunch of rain and wind then moose will get down into these bottoms like this it's real thick shelters them from the wind they can bed up there they'll lay there for hours and so it's it's a good idea to stop and really listen sit down for 30 minutes and it's in those times of stillness when you can hear the true rhythms of the wilderness [Music] there's no water repellent here no high-tech clothing to shed the frigid sleet and laramie has to make sure to keep his powder dry literally [Music] for sasquatch now and the mountain men before there is one universal law of the mountains cold is death and fire is life [Music] you know the wind's been blowing real bad up here what that does to the animals is it pushes them down in the thick river bottoms and thick brush and trees and makes it tough on sasquatch you got to go maneuver through there and hope you can get a bull to grunt [Music] last night it cleared off a little bit so the moose were probably rutting all night it's cloudy right now trying to rain and moose are going to be going to bed a little early this morning so hopefully we can get up there and catch them as they're heading down to bed and the thick willows in the bottom and down here is evidence that laramie is not the only one still carrying on the traditions from the days of the boss lopers you can see right here somebody's cut out a notch in the tree there's no pine martin trap they'll hook a pine martin trap to that and set some food in there and that pine martin will climb up in there and he got you a fur it's a lot of people up here make their money the way the old mountain man used to for the mountain man the way of life could always turn into a way of near death a threat to a mountain man could come from anywhere one day on the trail of free trappers confronted by a rut crazed bull moose great blades of antlers driven by nearly a ton of rage slammed the man into a tree knocking him unconscious when his blackness lifts the man finds the bull looming above him ready to attack again pulling his flintlock pistol from his belt the trapper fires a desperate ball through the moose's glaring eye this happened only miles from where laramie's now about to have his own encounter with a giant moose for laramie the trail to his moose leads through the close quarters of thick brush look right here that's where these moose have been bedding in this thick brush up there to stay out of the wind we're on the right track oh [Music] [Music] the shadows of the mountain men stretch from the past to the giant moose of today what remains the same is the threat of white death winter in the rockies as laramie sasquatch miller prepares to track a bull into its bedding grounds in far northern british columbia [Music] game calling is just one of the traditional skills laramie carries on [Music] pretty cool real little bull we don't want him but it's pretty neat to watch him time to go find big boy bullwinkle you can gauge the vastness of the wilderness by the way it simply swallows up the largest of animals the skyline shines with the shimmer of white death but this country has more than one kind some clothed in silver-tipped fur are the kinds of death that may find you before you find them or even know that they're there um [Music] [Applause] [Music] these moves willows like this is their main food source they'll walk through and they'll just eat the tops off all these willows your big bull moose will stand over seven foot at his shoulder so i mean these willows are just perfect height for him so over the top of this there's a big bowl back in the back so we're gonna sneak up this trail it's real loud through here with all the willows and brush and everything so we got to try to keep you know our sound down because then moose can hear you from a long ways away [Music] you only get one shot with these babies so you better make it count we gotta be within 150 yards that means getting up close and personal with the seven and a half foot tall animal [Music] we got the wind bad it's blowing straight down into this canyon we're gonna circle up and try to get the wind in our favor so they're in here we just gotta find them [Music] [Music] in the heart of country ruled by white death lives the magnificent canadian moose here laramie carries on the traditions of the mountain man as he challenges fierce weather treacherous terrain and another kind of death that robes itself in silver fur skilled at calling game laramie's brought the moose to him but still hunts for a bigger bowl it's a big knob right up here we're gonna go up there and sit and see if we can hear them bugs grunting down in the valley almost grunting over here we're gonna try to grind him in and see what we can't [Music] do hmm [Music] calling game means knowing a wide vocabulary hear that [Music] [Music] i'm just gonna shut up and see if maybe i'll get interested and sometimes it's silence that overpowers the animals with curiosity and brings them in now it's down to one shot from sasquatch's hawken rifle [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Music] as the moose disappears in a cloud of powder smoke laramie fills his hawken with a backup load [Music] and come on name him pumpkinhead he's got a big old dome on look we shot him from a little orange patch right there about 50 yards away [Music] about a high 57 58 inch bull i'm tickled to death [Music] [Applause] well we let the meat sit overnight we had to go get the horses to come back and pack it out let's say a dog's man's best friend i disagree i think it's a horse saves you a lot of work raining like a son of a gun ought to be fun there might be a grizzly sitting on it who knows we'll see in this land of white death there's an endless struggle for every bite of food and if the grizzly finds the moose before laramie can pack it out then one of them may have to die the horses know the score and are not excited about leaving the safety of camp [Music] it's a simple fact the further north you go the more things that can eat your horses the moose we killed last night he's just right over this little mole we're gonna ease in there and make sure there's no predators bigger than us [Music] with a single shot in his hawking laramie zane will have to be true if there's a grizz on the carcass [Music] let's go pack it up and get the hell out of here [Applause] [Music] for laramie sasquatch miller the trail of the mountain man is just beginning [Music] it's time to find camp for the night and cook fresh moose steaks [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] the smell on the wind brings in company [Music] this is only a first meeting for laramie and old ephraim something hunts these mountains shaped for myth formed by the spirit of the mountain man he lives by the way he hunts [Music] born of the mountainous blood of the indian he survived by hawking and longbow he's alone he's free he's forged by the elements journey with the last of a breed sasquatch mountain man a sasquatch walks up here retracing the first steps laid down by the mountain men who were his spiritual forefathers laramie has commenced his challenge of the wilderness with a tolerable hawken rifle and his own cast bullets that's my 54 caliber bullet capable of taking any game down in the world gonna be red squirrel pancakes tonight big game or small laramie knows he possesses the time-honored skills to keep himself fed in his far country but he hasn't limited his sights to squirrel and has already taken up his cap lock rifle to seek larger fare to fill his larder among the many things that laramie knows is the language of the animals and that savvy has enabled him to draw the mighty bull moose into range of his 54 caliber muzzle loader [Music] about a high 57 58 inch bull i'm tickled to death now in far northern british columbia laramie is looking to meet up with a rival the other great hunter of these woods and mountains and the one true man-eater the smell of fresh moose meat rises with the smoke of the fire and spreads into the night this is a challenge to the other hunter for whom all the game is his to be defended or confiscated he's old ephraim the mountain man's name for the devil [Music] [Applause] [Music] like the mountain men who preceded him laramie knows the grizzlies legendary power and danger are fact his scalp ripped from his skull a leg snapped by crushing jaws exposed ribs showing white through his torn side young hue glass lies seemingly lifeless beneath the carcass of the grizzly he's fought to the death with his knife seeing no hope two fellow mountain men leave him in a shallow grave wrapped in the bear hide for two nights in a day glass lies unconscious coming to at last he sets his own broken leg his one chance the cheyenne river a hundred miles away summoning all his will glass begins to crawl now with a lone bullet in his hawking rifle laramie's ready for his own appointed meeting with ole ephram [Music] for this grizzly hunt laramie's partnered up with jack another hunter with the blood of the mountain man in his veins look right here you can see where a bear's been rubbing they've got some hair it's shiny you know the black marks on the top and then there's a bite mark here about seven foot pretty good bear seven seven and a half foot somewhere around there a bear that tall can weigh 600 pounds he runs at 35 miles an hour has four inch claws and a 1200 pound bite force an ultimate survivor he'll live on berries and roots as well as on meat if you look real close you can see where these bears have been tearing up and digging for roots and everything else in here lots of bears in the area grizzly country's no easier to travel in than sheep country [Applause] [Music] from up here a giant bears no more than a speck on the broad river flat [Music] we got got a really big bear over here he's just feeding on me so berry bushes along the bottom we're across this dang river gonna go give her hell the race is on to get across the river and into position ahead of the bear before he feeds his way out of sight [Music] in these willows even the biggest of bears can vanish like mist on the wind we lost him down here in this thick stuff we're gonna go get on his knob look down see if we can't locate him again uh that bear's only 300 yards away right here we've got this bear down here it's a big bear it's down in the bottom it's thicker and all hell that's when the situation gets hairy but i got a kid within about a hundred yards that's why i love the old hawk and it makes it interesting if we can get an area where we can cut him off get a good job laramie will have to move fast to cut off the bear [Music] the path of the mountain man has led laramie to far northern british columbia now he's fording fast running waters and breaking trail carrying a traditional hawk and muzzle loading rifle in the hunt for one of the largest most powerful predators on land laramie's pushing through thick brush as he's ready to come face to face with the silver tipped grizzly bear there he is looking at it [Music] that's a different bear [Music] wind's starting to swirl it's making it real tough well we spotted that big bear down in the bottom just feeding on the soapberries in the bottom circled the round cup got in a perfect spot he come to about 150 yards which i could take that shot and i could hit him but he never stopped and i just didn't well there he is right there running the spectacular beauty of the country does not alter the fact that at times you have to claw your survival out of it right here we got a real good beaver run they're moving from the river to this little slough and what i'm going to do is almost set a conner bear trap right off into this little slough area just right off them we said another lake hole trap hopefully we can catch two beavers at once [Music] there's as much art as science to making a good trap set [Music] done right the result will be an instant humane kill [Music] bye [Music] lucky for laramie he doesn't have to wait for what his traps catch before he eats there's still moose meat from the kill he made earlier on this expedition into british columbia imitating a cow moose he called in a love sick bull and the one shot from his hawking brought down a trophy book animal and enough provisions to last a while [Applause] [Music] [Applause] a meal of moose would have been a godsend for mountain man hugh glass when he met the grizzly on the high plains and paid the price [Music] grubbing for roots feeding on berries letting maggots clean his wounds hugh glass crawls across the miles going in and out of consciousness waking once he finds a grizzly lapping blood from his skin later he somehow drives off a pair of wolves from a buffalo calf carcass and gorges on the raw flesh strengthened he completes his hundred-mile crawl to the cheyenne river and lashes up a raft now he lets the current carry him to the missouri and down to fort kiowa considered one of the most remarkable treks in history glass's 200-mile odyssey takes two months the saga of hugh glass is etched