Warbird782
AH enthusiast
- Joined
- Mar 9, 2013
- Messages
- 423
- Reaction score
- 517
- Media
- 12
- Member of
- NRA, SCI
- Hunted
- EC and NW Province RSA, USA
I just returned home a little over a day ago from a magnificent hunt with Loodt Buchner and Tootabi Hunting Safaris. Below will be a timeline of the how the hunt unfolded with some attached photos. This will be a work in progress as I have in excess of 1200 photos and videos to go through yet.
This hunt represented me chasing my dream of hunting a lion since I was very young. This dream could also be called a demon as it has haunted me for years. I am a few months shy of my 40th year on earth and I have realized life is to be lived and not dreamed about. Dreams (demons) need to become reality. This adventure is all about catching my dreams and facing them.
Day 1: I was met by Loodt and his friend James at OR Tambo for our trek out to Lion camp. They had over nighted in JoBerg and had rented a hotel room. They had not checked out of the hotel yet because Loodt had the fore thought that after 36 hours of travel I would love to clean up and change clothes. This was very welcomed on my part. After a shower and breakfast at the hotel we checked out and hit the road. After around a 5 hour drive we arrived to the lion camp somewhere along the Botswana border in the Kalahari. AH member Pieter Erasmus was there as one of the two DG PH's for my hunt. Yes AH, I had the great opportunity to share a camp with both Loodt and Pieter at once. This first night was all about getting prepped for the next days lioness hunt. There was a lot of discussion on hunting these cats and what my roles and responsibilities were. We went to sleep that night to the sounds of lions roaring in the distance. I was still extremely fatigued from all my travel but sleep was going to be difficult in anticipation for the next days hunt.
Day 2: We started out at the range. I would be using Pieter's Musgrave .375 H&H Mauser for the lioness hunt. First thing was to make sure that the gun was properly sighted in for me. The guys put up shooting sticks and a target at 50 yards. I was expecting to shoot from the bench but there would be no shooting benches or front pedestal rests in the bush. I only took two shots with both bullet holes touching to convince everyone that the gun was perfectly set up for me. With that we were off....
We then set out to drag the two tracks with a tree to clear all the tracks from the road from previous days. The day and night before it rained and we needed to ensure that we could find good fresh spoor to follow up on.
After a while of driving the two tracks we found fresh spoor leading into dense bush. We disembarked the bakkie and set out after the lioness. I had butterflies dancing in my stomach knowing how deathly serious lion hunting can be. After all who has not read Peter Capstick's books? After about 400 yards of following the spoor I realized the spoor was starting to turn circles. We came across a warthog den that the lioness had tried to dig the pig out of. She had been here very recently and we bumped her from her breakfast. We continued on the spoor this time taking us in one large circle right back to the warthog den. Her tracks were now in ours. The hunters just became the hunted. She was on our trail! Here is a photo of her pug marks on top of our boot prints.
I could tell that everyone's senses just got heightened a few notches. We knew that she knew we were hunting her. I was on overdrive at this point. We spotted here in the bush a few times but the sightings were brief and offered no shot. I even was up on the sticks at he ready but no shot was available. She took us into heavy bush with very little visibility. Cuan my other DG PH turned to me and said. "I need you to not look at the spoor but keep your eyes on the bush. She could come from any direction and a charge will come fast." After 4 hours and around 8 miles of tracking we called off the chase. Cuan asked if I was hungry and would like to go get lunch and pick up the spoor afterwards. Boy did I ever need to take a break. The Kalahari sun was getting intense and I was spent physically and mentally. My legs looked like I had walked through razor wire with the amount of scratches on them and I had a raging headache. I needed food and a rest.
During lunch another PH with clients had communicated to us via bush telegraph that he had spotted a monster eland. Loodt looked at me and said this is your chance for an absolute snorter by the sound of it. Do you want to try your hand at an eland before going back for lioness? With my answer of why the heck not we were in motion right away. We went to the last spot that the bull had been seen. We soon found him about 500 yards down a sendero. Cuan, Loodt and I put the stalk on through the bush. We got to about a 100 yards of the feeding bull when the sticks went up. When the bull turned broadside I placed a 300 grain soft point a 1/3 of the way up dead center on his shoulder. The bull bucked and took off. Knowing how they can cover a lot of ground fast even while wounded, I reloaded and ran out into the sendero. I placed the second shot right where I aimed at the base of the tail to anchor him. The bull crashed hard. I remember Cuan yelling on how he loves Americans because they know how to shoot. My first eland and the last spiral horn needed for my SA spiral slam was in the salt.
This hunt represented me chasing my dream of hunting a lion since I was very young. This dream could also be called a demon as it has haunted me for years. I am a few months shy of my 40th year on earth and I have realized life is to be lived and not dreamed about. Dreams (demons) need to become reality. This adventure is all about catching my dreams and facing them.
Day 1: I was met by Loodt and his friend James at OR Tambo for our trek out to Lion camp. They had over nighted in JoBerg and had rented a hotel room. They had not checked out of the hotel yet because Loodt had the fore thought that after 36 hours of travel I would love to clean up and change clothes. This was very welcomed on my part. After a shower and breakfast at the hotel we checked out and hit the road. After around a 5 hour drive we arrived to the lion camp somewhere along the Botswana border in the Kalahari. AH member Pieter Erasmus was there as one of the two DG PH's for my hunt. Yes AH, I had the great opportunity to share a camp with both Loodt and Pieter at once. This first night was all about getting prepped for the next days lioness hunt. There was a lot of discussion on hunting these cats and what my roles and responsibilities were. We went to sleep that night to the sounds of lions roaring in the distance. I was still extremely fatigued from all my travel but sleep was going to be difficult in anticipation for the next days hunt.
Day 2: We started out at the range. I would be using Pieter's Musgrave .375 H&H Mauser for the lioness hunt. First thing was to make sure that the gun was properly sighted in for me. The guys put up shooting sticks and a target at 50 yards. I was expecting to shoot from the bench but there would be no shooting benches or front pedestal rests in the bush. I only took two shots with both bullet holes touching to convince everyone that the gun was perfectly set up for me. With that we were off....
After a while of driving the two tracks we found fresh spoor leading into dense bush. We disembarked the bakkie and set out after the lioness. I had butterflies dancing in my stomach knowing how deathly serious lion hunting can be. After all who has not read Peter Capstick's books? After about 400 yards of following the spoor I realized the spoor was starting to turn circles. We came across a warthog den that the lioness had tried to dig the pig out of. She had been here very recently and we bumped her from her breakfast. We continued on the spoor this time taking us in one large circle right back to the warthog den. Her tracks were now in ours. The hunters just became the hunted. She was on our trail! Here is a photo of her pug marks on top of our boot prints.
During lunch another PH with clients had communicated to us via bush telegraph that he had spotted a monster eland. Loodt looked at me and said this is your chance for an absolute snorter by the sound of it. Do you want to try your hand at an eland before going back for lioness? With my answer of why the heck not we were in motion right away. We went to the last spot that the bull had been seen. We soon found him about 500 yards down a sendero. Cuan, Loodt and I put the stalk on through the bush. We got to about a 100 yards of the feeding bull when the sticks went up. When the bull turned broadside I placed a 300 grain soft point a 1/3 of the way up dead center on his shoulder. The bull bucked and took off. Knowing how they can cover a lot of ground fast even while wounded, I reloaded and ran out into the sendero. I placed the second shot right where I aimed at the base of the tail to anchor him. The bull crashed hard. I remember Cuan yelling on how he loves Americans because they know how to shoot. My first eland and the last spiral horn needed for my SA spiral slam was in the salt.
