Tales From The Trail

A family hunting heritage, a strong bond between twins, an insatiable need for adventure, and endless curiosity about the wild world have led Danish twin sisters, Trine and Rikke Wagner Jacobsen, to live an extraordinary and unusual life of hunting and guiding in the Canadian wilderness.

Trine was beginning to lose hope. It was already day nine, and she still hadn’t been able to get her client a moose. Her client would have to go home in two days. It didn’t help the pressure that Rikke had already shot a moose with her client on day six.

It was almost the end of the rut, and they were stalking near a long river. Trine told the client that it was almost sunset and they should sit down for a while, and she would try calling a moose in. She really hoped there would be a bull somewhere close by.

Trine sat down and called once. After a short silence, suddenly on the other side of the river there was a huge bull moose swaying his big antlers from side to side, licking his lips and huffing loudly. Everything fell into its place, and the client shot the moose, ending both Trine’s and Rikke’s very first hunting trip as guides in the Canadian wilderness in a success.

From a family of gamekeepers

Trine and Rikke Wagner Jacobsen are twin sisters, Trine being two minutes older than Rikke. They have been a part of the Danish hunting industry since they were kids:

“Our great-granddad was a gamekeeper in Denmark. And now our dad and also our uncles are gamekeepers in Denmark, so we have been raised with hunting our whole life,” Trine explains.

Their experiences growing up surrounded by hunters sparked the desire to help others who might not be as familiar with wilderness skills, camping and hunting. Now they have their own hunting business, Hunt & Hike, that offers guided hunts in Sweden and Canada, hunting courses, lectures, hiking trips and family camps where they teach the participants about nature and wild animals. With the courses and camps, the twins especially wanted to reach beginners, city dwellers, and those who didn’t get an introduction to the hunting lifestyle as kids.

“We now have our own way to show that hunting is important. It motivates us a lot that we have a voice and can change people's minds about hunting and nature,” Rikke says, and Trine continues:

“We are in a period of time when we really have to take care of hunting; otherwise, in ten or twenty years we might not be able to do it anymore. So we really need to show all the good things about hunting, and we have to show it in a nice way. It motivates us that there is something to take care of and something to fight for.”

For the twins, it’s important to set an example for others and make sure that people see the whole process of hunting. “So not just pulling the trigger, but also all the work before and after the hunt. We also really like to teach the young generation how to treat our nature,” Trine says and continues:

“The new generation of hunters plays a big part in keeping nature as it is today, so it's a huge deal when you speak to them about conservation. In our family camps, it's a lot about what is moving around in the woods and how we make the best circumstances for the deer and the birds and all other animals.”

Trine’s and Rikke’s dad was instrumental in showing them that hunters do a lot of good for both animals and wild habitats. For example, taking care of wetlands for ducks and giving wild animals places to hide by planting new trees, or managing game populations to keep local ecosystems thriving and balanced.

“If we didn't have hunters here in Denmark, we would have huge populations of all the deer species. We don't have enough vegetation that can feed all these animals if we don't do something about it,” Trine says.

Rikke continues by explaining that it is also very important to be sensitive to the concerns of the non-hunters, and to show them that hunting is not only about killing the animal or about the trophy. The twins emphasize that it is more about the deep connection to nature, fresh local meat, stories around the campfire, cooking on an open fire, and getting to know each other on an intimate level.

Guiding in Canada

Trine’s and Rikke’s dad was a hunting guide in Alberta in his late twenties. The girls saw many pictures of their dad's time over there, were instantly drawn towards the Canadian wilderness, and decided they too wanted to experience guiding in Canada. Before pursuing the dream, the twins traveled and learned new skills. Rikke was working as a hunting assistant in Greenland on musk ox and caribou, and also as a sled dog guide in Sweden, Iceland and Alaska. Trine guided in Northern Norway and South Africa, where she also trained owls.

“We wrote to almost fifty outfitters over in Canada and got one email back. But that was all we needed. So we traveled over there in 2021 and helped around for two months as wranglers,” Rikke explains. She continues by telling that after the test period the outfitter decides if a wrangler is suitable for the job and if the candidate should be allowed to try guiding. It is a sort of qualification.

After two months, Trine and Rikke were allowed to take the final test: guiding their first clients on a hunt for ten days. The client's evaluation was of utmost importance in deciding if the twins would be allowed to become guides. Everything turned out perfect, and both their clients got a big trophy moose each. Since then it’s all been a huge success, and Rikke and Trine have already sold out spots on their hunting trips for both 2024 and 2025. But despite living the dream, it’s not always just fun and games.

“Most people think that when we're going to Canada it's just a vacation, but it's really not. We have 10 days with the client, and then we have one change day, and on that one change day you prepare for the next client, and after that you again have 10 days with a new client. On hunting days you get up early. At three or four o’clock.” Trine smiles and continues:

“It depends on the physical condition of the client if we do moose hunting from the basecamp or go further into the backcountry, but the mountain goat clients we always take further into the wilderness. And when the client shoots his animal, then you have to process it all.”

A guiding trip actually begins well before setting foot in Canada. At home in Denmark, Rikke and Trine have meetings with clients so they know what to expect and what to bring on such a huge trip. For mountain goat hunts, they also make sure that the client is in good enough physical shape to do the hiking and climbing involved. The hunts are always planned according to the clients' wishes, age, and physical abilities.

