Mountain Men (2012) s04e02 Episode Script

Previously on "Mountain Men" in Montana, the early-arriving winter brings chaos to the mountains Whoa.
How'd that get there? putting Tom on the defensive against a new threat.
If it comes back here, I'll have to kill it.
Marty makes a bold start in the Revelations and gets caught in nature's trap Wow, look at that storm coming.
Can't even see anywhere.
Starting to think that the whole season is gonna be a bust.
And if it doesn't snow, I can't trap.
Whoa.
while Morgan looks to claim his own piece of Alaska.
I've always wanted to build my own home in a wild place.
But freedom doesn't come without a fight.
Whoa! Look at that.
It's one of the biggest pieces of rock on earth, and I got to get to the other side.
And I got to get to the other side.
in the shadow of the great Alaska Range, winter is in the air.
Subzero temperatures set in by late fall and usher in a five-month deep freeze.
The descending cold has Morgan Beasley in a race against time.
He has more than 260 miles to go on the most epic journey of his life, a trek across the Alaskan wilderness to reach his land in the north.
Being out in the open land and the wild country -- I feel at home there.
I love the challenge of taking care of my daily needs from the immediate resources around me.
It's so much more rewarding.
It's just more free, really.
It took Morgan seven years to save enough money to buy the land, and now he's risking it all to get there.
You can go cradle to grave without ever really being a real human being and doing something that's truly challenging.
Aw, crap.
This crossing looks pretty bad.
Standing between Morgan and his destination is the Mat-Su valley, a maze of thick brush cut through by hundreds of rivers and streams, obstacles that Morgan must navigate as he blazes an entirely new trail through this uninhabited land.
Every fall and every spring, there's kind of this shoulder season, this awkward season, where there's kind of half water, half ice.
Things are really starting to ice over, which means the raft is out of the game, but I'm not sure if the ice is totally thick or not.
There's no way around this river.
If Morgan wants to continue, he'll have to cross.
I see, like, water bubbling up through random holes in the ice there, which kind of makes me a little nervous.
You'd better be able to judge your ice really well, 'cause if there's any variation there or there's any weird weak spots, then you're in real big trouble, and you really don't have any room for errors.
Yeah, I don't know about that.
With no choice but to attempt the dangerous crossing, Morgan hatches an emergency plan.
This here is just a green birch branch, and I'm gonna make it into a couple of ice picks.
The way I'm gonna do them -- take a small chunk of birchwood, about the size of a broom handle, and cut a groove into it with my saw then mount these nails in those pieces securely so that the nail sticks out about 3/4 inch, and it just gives you a sharp metal point you can reach up and drag at the ice with, get some traction, and then wrap it with cord extremely tight to kind of lock the nail in place so when I'm jabbing into the ice, it doesn't just press the nail back further into the wood.
I'm gonna score this a little bit with the file on my multi-tool and then clip it off, make a nice little point.
There we go.
Well, those ought to bite.
They'll be floating in front of you after you go through and you're in the water, and you can just grab it and reach out and get a hold on the ice, and then maybe drag yourself up out of the ice.
Gonna test this sucker out.
See, it gets a little bite, there.
Oh, yeah.
That's gonna work.
I'll probably just keep those tucked there, out of my way, till I get on something that makes me nervous, and there they'll be, right there.
If you're traveling on a lot of ice, it's good insurance to have it hanging around your neck.
Kind of like wearing your seatbelt when you're in a car.
All right, here we go.
When I take a calculated risk like this, I have to do everything I can to be prepared.
That's the right thing to do.
In Montana's Yaak Valley, Tom Oar and his friend Will Stringfellow are reinforcing the bear-proofing on the tanning shed in the aftermath of a break-in that cost $5,000 worth of damage.
We're gonna put a piece of plywood over that window, and we're gonna leave that up until we get a new window and until the bear goes into hibernation.
The black bear that ransacked Tom's shed is one of an estimated 10,000 that are a growing threat in the state of Montana.
Get out of here! Yah! Get out of here! Winter's early arrival here caught the bear population off-guard and has set off a feeding frenzy as they hunt for every last scrap of food before bedding down for the cold season.
