MOZAMBIQUE: 'Twas The Night Before Safari - Mozambique 2024

[matt vejar]

If you see Junbo again tell him I’m ready anytime for the brotherhood deal he offered me in October of 2022!!!

 

[Rare Breed]

I always so very much enjoy your posts and hunt stories Phil!!! You always take us with you!!!

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

Well it seems loading one pic at a time works a little better. Below is Pemba International. No jetways here. Planes land at one end of the strip, go to the other end and u-turn to get back to the middle and finally turn into the tarmac.

Not exactly the busiest airport, but that was just fine. Just inside that door you see people standing outside of is passport control. We made it through that quite quickly, and just on the other side were some of the Kamabako team guys with our baggage waiting, sans gun cases.

Below is @AZ KJ and young gent named Franz. Franz is the official bush pilot for Kambako but will be flying us into Jaco’s area tomorrow. It was a bit of a geezer moment meeting him. We’re putting our lives in the hands of a 22 year old pilot! However I’m quite confident he knows his job and he’s a very nice guy.

 

[BigHill]

A good pilot is early born, I flew in with another youngster.

 

[thi9elsp]

Our pilot from Harare into Zambezi Valley back 2011 was somewhere in his 20s. He was texting a bit while flying to camp. Once we landed and stopped, Ann smacked him on the back of the head for not paying attention! I cracked up. Felt safe with him both ways on the flight.

 

[Houston Bill]

Phil, glad you have arrived safely and the guns and ammo made it. Good luck on the hunt and can't wait for the hunting part of the report to begin.

 

[buck wild]

Best of luck Phil !!

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

Okay, so Sunday was a day of anticipation. Franz our pilot had a busy day of taking clients in one of the Kamabako concessions and also flying in equipment. He actually took all of our bags also to the L9 block that Jaco hunts. Then back to Pemba to await Jaco flying in on the Airlink flight in the afternoon.

Sure enough he arrives and we all pile into the Cessna. I had unashamedly and without hesitation called dibs on the seat next to the pilot. This was a first for me and I was in total engineer geek mode. We had a great flight in, very smooth and a surprisingly soft smooth landing on the dirt strip which is right next to camp.

Well crap, pictures are still being a problem. And I am bummed, today was first day of hunting and it was a pretty good one. But without pics, just isn’t the same. So putting this report on hold for now.

 

[AZDAVE]

Looking forward to the rest of your report. We will be there is under two months.

 

[Doug3006]

Our pilot from Harare into Zambezi Valley back 2011 was somewhere in his 20s. He was texting a bit while flying to camp. Once we landed and stopped, Ann smacked him on the back of the head for not paying attention! I cracked up. Felt safe with him both ways on the flight.

On our return bush flight from Dande camp to Harare, our pilot, a young, and very attractive lady, told us that she would be texting in-flight. She told us not to be concerned. She was not chatting with friends. She explained that she would be communicating with the tower in Harare, letting them know when she passed waypoints. I asked her why this was necessary. Certainly they’d see her on radar, if her transponder was working. She said “oh, the radar hasn’t worked for years at Harare international!“ Yikes!

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

Well we have made it back home. We started our journey home at what would've been 2am Phoenix time on Thursday morning. It was an 11am departure time on our charter from the Litule camp. We had a bit of turbulence during the flight due to thermal currents, but not too bad.

It was then off to JNB on our Airlink flight, then the Delta flight to ATL and finally after one last layover, on to Phoenix. We got home right at 3pm yesterday afternoon, so some 37 hours of travel. We are beat. A decent nights sleep, but woke up at 4am this morning and I'm a little groggy this afternoon.

All flights went basically well. On time or early arrivals, all luggage made it back home. Delta had earned back a few points with me on the outbound side of the trip. They lost a few points on the inbound leg however. I had an aisle seat and we were lucky enough to have an open middle seat between us. Despite however as much as I leaned toward the middle seat the flight attendants seemed bound and determined to ensure I was bumped every time they passed by.

Would I choose Delta again under the same circumstances? Yes I would, but I hope to not. Some pluses to Delta overall, but their flight crews could use a little improvement in how they treat people.

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

Hunting Conditions

First I thought I'd set the tone for the rest of this report based on the hunting conditions we experienced. The dates chose for this hunt were based first on my wife's schedule. She has been on two of my past 6 trips with me, and it was time to take her back. At the time of booking she worked for a school system where we live, but now works for a private school.

Regardless of which, the impact is the same. Here in the land also known as Hell, Hades, The Lake of Fire et al, the school systems have a fairly short summer break. This in favor of longer fall, winter and spring breaks when the weather is nicer. As such the various school systems start either the 3rd or 4th week of July. So it just wouldn't work to choose an August or September hunt. We could've done October, but man it's getting hot in Mozambique at that time.

The second factor was moon phase, I centered the hunt around the new moon.

These dates in fact made us the first party hunting in the Niassa with Kwalata. Ordinarily not too much of a problem. And in fact, had the rains maintained the way they started this year, it would not have been. The rains were actually quite low for most of the season, but there was a lot of rain at the very end of the season. This led to a burst in the growth of the brush and also filled the various water holes in the block.