Trine also says that it hasn’t always been easy to be two young women in a male-dominated industry:

“When people come into basecamp, they sometimes assume that Rikke and I are going to be taking care of the kitchen, so we in a way have to show that we are capable of this.”

Other hardships the twins have endured include porcupines eating the tires from their cars, spending a night in the backcountry being extremely cold, and battling wildfires.

“I thought I was about to die there. So yeah, when you come back home, sometimes you just say ‘thank you,’ ”, Rikke tells her feelings after fighting a forest fire for eight days.

“One of my hardest moments was on a mountain goat hunt. We had shot a billy and had to wait until the morning to retrieve it. I was with my client and our boss. It was so freaking cold that night. We huddled close to each other and made a huge fire. I kept on moving closer and closer to the fire. So close that my pants burned,” Trine thinks back on the coldest night she has ever experienced.

First mountain goat

Trine’s and Rikke’s first mountain goat guiding trip was an especially memorable experience. They started the hunt with their client by flying a floatplane to the foot of the mountains. The scenery was majestic, with steep cliffs rising all around them.

“We saw a lot of mountain goats, but they were just too far away up on the mountain. That's the hardest part of mountain goat hunting. If there's snow on the mountain, the animals don’t wander down. They stay up in the snow,” Rikke says.

Trine and Rikke used spotting scopes to look for goats from the vast landscape and to differentiate billies (male goats) and nannies (female goats) from each other. It is a difficult task, since the guide has to see how the animals act, what the body size is, and how the horns look from as far as several kilometers away.

“You need to be very sure that it's really a billy that you're going after because it's almost illegal to shoot a nanny. And if it’s a billy, it has to be a good trophy individual.”, Rikke explains and continues:

“You also need the billy to bed down and stay put for a long time. You don't get clients to climb the mountain more than one or two times during a hunt because it's so hard.”

Trine and Rikke usually use horses when hunting with clients. There are no roads in the area they hunt, and the horses are used to carry supplies, camping gear, and the meat. But this trip was different. The client was not comfortable riding horses, so the trip was done on foot, making the hunt even harder.

Finally, on day eight, they spotted a promising-looking billy. Trine stayed put watching the goat with the spotting scope, while Rikke and the client started the stalk. The going was tough with very steep and sometimes scary cliffs. The twins communicated with each other with a radio, but the signal was so bad that there were long periods of not hearing from each other at all.

“We came into, I think, 200 meters and the goat was bedded below us. The client managed to get a shot at it, and I saw the goat rolling downhill. It was too close to dark, so we could not get over to it and retrieve it,” Rikke tells.

Excited and exhausted from the day's hunt, they went down to camp and slept in the tents. In the morning they climbed up to retrieve the goat, but couldn’t find it. The search had gone on for three hours, and the atmosphere started to sink. The client sat down, shaking his head, discouraged. Rikke and Trine also felt the pressure, since it was their first month together guiding for a mountain goat. On top of that, the other guides had doubted whether they would manage the hunt - the twins being two young women. Mountain goat hunting is physically and mentally demanding and sometimes seen as only suitable for the very fit and gritty men.

In the midst of desperately searching for the goat, Trine thought of their granddad. She says that she thinks he always looks after her and Rikke when they are on their trips, and she silently asked their granddad to give them a sign and help them find the billy.

“Then suddenly the wind changed, and I was hit with this very, very bad smell, like a stomach smell. And I just followed this smell and the goat was lying down there,” Trine tells enthusiastically.

A huge sense of relief washed over them, and the three of them stood on the mountain crying and hugging each other. To top it all off, Rikke and Trine turned 30 that same day. Finding the goat was the best birthday gift they could have ever wished for.

Connections matter most

Long trips to the backcountry and living in simple conditions bring people together. Sitting around a campfire is the perfect setting for forming deep connections. A hunting guide often becomes an important part of the clients' hunting stories.

“I think it's really nice to get friends from all over the world and have a really good time out in the woods. To meet people from different cultures. In ten days you learn so much about each other because it's all so intense. The whole surroundings are doing something really beautiful to us. And we love it,” Rikke says.

“You also get to see all the mood swings and how people do when it's cold and wet. And also you see when they are the most thrilled. The clients have been looking forward to this trip for so long, and they put so much money into it, and then it's all happening. There’s joy and tears, and you’re right beside them all the time,” Trine describes.

Trine and Rikke have met a lot of hunters and had many demanding and memorable experiences while guiding in Canada, but when asked what their favorite hunt is like, they say that the time spent with their family is the most precious to them.

“One of my fondest memories is with dad and Rikke hunting red stag in Scotland. That was our first real hunting trip together,” Trine tells, and Rikke concludes:

“I think the time with Trine and our father is what means the most to me. I would rather sit with my father or Trine than sit by myself and shoot something big.”

As a testament to their tight family bond, when Rikke and Trine were offered a possibility to go on their own hunt for moose, mountain goat or black bear as a thank-you gift for their hard work guiding clients, they didn’t hesitate for long. They chose a mountain goat hunt, which they gave to their father on his 60th birthday. Daughters guiding their father will be a special and deeply memorable experience for all of them.

“He taught us everything about hunting, and now we are going to guide him. That's going to be pretty huge,” Trine says.