The Missouri River Breaks is a huge landmass with lots of rugged landscape and unforgiving conditions. Grant and his dad Kurt, who is a sheep finatic there to help us navigate the landscape and judge ram size and age. After scouting they gave us a call saying we will need a boat to travel the landscape successfully, due to mud, snow and location of most of the sheep. We were so fortunate to follow a snow plow since it was -6 and blowing as we left Malta. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have made it to the campsite with the trailers. After setting up camp, we headed out on the boat. David was captain as we started out on the waters of the Missouri River. We spotted one ram from the boat and then parked the boat another 3 miles up at the start of the drange. We made it about a 3 mile hike up to a vantage point where we located 9 rams and some ewes. The biggest ram would have scored in the mid 170s. A ram of this caliber would be very impressive in other areas, but in Missouri River Breaks the standard goes up and you have a legitimate chance of a world record ram. Day 2; The original plan changed abruptly when some guys in camp gave us a report of a potential 200 inch ram towards the top of one of the coulees. They showed us a picture and we verified this ram is all I imagined and hoped to find on this trip. As we left camp, tensions were high. We made it to the spot and did a quick glass then headed to the ridge where the 200” ram was spotted 2 days ago. We peaked over the crevasse in the hill and put up our binos, but there were no sheep on the ridge. After 30 min of glassing we kept moving to another area known to hold sheep. As we were walking we bumped one ram that was about a 165”. On the hill side there were about 15 sheep, holding 4 rams. We sat down and watched for hours, waiting and hoping the 200” ram would make an appearance but never did. We decided to head back to try the water again. But, as soon as we made it about 3 miles down river, the wind hit and so did the waves. They were crashing over the front of the boat, spraying us with water. We made the call to turn back. We talked to another person and they said there was a 195” ram in the adjacent drainage to the one the 200” Ram was spotted. So, we took side by sides, in the morning up some gnarly roads, going through drifts and the well known Missouri River Breaks mud. We spotted a group of rams on the way in, but they were not the caliber we were looking for. We snuck up to 100 yards and started judging the score. After passing the ram, Kurt came to the conclusion that the ram was a low 180s with a high sperm line, meaning this ram was only 5-6 years old. It wasn't what we were looking for, so we passed and started to make a plan for the next day. Day 5: We changed our plan again and headed back to the boat to cover as much of the country as possible. We ended up spending the whole day on the boat locating 28 different rams. None of these rams were what we were looking for so we never went after them. We put 60 miles on the boat that day. Grant and Kurt stayed back and scouted for sheep while we were on the boat. Day 6; We took the rangers up an ATV trail and parked and glassed. After glassing for a while I noticed some sheep across the drainage and one looked like a ram, but it is so far we couldn’t tell how big. So we moved forward another mile to get a better look. After judging the ram, we came up with a score around the 175” mark, a good ram but not what we need. Now, we are on our way to where Kurt and Grant had located a good ram the night before. The land on the way to the rams is mostly flat with little grassy ridges with timber, not typical sheep country. We were just walking along not really paying attention when all of a sudden Kurt and my dad hit the dirt. Three rams were just walking across a grassy bench 150 yards in front of us. I hurried up, found a rest on a stump nearby and put my gun up and waited. The 2 rams in the back had a low sperm line with a decent curl. The other ram looked old. The excitement and intensity grew as we realised this was an old ram with a good curl. Kurt guessed it in the mid 180s. My dad and Kurt asked me if I liked him. I knew it was time to let some lead fly. I quickly found the ram in my scope and started to squeeze the trigger when one of the other rams ran in front of the big ram and stopped. I was ready, all I needed was a clear shot and finally the smaller ram started to move forward and I had a clear shot. I squeezed the trigger and boom. A solid hit but he was running towards a 200ft drop off. I had to put him down now or we might be packing out a broken sheep. He was running and I threw the crosshairs on up and boom, it was high, a miss. I jacked in my last shell and concentrated, slowly pulled the trigger, boom he was dead in his tracks. High fives were passed around as we realized what just happened.