Another African Hunting Story From: Chuck Shook Cats Dad: After arriving in South Africa I spent five days in Kruger National Park with friends; Raymond Le Clue and wife Vina. Raymond is a South African policeman and they are quite different from the United States police here. Each South African policeman has jurisdiction anywhere in South Africa where the flag is flown. At that time it included South West Africa that is called Namibia today. After a nice rest with my friends, I flew up to Rhodesia where there was a war going on. This was in 1976. Everyone was telling me that I should go see Victoria Falls along the Zambia River. I purchased a ticket when I got to Salisbury, the Rhodesian capital. It was cheaper to buy a ticket in local money rather than purchase it with USA dollars. Anyway, I boarded an old English 2 engine military plane to go to the falls. As we took off the pilot put the plane into a hard left bank and spiraled straight up. I looked around and all of the passengers were military men except for myself and a freelance photographer from Switzerland . I asked one of the troopers why spiral take offs and he said to get out of the range of the shoulder fired rockets as quick as possible. we also did this on the dissent for landing at the falls. The small airport was under control of the Rhodesian Army. we arrived about 10:30 AM. Myself and the Swiss guy were the only two civilians on board . We boarded a smallish bus that would hold about 12 people and were escorted by the Army to Victoria Falls,about 15 miles from the airport. The army had a pickup truck with a 20 mm gun mounted in the bed attended by two soldiers. There were four soldiers on motorbikes around the outside of the bus and two on the inside of the bus and two on the rear of the bus. All were fully armed and they left to patrol in the area around the Falls after we arrived.The road side going to the Falls was posted with red signs that read DANGER MINE FIELDS The Falls were awesome to say the least. The noise is very loud and a light rain falls day and night and there are many plants here that are found nowhere else in the world. This is a must see if you ever are in this area. We boarded the same bus at 6 AM the next day for the return flight to the Salisbury airport. A small plane was waiting to take me to Bulawayo where superintendent John Poslet met me as he had done in 1974. The next morning we had a big breakfast and after resting we had to make a plan (SouthAfrian talk). About 9 AM we went out to scout the areas for the next days hunt. At our lunch break, which is from 1:00 PM to 2pm we had 2 very thick slices of bread, One half of a tin of bully beef with a huge slice of onion and a bottle of Castle beer. Not bad if, you are hungry. At 6 AM the next morning we hit the road and the roads were mostly game trails which made for some really rough riding. John kept saying you have to go where they are. We saw many herds of impala and the trackers started to whine about meat for supper. John told them that if they found a very very big buffalo that we would get them one on the way back. Since our pickup could not carry but so much weight. And if you do not find one, we will not shoot you any meat. Well they begin to get busy. Then they wanted to bargain they also wanted two beers each to find a huge buffalo. This kind of banter is standard behavior. John told them that they would have to walk all the way back home if they did not find this buffalo. That got their attention I think John had done this before anyway they really started looking! Nikki, one of the trackers was in the bed of the truck with a long stick with a piece of white cloth tied to the end of the stick and was signaling which way to go as we were in a big patch of elephant grass. This grass typically is 6 to 10 feet tall. He tapped on the top of the truck to stop. He had spotted a large buffalo standing alongside of a forest of large Thorn trees. He was looking toward the grass where we were so, John put the truck in first gear and drove slowly stright toward him. I got out of the truck while it was still moving and got into the back where Nikki was. As soon as I could see him well enough i would tap on the truck top 1 time and he would stop quietly. No one moved or made a sound at this time. I could see the animal. Clearly. He was standing broadside facing left. I sure did not want to wound this buff. And have to dig him out of that thorn thicket. It was about 150 yard shot. I decided to to try and anchor him with a shoulder, heart shot then place a second shot if he moved or, did not move. He fell and before he could get up I shot him in the neck just behind his ears and that did the trick. I was shooting a Winchester .338 Mag bolt action rifle. The first shot was a 300 grain solid and the second shot was a 300 grain soft point. You can say that I was quite relieved. The animal had a good set of horns and he was very very big and very heavy. Unfortunately the ears were split badly and there was several places on the hide where the hair was completely rubbed off. There were many many ticks on him. Well he wasnt pretty but, he was big. The trackers went to work. They guted him out on the ground and John estimated his heart would weigh over 10 pounds. John said look up in the sky and I did not see anything. In about 30 min. there were many vultures flying above. John says that they hear the report from the rifle and home in on the sound.? Of course the trackers took the heart and liver and the stomach. They cut the legs off at the first joint. And John got a 2 ton, come along and hooked it to an eye bolt in the floor. After much huffing and puffing and a few bad words they got him loaded. He was loaded butt first to get as much weight as possible up front. The front tires were coming off the ground. The trackers had to ride on the front bumper Area on the way back to the station. It was a slow ride back to the station. When we were on a good road close to the station John stopped. He said to me, shoot 2 of those implalas to help hold the front end down..The trackers were grinning from ear to ear and one of them said dont forget the beer. I had better stop now so you wont go to sleep,fall down and hurt your self. Always looking out for my readers ,you know. Cheers, Chuck Shook PS: My daughter says this is too short so I will tell you how you get through a road block in Botswana,Africa. The Botswana goverment gets the idea to post a Guard on the roads leading out of the hunting areas from Botswana to South Africa. The post is usally in the middle of no where The guard has no shelter, one flash light that usually doesnt work, a 2 gallon bucket of water, no transport, no radio and no fire wood and The South African border is 20 miles away and closes at 9:00 PM At 830pm two Toyota hunting vehicles drive up, one pulling a trailer. A man in the lead truck says it sure is a cold wind blowing out hereYes it is the guard says; Man says here is a bottle of cane( Booze) for you. Before the guard can say anything the man places another one in his other hand and says what time does the border close? The guard says 9 oclock and the man says oh we have to go through tonight! The man turns and tells the driver of the other truck to give his guard friend some biltong ,bread and a bundle of firewood and the man puts the truck into gear and drives away. The guard is looking at the first truck and trying not to drop his booze as he turns to look at the second truck the driver hands out a loaf of bread ,a good hand full of biltong and throws out a bundle of fire wood as he speeds away. WORKS EVERY TIME
Posted on: Sun, 19 Jan 2014 03:18:55 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015