Well, you think that'll do it? That better do it.
That better do it.
Yeah.
This bear is really setting Tom back, so if there's any way I can help him, I sure want to do that.
I think this is what we need to work on now -- some sort of a latch that we can put on here so he can't tear this door open.
This is the way he came out, so it might be the way he'd want to go back in.
Yeah.
Right.
The bear actually came in the window, but he went out the door.
You can see all the claw marks by the door before he broke the latch open.
Now, if we could put some sort of a bar across here -- 2x4s is about the only thing I can think of.
We'd have to just build, like, a little block thing to slide a board through, you know? Yeah, makes sense to me.
Within a few days, this bear should go into hibernation.
They usually go into hibernation before the first snow falls.
But everything here in the woods seems like it's unpredictable lately, you know, so I don't really know what to expect anymore.
All right.
I bet that'll keep him out.
9,000 feet up, among the towering peaks of Alaska's Revelation Mountains, a violent Windstorm has kept Marty Meierotto grounded for the last 36 hours.
With only four days left before there's no longer enough daylight to make the flight home, Marty has to move fast to escape the mountains or risk getting stuck here without any of his trapping gear.
Today, I'm gonna fly home and get one last load of supplies.
I'm just trying to get as many traps as I can carry and fuel for the snow machine so I can start trapping.
The weather's good -- no wind for a change.
The weather is always changing, so if you have an opportunity, a window to get out, you take it, because tomorrow, it could be unflyable.
All right, I think I'm ready.
The winds have died down in the valley after reaching a peak speed of 50 miles an hour during the storm.
But that's not the case in the canyons.
The winds come funneling down out of those mountain passes, and they just accelerate -- can kick up real fast and get blowing 60, 70 miles an hour in a hurry.
Marty's first test is what he calls Hell Hole Pass -- the 25-mile-long granite gauntlet that's the only way in and the only way out.
Conditions change so quickly here that each trip through the Hell Hole requires a new strategy.
So instead of going over the top This time, Marty's chosen to fly low to sneak below the head winds.
But that leaves him hovering just 10 feet above the canyon floor.
When you are flying low like that, you got to be on.
If you stall that close to the ground, you're not gonna recover.
In Alaska's Revelation Mountains, Marty hovers just 10 feet above the canyon floor in a bold strategy to survive Hell Hole pass.
I'm down in this channel, and now the wind's blowing good.
It's coming right down to the slough, so there's really not much I can do.
I have to climb out of it.
A little turbulence is just uncomfortable, but if gets real bad, you lose directional control of the airplane.
Then you're really in trouble.
Holy Whew! All right.
Yeah.
As a fresh blanket of snow falls on northern Montana, Tom and Will are fighting back with a new line of defense against Tom's black-bear problem.
Get some nails? Yep.
Just for a little added insurance, we're gonna drive a bunch of nails through boards, and we're gonna put 'em underneath the window and underneath the door.
Here we go.
We're usually laying out the welcome mat, but this is what I guess we'd call "the unwelcome mat.
" I believe that's gonna work, Tom.
Looks pretty good to me.
Let's see what this looks like.
Oh! Oh! I believe that'll do it.
Yep.
Really.
I sure wouldn't want to step on it.
Ooh, they're sharp.
Ooh! Well, that should keep him off.
That should discourage him.
He wouldn't be able to stand on that for very long.
Well, looks like that should work, huh? Maybe it's a little overkill, but hopefully, between all the new locks and the boarded-up window, we can keep this damn bear out of the shop.
This is what I do for a living, so I'm gonna do whatever I've got to do to keep the bear from getting back in again.
All right.
Good deal, Tom.
On the banks of Trapper Creek, and 40 miles into his journey through the great Alaska Range, Morgan is searching for a spot where the ice is thick enough to cross.
I want to get across this damn creek.
Looking at something like that, I'm thinking, "Well, this is probably crossable.
It's probably fine.
I'm probably being overly cautious.
" And then another voice in my head is saying, "Well, people have died thinking that exact kind of thing.
" I think the safest thing to do, though, would be to blow up my raft to have out there, just in case.
