Very wise training routine. I walk 1 - 3 mi 4 - 5 days per week, often in deep snow, sometimes on snowshoes. (In spring, after snow, I alternate with bicycle.) For hill training substitute, find a tall building with lots of stairs. Does a heart and lungs good.
Niiccceeee setup right there... near perfect. Seems to be something unusual with the bolt location though.
Snow shoes are great exercise I really enjoy it too. We didn't get much snow this year and its already all gone. I'm going to try the stairs thing, I hate to train on all man made things but it's better than nothing.
Agreed re manmade things: better than nothing. 15 years ago, I worked in a five story building with an office on fifth floor. Tried to avoid the elevator. Stayed in good shape. I'm now 66, and still avoid the elevator in my building. (Power outages here in winter are not rare.) Still in good shape. No meds aside from mineral supplements, and I've own no motorized vehicle for 7 years (not by choice; forced on me by financial conditions). In Maine in winter, that insures good exercise. (Grocery shopping by backpack.) I carry a 15 - 17 lb pack on my walks out back. Not a lot of hills out there, but some. Our snow cover has ranged from 1' (Dec) to 4' (early Feb) to 1' now, packed and icy. Another 1' coming mid next week. One more chance for snowshoes this season.
Rook, as far as conditioning, I would do the stairs or any hills you can find. But I would work up to carrying 30-40 lbs in a backpack. Training with serious weight will make it easier when you aren't carrying as much (hopefully you're not carrying that much gear when you're there). GORUCK has all the exercises you need to build your lungs and strong legs. Squats, bear crawls, lunges, etc with that amount of weight will get you well prepared. .270 is fine for everything. Jack O'Connor would approve.
Great read so far mate..... I just spent the past two weeks hunting Sika (Jap Deer) in the Kawekas (New Zealand), I can happily attest to training with more weight than you are going to carry and finding something to climb....for us it seemed that everywhere you went was uphill...even walking downhill... LOL And it gets the legs and lungs burning...!!! After ten days (9 hunting around) I lost about five pounds and an inch off my waist... that and I can crack walnuts on my thighs and gluts !!!! I was hunting with my oldest friend (not age wise but length of association - 35+ years now) in the world. He took his .270 Ruger 77 (well only the action and rings are still Ruger) and I took the .300Win, both are good choices as it is really the man (or woman) behind the butt that makes the difference. Check you gear then check it again... I will repeat the story when I put together my pics and thread of the trip but on the first afternoon in the bush my boots had an almost catastrophic failure... the sole on my right one has peeled off at the heal and was swinging free and on examination the left was starting (not nearly as badly). I don't buy rubbish (these are Italian Zamberlans that run about $500) and are less than 2yrs old. I have three pairs, one well used, have hunted in them for over 6yrs and beaten the hell out of them but they are still more than workable, this pair I started wearing as my around town boots in late 2015 (wore them when I travelled to Africa on flights and as a tourists but hunting in my old ones) with the plan to have them nice and comfy for all the walking in NZ plus I have a NIB pair put away. I though my trip was almost done before we started as you can't go crawling around slips and steeps climbs with fugged boots or one will take a tumble.... my mate had a single small tube of superglue in his first aid kit and I took to the worst of the pairs with it and some tape to hold it in place while it set.... I was not confident it would hold rubber to leather but stuff me it did... I flogged them for the next 8 days up hill and down dale (expecting a failure at any point) but they are still together now...!!! Phew... !! They lost their water seal however so some cold wet tootsies for me... I look forward to reading of your preparations..!!! I have a close mate that lives on Sitka (he is in the volunteer rescue group there and a paramedic - so if you get in strife you may meet him ) who has been asking me there to hunt for ages.... you may just put me over the edge...!!!!!!!
Great caliber and fantastic rifle. One thing I would consider. I'm not sure I'd feel comfortable trekking around Kodiak, which holds one of the densest population of some of the largest brown bear in the planet, with only a 270. Great hunting round for most any North American animal, but I'd be a little nervous about it being enough to stop a pissed off 1000lbs+ bear. Maybe im way off base, but that's my thought.
Bullet choice and shot placement are more important than caliber choice. Jack O'Connor's wife dropped lion and elephant with a 30 o6. She considered it her "big gun". Jack himself is the man who pushed the greatness that is the .270 to the readers. W.D.M Bell used a 7×57 mouser to drop Elephant with a single shot. Understanding (Jack's not Elenore) when to use softs, when to use solids, along with other factors allowed Elenore to use the 06 in the way she did. Understanding how to shoot, doing it with both eyes open, using a long solid at the right velocity, combined with an ability to shoot accurately that stayed with him even in old age, shooting moving rabbits at distance with a rifle.............Something both O'Connor (untill his eyes went) and Bell did showing off in old age........... Allowed Bell to use the 7x57 the way he did. (It is my opinion that the 338 o6 is as close to perfect as you can get for a one gun Hunter situation) Blah blah blah I will stop , do not believe the hype. A proper bullet in a .270 and it will be just fine. If you can hit what you are shooting at, have the proper bullet for the job and know where to shoot. If you can't you are in trouble no matter what you have. @Zeek and @Rook52 you both have it wrong, Mod70 is the way to go
I agree 100%. But what does one have to do with the other? There is a huge difference between hunting an animal, where you have the opportunity to make a well placed shot, and shooting at a large, angry animal bearing down on you from a relatively short distance. In this case, you want something that will put that animal down fast, regardless of where you hit it (assuming you hit center mass). Not to mention, anytime you see people hunting large dangerous game with a smaller than ideal caliber, there's is almost always (I'd say always but I have no way of proving that for certain) someone nearby, with a very large caliber weapon, at the ready if things go south.
You want to have the ability to place your shot in either situation. Bullet choice is again the answer. Those "guides" have a very specific load they are using for dangerous game. (So even if you were carrying the same caliber rifle as the guides the chances are the round you are using for deer IS NOT the same round they are using.) And even then............. Take Selby and his 416, what worked on an elephant was not the same load for a hippo a cat or buffallo. my point being, and I apologise to the op if I am messing up his thread is this.......,(defence or hunting bullet performance matters more than caliber.) The .270 loaded with 130gr green box will blow through the shoulder on a side on shot, it will absolutely decimate everything between the shoulders and the shoulders on a whitetail. That is a thin jacketed bullets I have seen fall apart. So, on game with tougher skin, it may not penitrate to where it needs to be. If you just shoot a solid you may not do the damage needed to take down the game. Now if the op was to take woodleigh 180 gr 270 rounds as defence rounds, in my opinion he is all set. Those will take a bear if placed correctly. (I think his hunting rounds would do the trick as well, but if you need more.) Bullet choice and placement. No round will just take an animal out, you need to know where and how and what to shoot. A perfect example, (I will try to find the article in Peterson's if you wish) happened on a buffalo hunt. Some poor fool bought a 470ne and some very expensive ammunition. He then spent a small fortune in solids into a very ticked off buffalo. Shots aimed and put where he was told. A couple were off the Mark. It did didly. He loaded a soft and dropped it. I heard horror stories of moose not going down and having enough gun. I have seen a well placed shot from a .270 absolutely anchor one. (Moose are not that tough, comparitevly in the dg world. They also do not eat you, so....)
If you will have a base camp and won't have to carry all your gear everywhere, I'd think about taking a back up rifle. I'd hate to do all that preparation and then have my only rifle break on me in the middle of the hunt.