As a result, the block was still very green when we arrived. Lots of food, lots of cover and most importantly lots of drinking water for the animals. Good for the animals, not so good for the hunters. The wildlife barely had to move. Water, food and cover we no more than yards/meters apart versus miles/kilometers apart.

Unless the wildlife was pushed by predators, there just wasn't any reason to move. With low animal movement and thicker cover, it made for challenging hunting conditions. This would come into play.

I know @AZDAVE and I believe at least one other AH'er will be hunting with Jaco in the Niassa. Not to worry, by the time you guys get there these conditions will no longer exist. We could see it already changing by the time we left. In a couple of weeks, all will be different.

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

Dagga Kudu

So it was on the truck a bit after daylight to go ensure the rifles were sighted in on our first morning. The .375 was right on and needed no adjustment. My .470 double however needed a bit of adjustment. Not sure why, but perhaps because I had changed the battery in the Trijicon RMR sight just before leaving.

After that we were off to scout for buffalo. It is a brand new season and a bit of research was needed to find tracks of buffalo near known water holes. With daylight actually working against us in the morning, we were behind the buffalo. However a number of tracks of suspected duggaboys were found and gave us options to work with for day 2. The evening hunt was much the same result.

On our way out in the morning, about 20 minutes from camp is a very large pan, holding lots of water and lots of feed. It is an oasis and there's lots of wildlife that stay in this area of what they have named the Presidential Pan. Impala, waterbuck, kudu, warthogs were seen there.

A brief pause here to describe wildlife sightings. Hunting pressure in the L9 block is quite limited. Quota is pretty tight and as such the animals are fairly calm at the sight of a truck. Not all, but most of the time the animals will move away from the truck if fairly close, but usually don't run off for the next block. As such, if you can see the animals, you can usually get a fair idea of age and trophy quality. And so it was early evening as we came back by the Presidential Pan.

On the other side of the pan were 3 kudu bulls. One of which immediately caught mine and Jaco's eye. I had told Jaco I was looking for a 55" bull or better. I could see he was deep curled and thought he might make that number.

Jaco was guessing him to be 53-54 inches, perhaps better, but not likely. We decided to circle around to the other side of the pan to get a closer look at the bull as well as the other animals that were further away.

As we came around, the kudu came into closer view of course. Again I was thinking this bull was pretty good, but again Jaco wasn't sure it would make that 55" mark. Well.....I may not want to take the bull.....but my wife Donna has not taken a kudu......and this one would make a fine first I thought. I shared the thought with Jaco and he agreed and so did Donna.

So off we went on a stalk. Now in this area the cover isn't so thick and in fact it was a bit too open. We were able to get within 200 yards of the bulls, but no closer. Jaco looked back at me to ask if that was good, I waved it off. I got Donna shooting my .375, but I was keeping her to 100 yard or less. She's still quite new to hunting and I didn't want to push her past that distance.

Well the kudu make us and head out. But again, they don't head off for parts unknown. We are able to shortly get back on them and now are within 100 yards. The bull is facing us head on with a bit of brush in front of him. I'm wanting to wait until he turns broadside to give a better shot for Donna but Jaco is concerned now with us bumping him a 2nd time that his next move will be to bolt much further.

So Jaco coaches Donna on where to place the shot, on the neck where it connects to the body. Donna confirms she's got it and lets a bullet fly. Damn if she didn't drop him in his tracks. The bull is kicking still and a finishing shot was taken. But that first shot was a killing shot.

It was quite fun for me to watch Donna's reaction to all of this, she was quite proud of herself.

Now the kudu rut is on and there's no doubt this old boy still thinks he's the boss bull around. Somewhere along the line he'd bin thrashing his face and horns in the mud. As such I've nicknamed him Dagga Kudu. He was quite old, turning almost blue like an old Eland. His mane was nearly gone.

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Now the funny part. A little later after we are back at camp and have showered and get settled in for dinner, Jaco is grimacing. It seems while we were getting ready for dinner he measured the kudu. It came in unofficially of course at 55 3/8". He is apologizing, but I don't know why. Sure it was what I was after, but I was just as happy that my wife took him and will enjoy the trophy on the wall just the same.

 

[Mtn_Infantry]

Great first Kudu, looking forward to hearing more

 

[thi9elsp]

What a great stalk and shot. Way to go Donna! And that is one fine Kudu.

 

[Firebird]

Congratulations Donna! Eager to read more from your adventures

 

[gillettehunter]

Great shooting by your wife. Congrats to her! Nice start to the hunt.
Bruce

 

[ACM]

Great report so far Phil! I’d be very pleased to see a kudu like that one in August!

 

[Fatback]

Congrats to Ms. Donna on a fine kudu bull.

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

Great report so far Phil! I’d be very pleased to see a kudu like that one in August!

Ah yes, you're the other gent here on AH who is hunting with Jaco there this year. There's at least one kudu bull that you should ask Jaco about. He'll know once you tell him he was seen and pictured during our hunt.