Morgan can distribute his weight more safely by floating his 40-pound pack across on the raft.
I'm trying to stack the deck in my favor as much as possible.
Getting wet in these kind of temperatures can be life-threatening.
You don't have long to get warm before you start to shiver and go into hypothermia.
All right, here we go.
This is a little sketchy.
It's spooky walking out onto the ice knowing that there's just this thin, brittle layer between you and hypothermia.
Oh Aah! On Alaska's Trapper Creek Aah! Oh! Morgan makes a deadly miscalculation.
You don't have time to think.
There's one thought in your mind, and that's "out.
" "Get out.
Get out.
" I got to go start a fire! With a windchill of 12 degrees, Morgan is now losing heat 25 times faster than normal.
Being able to make fire is just absolutely essential.
Gah.
It's all wet.
It is probably your number-one emergency response.
There we go.
Oh, yeah.
Once you've lit that fire, that's a pretty good feeling.
He has 15 minutes to warm up before exposure begins to set in.
That should get good and hot here in a minute.
I'm gonna get my wet stuff off, strip down, start to dry off.
Ugh.
Oh, that sucks.
I can't believe I went through the ice.
I don't know what every kind of thin ice looks like.
I haven't seen it all.
So that kind of stuff just took me by surprise, and, you know, it's kind of a learning experience for me -- a little humbling, really.
It's gonna be dark just real quick.
This looks like a pretty comfortable place to sleep for the night.
Definitely not gonna go trudging around soaking wet.
When you do something like that, it's probably a good time to stop and rest, take stock, figure out what went wrong, why did you get in that situation, like, how can you adapt your behavior.
Those are all questions that are going through my mind.
There's a lot to think about.
Morgan's fall through the ice puts him short of his daily goal.
I only really went about that far on the map, you know, having to scout up and down the creeks for decent crossings, and blow up the raft and deflate it.
It looks like those are the last of the big creeks we'll have to cross for a while.
And hopefully, by the time I get to some more creeks and rivers, it'll be more significantly frozen.
Wish I hadn't gotten soaking wet, but whatever.
I got a nice fire going.
Just a silly story now.
It just goes to show that being out here, like, even someone like me that's taking all these precautions and trying to be careful, you know, stuff can just jump up and surprise you.
You know, just a cheap blessing.
You know, I got off lucky that time.
Could have been a lot worse.
4 hours and 400 miles south of Revelation Mountains Marty closes in on his home in Two Rivers, Alaska.
All right! Hey, girls! Hey, you made it! Yeah! Long time no see, huh? Yeah, long flight.
Good to be home, though.
So glad to see you.
Been a good girl, baby? Yep.
Let's put this plane to bed and go in the house, and then get something warm to drink, huh? Marty's homecoming is a short one.
He only has three days left with enough daylight to make the return flight, so he intends to set out within the next 24 hours with the last of his trapping gear.
Bring it all the way around there.
All the way around.
In the day ahead, he'll need to prepare his family for the coming winter.
All right.
I'm gonna try and fill up the day with just getting the house ready, and Dominique getting all ready, and then also getting everything prepped with the airplane for the flight out.
Alaska is about to enter its darkest period, a month-long stretch where night lasts more than 20 hours.
Dominique and Noah will fend for themselves over the next six weeks, and then plan to join Marty on the trapline, if he can finish the job in time.
Well, the plan is to have Tash fly you guys out.
Hopefully, the cabin will be done by then, or at least livable.
It's gonna be pretty rough, but hopefully, it'll be done, you know? The way the mill's cutting the logs, it's gonna be nice and bright in there, so it'll be -- I think it'll be pretty nice.
Okay.
All right.
Awesome.
It'll be great to have you out there.
One of the hardest things with trapping in the wilderness is being away from my family.
There's a lot of work ahead of me.
It's a big job, but it's gonna be worth it.
While I'm home, I need to make sure that everything's taken care of for Dominique and Noah, just making sure everything's good to go here, 'cause I'm not gonna be back for a long time.
In New Mexico's Cimarron Valley, it's three weeks until winter hits.