into the dna of laramie miller and he knows what he'll be up against when it's time for him to stare down a grizzly look here you can see pretty fresh bear sign they've been eating these salt berries it's just chock full of salt berries take that home make it a soup for you on this ridge pretty much all day we've seen a pretty good chris down here in the bottom and then we just saw a smaller we can't tell if it's four or so out here we've got another big big bear up on the hill we're gonna go get on the bank and see if we can't get a good look see if it's a sour or so the episode of grasp or sasquatch is still ongoing [Music] we had the wind blowing down we're going to try to circle around hopefully he walked right to us there's about 40 yards [Music] the animal most feared and respected by the mountain men feigned for its fierceness and power the object of laramie's quest in the north country of british columbia here laramie brings his traditional skills the hunt continues across the vast and rugged landscape we've got the wind blowing down we're gonna try to circle around hopefully he walks right to us in this country trying to chase a grizzly on the move is futile at best crazy at worst [Music] we had that big bear right down here in the bottom we figured he's heading this north real fast figures trying to circle around in front of him and pull the houdini on us [Laughter] [Music] here a grizzly has his own entire world to run and hide in and grizzlies they love to feed on flats like this you got a lot of fish spawning down in these creeks but you got the big sand bars where they can drag them fish up on the sand bars you got tons of soap berries going along which is one of the bears main diets but they'll come out of this thick brush and they'll come down here and feed you can see them anytime throughout the day [Music] it's amazing you get an eight nine ten foot animal and they can just disappear you look across here and it doesn't look like there's any cover for them to hide anywhere but they can disappear and they'll show up 200 yards from you so patience is really key [Music] this would be a great place for them bears to stay out of the rain they got all kinds of berries that's what these bears are eating soapberry it's bitter [Music] they're very bitter not bad though you could live off that for a while [Music] what looks like play is a serious grizzly technique for spotting small animals [Music] once again the land draws a cloak over the grizzly bear yes they don't get big for nothing [Music] as the bear continues to elude laramie his trap has borne fruit from the river [Music] laramie will care for this beaver in camp he has a pelt and food and without firing a shot and disturbing the area [Music] for all the care lermy's taking with skinning and flushing and butchering this beaver there's nonetheless one part that ranks is not so much i'm going to cut off this beaver tail so that i can use it for bait no i'm not going to eat it you hear all these stories of the mountain men back in the day and beavertail being a delicacy well it's full of gristle the beavers store gristle and fat in this so that they can make it through the winter that's why their tails are a lot bigger in the fall than they are in the spring and just for that lone reason i don't see how the mountain men could ever eaten it it's inedible to me i've tried it in not so other bueno of the beaver though are downright mouth-watering [Music] [Applause] [Music] now that's some fine haunch of beaver [Music] belly full of beaver meat laramie carries on his quest to meet up with old ephraim see we got a big big chris up there looks like he's trying to dig to china he's digging for gopher's boy and he's throwing dirt everywhere bear and laramie are now on a collision course we got a bear eye out here in the flat i'm gonna go check see if it's a sour or a pretty good-sized bear [Music] bring me men to match my mountains the poet wrote men to match the grizzly that walks the trails here the traditions of the mountain men live on here embodied by laramie sasquatch miller out on flats ripe with berries and across creeks running with fish laramie draws nearer to facing down mr grizz he's digging for gopher's boy and he's throwing dirt everywhere we got a barrier in the flat i'm gonna go check see if it's a sour boar pretty good sized bear [Music] looks like a salad we're gonna double check laramie's hawk and planes rifle was the long-range hunting weapon of its day that was in the 1820s and then as now a hunter with a hawking needed to get within 150 yards or closer to ensure an accurate shot but at that range there's no problem identifying the animal if the weather cooperates [Music] it's a beautiful country but once again you can see it's raining like crazy you can't see the sides of the mountain visibility's pretty poor at least the rain will quiet laramie's stomped through the willows toward the grizzly [Music] [Music] it's only about 40 yards only 40 yards in point-blank hawking range but the beast might as well be at a mile that's exactly what you want right there it's about 40 yards it's a bow hunter's dream if it was a good blower too bad it's a sow big enough to be aborted the seven foot bear i can't see nothing hanging that's the thing about these bears is i don't care how good you think you are you never know 100 for sure until you get you know up close within 50 yards and you can look at the color and the size of the head always helps but it's never a guarantee if you look at that one right there i would have bet money she was a boarder but nope i'm gonna back out of here real slowly and she knows we're here she just don't care she's feeding i don't want to risk making her mad because it could get ugly really quick [Music] old ephraim said the mountain men hinting at brimstone and indians knew it as the beast that walks like a man leaving a clawed hind track in the image of the human footprint or the sasquatch for this sasquatch his ultimate rendezvous with the grizzly or the devil awaits

Channel: TRACKS - Travel Documentaries

Views: 91,392

Keywords: eco-living, mountain retreat, mountain survival, mountain traditions, mountain wilderness, naturalist lifestyle, off the grid living, off-grid living, outdoor exploration, rustic lifestyle, rustic living, survival skills, survivalist living, traditional living, traditional skills, wilderness documentaries

Id: kptVboZ3IlQ

Length: 44min 29sec (2669 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 08 2022