Yates writes, "I missed the first scheduled day of my hunt in Turkey due to late flights and missed connections. Caprinae's man on the ground was Mete Babayigit, who proved to be an excellent guide and spoke very good English. My luggage did not arrive, but Babayigit loaned me some hunting clothes and his rifle, an Italian made 30.06.
"The hunt took place in the Eastern Taurus Mountains, near the city of Adiyaman. At the start, we concentrated our efforts on Sengul Mountain and saw numerous Bezoar ibex, including one that was 48 to 50 inches, but no hybrids despite covering a lot of ground. Unfortunately, I did not have a license for the Bezoar. December 6 saw us on Hallof Mountain, where we saw more Bezoar, but we also encountered several hybrids. None of the hybrids were particularly large; I took the biggest we saw.
"Then it was on to Vienna where I was met by Ivan Bezak, whose father operates the outfitting company Tatralov. Bezak showed aggressive familiarity with the gas pedal, and three hours later we were at our lodge outside the village of Blatnica in Slovakia, where I would hunt chamois in the Low Tatra Mountains.
"The next morning, I set off with my guide Martin Hostak, on a slow climb in the Velka Fatra Mountains, which are the beginning of the Low Tatras. A light snow had left a coating of less than an inch and made spotting chamois relatively easy despite the heavily wooded mountain- side. We probably saw 10 to 15 before I took a nice 10-year-old at about 250 yards. The hunt took only 1½ hours."
Yates gives a cost of $19,500 for both hunts, and recommends them for hunters "looking for something different." He gives Caprinae high marks for arranging the entire trip and says the hunts went very smoothly. His only........(continued)