At 6,500 feet, amongst the dense Ponderosa pine forest, the local wildlife is making preparations for the cold and so, too, is Kyle Bell.
I've got a job to do today.
Winter's closing in, and I need to put some meat in the freezer.
It's time to hunt now.
Come on.
Up in there.
The fact that I can live here and make a living here is what's most important to me.
Kyle is hunting mule deer.
One buck can provide 200 pounds of meat -- enough to feed his family for two months.
Come on, Lucy.
This time of year, the deer are up high.
That's where their food source is.
I have got to get up there and get some meat for my family and get back as quick as I can, because I've got a lot of work ahead of me later on this winter.
Y'all behave while I'm gone, all right? I'll be back in a little bit.
Where I'm headed is up on the mesa.
I'm gonna be hunting between 7,500 and 8,000 feet in elevation.
This time of year, that's where the deer are, because the acorns are ripe up there.
That's why I'm going to this much trouble.
Look at that.
That's a bear den.
This time of year, it's probably not active, but that don't mean that there ain't one close by.
The Cimarron's black bears are often found near the best hunting grounds where deer come to feed, and bears preparing for hibernation are aggressive and territorial.
Bear scat.
That's not a good sign.
Really fresh bear scat.
This is the last thing I wanted to see up here.
There ain't even no flies on it.
It is really fresh.
I'm not the only predator out here, so I'm gonna have to keep my guard up.
In two rivers Alaska, Marty has just 24 hours before he returns to the Revelation Mountains.
All right, let's unload this wood, huh? Okay.
Dominique and Noah plan to join him on the trapline later in the season.
This will keep you and Mama warm while I'm gone, huh? But in the meantime, he must prepare them to face the onset of winter without him.
Well, this trip home, I want to make sure I got enough firewood and everything taken care of so that while I'm gone, everything's good to go here, 'cause I'm gonna be gone for a while.
It's getting harder and harder for me to be away from my girls for so long, such big, long blocks of time.
It's pretty tough sometimes.
You're gonna like it out on the trapline.
Got all kinds of big mountains around.
Papa's building a new cabin.
It's gonna smell just like this firewood.
It doesn't smell like anything.
That's because you've been around it all the time.
It's really a big deal for me to have my girls out there with me, 'cause it's gonna be a great family experience, and it's gonna be a great experience for Noah in the long run, for her life, you know? She's old enough now to where she can appreciate this kind of thing.
It's always hard to leave your family, but knowing that they're gonna be coming out in six weeks, hopefully to a new cabin -- I'm looking forward to that.
3,500 miles east, in North Carolina Eustace Conway nears the end of a 40-mile journey through the Blue Ridge Mountains to reach a hundred-acre parcel of high-priced timber located somewhere in these backwoods.
He stands to turn a healthy profit clearing unwanted trees from the property.
But first, he has to find it.
We're getting close to the logging area.
We're not real familiar with the area, but we've got key landmarks to be looking for.
We got to find the blazes, 'cause that tells us where we are in this big world out here.
Blazes are signs that mark property boundaries.
A centuries-old practice, trailblazers once used hatchet chops as markers, but today, they're more commonly made with paint.
Hey, Preston.
I see it, too.
We made it! I think so.
Wow, it's cool to find those red blazes.
Now we know we're in the right place.
We just need to find a good spring and a place the camp out now.
Yes, sir.
I'm ready to get off of this horse.
Me, too.
Come up, boys.
This land looks good, so we've got hopes for a good logging camp coming up.
But before we start, we got to find water.
We're gonna be looking for a good, healthy spring so we can have a good water source while we're here.
In the high pines of the Cimarron Valley, Kyle hunts for deer, but he's not alone.
I ain't the only one using this trail.
I just found some fresh bear scat.
There's no doubt that there's a big bear in here, so I'm gonna have to keep my guard up.
No doubt, he's been feeding the same place I'm going.
Bears are packing on pounds this time of year, so Kyle must proceed with caution.
Normally, I don't give bears a second thought, but it's a different situation today.
They're looking for anything they can find to eat for the winter.
They're very territorial.
They will protect a food source.
I'm trespassing in their territory.
