Early October 2012 found me sitting in the back seat of an old supercub bouncing down a tiny portion of airstrip just shy of the Northwest territories border in the extreme northern part of Alberta. The little river Chad and I had planned on hunting was only a “short” mile and a half walk from the little landing patch we had cut from an old airstrip that had not seen much use since the early 90’s. It had frozen the previous night so the bugs were non existent as we trudged towards the river through knee deep swamp in our hip boots. Three hard hours later, completely exhausted we collapsed on the banks of the beautiful Yates river, pulled off our waterlogged hip waders and pitched camp. Having flown early in the morning allowed us to hunt that evening as we fulfilled the mandatory six hour wait after taking a bush flight before we could begin hunting. We gathered up the little energy we had left and split up.

 With the goal of opening this area to non-resident hunting, we were here to scout, hunt and asses the viability of hunting such a remote region. With the nearest road being 40 air miles away, and not a hope of accessing it by land, it is about as remote as Alberta gets. The mouth of the Yates river, long famous for its incredible walleye fishing and abundance of moose, flows into the Buffalo Lake in the Northwest Territories. That area has for generations been hunted by the indigenous people of the north, and we were hoping 35 miles upstream was no different.  Although the walleye do not come up this far, as they are hampered by multiple rapids and gargantuan log jams, we did quickly realize the moose hunting was better then we had ever seen.

Less then an hour into our evening hunt I could faintly hear Chads cow calls echoing through the cold evening air, followed by the sounds of a giant old angry bull moose coming in for his hot girlfriend. Moments later we had a 50” knarly looking Boone and Crockett bull laying in front of us.  We had hunted for a total of two hours, heard multiple bulls reply and were instantly convinced that this was the new Mecca of northern Alberta moose hunting, and vowed to make our yearly pilgrimage back here for years to come.

Its been many years since then and the only season I missed on that lovely river was in 2019 because of the birth of my fourth child. Only now we hunt it with a lot more comfort. Helicopters drop off the hunters within walking distance of camp and support is flown with a fixed wing aircraft. Meat is packed back to the air strip in an amphibious Argo and hunting is done with freighter canoes and shallow drive Mud Buddy engines. There are still plenty of moose to hunt and rivers to explore. The main camp now consists of two wall tents, cots, portable shower, generators, and good home cooked food.

The terrain is densely forested along the river and generally wet and boggy so sturdy waterproof hunting boots are a must. Muck boots are a great idea. Temperatures can range from 32°F to 75°F in mid September and down to 25°F to 40°F by late September and early October. I encourage all hunters to purchase tags for black bear as its common to bump into them during your hunt. A wolf tag will be given to each hunter and NO trophy fee will be charged if you are lucky enough to harvest one. We spot the occasional woodland caribou but unfortunately no tags are available in Alberta.

Moose hunting is the best and most exciting during the rut so I only hunt the last half of September and the first ten days of October trying to hit the peak of the rut. Hunting time is 7 full days.

The morning your hunt starts, you will be picked up at the hotel in High Level and transferred to the helicopter base for the 30-minute flight to camp, arriving mid afternoon. At the end of the hunt, the helicopter will leave camp early in the afternoon for your return to High Level. You will be met at the helicopter base by someone from our team. You will then be transferred to the hotel in High Level for your flight home the following morning.