Newest Member of the 700 Club

That would be the Remington 700 club, and not the 700 club of Pat Robertson fame on the ABC Family channel.

For years I've wanted a Remington 700. My Dad has had one since before I was born. 6 months before I was born to be exact, chambered in .270 Win. That rifle has taken more game in our family than any other rifle. It's taken countless deer, numerous elk, and one moose. I also took my first two deer with that rifle. (One a side note, all this hubbub about the model 700 recently hasn't made much difference to me. Dad's got one in .270, and my brother has one in .243. In our experience, this dust up is much ado about nothing.)

Being a southpaw, decent rifles are hard to come by. Very few rifle makers offer their wares to us lefties. And even fewer still offer them in the caliber I was looking for, .308 Win. Oh, I could have had all kinds of stuff from Remington, Ruger, and others in calibers ranging from .204 Ruger all the way up to .375 H&H. But .308 was very few manufacturers list of chamberings.

My first left handed rifle in .308 was a Savage Model 10GLXP3. A decent enough gun, the Savage. Excellent trigger in the Accu-Trigger, but the rest of the gun left a lot to be desired. It was too light, firstly, and was not fun to shoot because of this. Secondly, the parts seemed to be made of pot metal. Lastly, the stock looked to be made from something besides walnut. Oh, it looked like walnut, but if I were to scratch the surface finish off, I'm betting it would've been a white colored wood under there.

Last spring, I scared up a used Ruger M77 Hawkeye in .308. Very good gun, easy to shoot with enough weight to absorb the recoil. She came with a Leupold VX-1 2-7x33mm scope sitting on top. The previous owner had glass bedded her, and she shoots like a dream.

Last Friday, I was down at the local funstore here in RC, and was ogling a newish left handed 700 chambered in '06. Nice dark walnut stock, mounted iron sights, and just an all around good looking gun. Talking with the sales dude, I was lamenting the fact that Big Green had offered the left handed 700 in every caliber under the sun EXCEPT .308 in their hunting line. The only place you could find a lefty 700 in .308 was in either their line (XCR) or the police line (SPS). On my way out the door, I talked with the owner and passed along my frustration at not being able to obtain what I was after. He didn't miss a beat in telling me that he had, in fact, put out a left handed 700 in .308 that very afternoon. Talk about a dose of cold water.

TOTAL AWESOMENESS!!! That's what I wanted to hear! So I had them put it back for me and yesterday I went and traded that Savage Model 10GLXP3 towards that 700. After adding a Sightron S1 3-9x40 scope and Leupold bases and two-piece base, the total OTD was right at $504.

So yes, Louise, I'm now a member of the Remington 700 club.