I've got to respect the fact that this is bear country.
I've got to stay alert.
Last thing I want to do is surprise a bear and end the deer hunt the wrong way.
But, bear or not, I've got a deer to get.
Kyle pushes to the top of the rise.
The open plains here give him a chance to spot deer from a distance and make a controlled approach.
Deer hunting is a slow process.
You got to take your time, 'cause they could be anywhere.
In this kind of forest, deer are really hard to spot.
All the colors combine together.
That's how deer are so successful at hiding.
You can walk right by one and not even realize it.
Well, they're up here somewhere.
I found quite a bit of scat on the side of this hill.
You can tell if it's been there awhile.
If it's fresh, then whoever left it there is still in that part of the country.
I'll be danged.
Here's my chance.
This is what I came for.
They're too far from me to take a shot with this muzzle-loader.
I'm gonna have to get closer to get a good, clean kill.
The closer I get, the better chance I have of spooking them off altogether, so I've got to be really careful, take my time, and decide just how close I can get before taking that shot.
Atop the tallest peak in the Cimarron, Kyle closes in on a group of bucks.
I've spent most of the day trying to find deer.
Well, I found them.
I'm just creeping through these trees, hoping that I can use the wind in my favor.
It's gonna be hard to sneak up on anything with making this much noise.
Kyle needs to be within 50 yards to make a clean kill, and that takes expert stealth.
These are mule-deer bucks.
They're called that because they've got huge ears, like a mule.
They can hear a branch break or a misplaced footstep hundreds of yards away.
I'm creeping through the oak brush right now, just inching my way along.
The bucks know that I'm there, but they can't smell me.
That's the only thing that's saving me right now.
I made a shot.
I feel like it was a good shot.
I don't know if I've got a buck down or not.
I've got to go find him.
Deer experience a surge of adrenaline after being wounded that can cause them to run up to 200 yards before falling.
I'm losing daylight.
I have to find him before dark.
Yes! Whoo! I was both happy and relieved to find that deer as quickly as I did.
It really makes a man feel good to know that he can hunt and provide for his family.
Appreciate it.
This full-size buck provides Kyle with nearly 200 pounds of meat for the winter.
But he'll have to move quickly to break it down.
I've got this buck down, but the work just now starts.
I have got to get him quartered, get him packed up, and get him out of here.
Sun's starting to go down.
I don't have much time left.
And I ain't the only one here.
The bears get really busy this time of day.
All hunters have their own way of processing a deer, but the basics are pretty much the same.
First thing I'm gonna do is start skinning him.
Man, this buck is good and fat.
Then the next thing I'm gonna do is quarter up this deer.
I got to be really careful that I don't punch a hole in these guts, because if I do, it could ruin a lot of the meat.
I hear you, raven.
Don't worry.
There'll be plenty for you.
In the Blue Ridge Mountains, Eustace has arrived at his new logging site.
His first priority is to locate an ideal spot for a campsite, and that means proximity to clean water.
One thing we could do is drink out of the creek, but that often has contaminants.
That's why we're looking for a spring, because when you have a spring, it's coming up from deep, deep down in the earth, and it's filtered by the natural filters of the earth.
Whoa.
Good boy.
You got me tied there? Yep.
There's a lot of ways for water to get trapped up here, you know? There's a lot of rock, there's a lot of dirt, and it catches the water, and it holds it, and you just have to find that little spot where it comes out.
Eustace is an expert at reading the mountainside for the telltale signs that water is nearby.
We'll look for a depression where, over thousands of years, the water has worked its way out of the ground and eroded away a little bit, like an unusual-shaped bowl on the side of a hillside.
How's it look? It's dry right now, but there's a lot of runoff coming in here, too.
But if we get up higher, we might find the source of it.
Yeah.
Well, that's what we're after.
Let's head on up the holler and see what we can find.
Yes, sir.
Usually, the head of a stream will be uphill, you know, so we'll just move up and see if we can find one.
As Eustace and Preston head up the hill, they spot-check the ground for moisture near pockets of green vegetation.
Dry.
Nothing there, is there? No, there's too much topsoil here.
My guess is that it's going under somewhere and coming back up down there.
There's still got to be one higher somewhere.
Well Let's keep looking.
I hear you.
Whoa.
Yeah, this really looks wet here.
Uh-huh.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, look at that.
Yeah, the water's just bubbling right up.
We just need a shovel.
Well, I'll get that.
While the water is a promising sign, they won't know if it's clean enough to drink until they locate the source.
We don't really know until we start digging.
So, basically, we have to dig down into the water and see if it is continuously bubbling up.
Yeah, we're hitting it here.
Pay dirt.
Yes, it's just pouring out there, Preston.
Look at that.
That's sweet.
That's what we want.
It's pouring out of there good.
It's filtered by the natural filters of the earth.
Looks pretty clear.
It does, don't it? And that's what we're looking for.
We're looking for filtered water here.
Doesn't look too bad, there, does it? Yeah, how about that clear stuff? Yes, sir.
Now, that's good.
Now that we've got the spring sort of figured out, we can kind of start thinking now, "Where are we gonna camp?" And it'll be nice if we can kind of keep our campsite fairly close to that spring so that we don't have to make a big, long trek over there to get water.
Let's see what we can find.
In North Carolina's Blue Ridge Mountains Eustace and Preston break ground on a new campsite that will serve as the home base for their winter logging operation.
Making a point here so it can go down in the ground good, and I'll cut the end off so it's easy to hammer down.
It's not too much, but that's a little tent stake there.
They construct frames out of poplar trees, a durable hardwood that will brace their tarps against the elements.
How's that for service? That's pretty nice.
I don't know if I can quite get it up there, Eustace.
Not like the old days, huh? I'll go get another one.
Yep.
So, what I'll do is I'll just drape my tarp right over the top of this ridgepole.
That's what we call it.
It's the very top part.
I'm gonna tie it to this oak tree.
Think I'll just probably pick this up about right here and tie it up.
When we set up our tarps, what we're gonna do is we're gonna put them kind of low to the ground, probably lower than most people would expect.
You'd have a tarp that's set up real high, the wind will come under.
I'll blow rain in on you, snow in on you.
You'll just get wet and miserable.
I've got this one set up.
You need any help with that one? Nope, I'm done.
It won't be as comfortable as being at home, but it feels good to have my tarp set up and know where I'm gonna be tonight.
I've got hopes for a good logging camp coming up.
Across the country, as darkness sets in over New Mexico, Kyle Bell searches for a safe place to camp for the night with 100 pounds of fresh deer meat in his pack.
Got to be really careful, because I'm in bear country.
Whoa.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Whoa.
Right here.
All right, good girl.
Appreciate you getting me here safe and sound.
I've got me a good place to camp, out of the wind, but I did not prepare for staying out all night up here.
I didn't bring heavy clothing.
I didn't bring a tent or anything.
And it's getting cold.
I've got to hang that meat up so the air can circulate around it.
It's plenty cool down here tonight, and that will chill that meat really good, keep it from spoiling.
But I can't hang it high enough in the air to keep the bears off of it.
Earlier, Kyle discovered fresh bear scat nearby, a warning sign that bears in these hills have not yet retreated into hibernation and are still on the prowl.
This will be chilled out at least overnight.
A bear's sense of smell is over 2,000 times stronger than a human's, so Kyle will have to remain vigilant to protect his kill.
This time of the year, the bears are really aggressive.
They're in a race against nature to put on enough fat to survive for the winter.
I would almost call it a feeding frenzy.
Oh, just a little fire sure makes a fella feel better.
I'm tired to the bone, but that warmth sure feels good.
Hey, bear! Hey, bear! A bear in the dark, with a single-shot rifle, makes a fella think about things.
Hey! Hey! Hey, bear! Next time on "Mountain Men" In Montana, Tom picks up the pieces The elk hide needs to be really good, or I don't make any money.
while in the Revelations, winter is nowhere to be found.
Holy cow.
Man, I got to get some snow.
It's like 50 degrees.
And in Alaska I realize that you either keep going, or you die.
Morgan's journey takes a dark turn.
Probably not gonna be able to go much further.