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Part two

Saturday morning early, the camp is very calm. No one is awake so our planes are not going to well but we had a nice evening and night at Harris. At nine we have our breakfast and then we are out again for the hunt. The time before lunch we spend driving around for smaller game like Impala and others and when we get some Pheasants in sights I decide to try one with the bow from the car. The distance is about 25 yards and the hit is perfect, the bird just takes of and the n drops down to the ground. I have taken my first game with my bow and that feels great.

After lunch me and Bastiaan spends a couple hours in a tree house over a waterhole watching for something to shot with the bow. The only thing we see is the 1 yard long croc in the pond and some Guinea fowls.

Later we take of to the top for some tracking in the area. We see some Elands but there are only females and young males. Also a couple of Oryx and Ostriches cross our road. Suddenly we see a Blue Wildebeest bull just walking slowly 100 yards parallel to the road without noticing us. We steps down from the bakkie and starts tracking. Soon we realise that he is not alone but what we saw was the end of the heard. Then it all goes quick. From a small opening we can spot about ten Zebra and they are crowding together, when one of the bigger one are free I fire the shot and then all is chaos; dust all over, five Wildebeest coming right on us and Zebras all over, and then after some seconds everything is quiet again. Kinbelie our tracker finds blood and we follow him. The Zebra is standing 80 meters away broadside as I take the second shot and she starts to go down. The first shot has taken a little back and even if the second one is better she is not prepared to die yet, so she struggles a bit but the fact is getting to her and she is down.

After a lot of walking for Zebra this time and in May this shows how hunting can be. When you walks for one animal and you ends up with another that you did not expect this time. However I am really happy to have my Zebra and after the skinning was done I got the recovered bullets that really made me satisfied with my choice of the 270 grains Rhino Bullets for my 375 H&H.

Back in camp we starts to pack, we are going to Zimbabwe for a one day Warthog hunt in some Orange fields by a friend of Jasper. After dinner we are of to pick up some stuff at Jaspers house and meet his friend at the pub. At the pub we are suppoused to stay for about 10 minutes for some friends talk but after three hours and a lot of friends I grab Andrew and Jasper and we are on our way to the border.

What we thought would be the hardest here was the gun but that shows up to be the car and the time all paperwork takes. Extra time for bringing my own gun was only five minutes. After the border we have about an hour to drive before we reach the farm that is situated along the Limpopo river. At three a clock we are to bed and that feels great. We skip breakfast and settles with some fresh orange juice and at nine we are of. It only takes a couple of minutes until we see the first pigs and when we have a big one just along the road we decides to give it a try. Since I want it on video and there is so many of them I decides that it’s worth loosing some of the opportunities waiting for the camcorder to leave the stand by mode and record. And this is such a moment, luckily for me. We see him ran of into the bush and decides to walk for him, just 20 yards from the road we see another one sleeping and Jasper tells me to shot. It is a Bush pig and after the lung shot it runs for 40 yards. When we finally get it to the road we can see it’s a big one.

Up with it on the bakkie and then away. Now we wait until we are in the plantations and there it is plenty of pigs. We estimate around 3 to 400 during the day. They are standing in the lines and we most of the times shot them from the car. After a while w e decides to go back for some food but we are often stopped to load more pigs and when we finally gets to the place where we will drop them of we count to seven pigs (6 Warthogs and 1 Bush pig) in three hours.

Lunch is indeed good and then we are of again. Another two pigs are shot before we get an offer we can’t refuse. There are three Blue Wildebeests on the area that we are allowed to shot for a good price and one of them is a bull. So I will take the first shot and then Jasper and then me again if possible.

They are not hard to find and I take the bull with a neck shot 100 yards away, then the two other runs to our side and in the same distance about Jasper takes the second one with a frontal shot. The third gets to spooked from this and we never get the chance for that one.

On the way back I take another Warthog that after the shot runs about 100 yards, maybe not so much but right in to thorn bushes so we have about 45 minutes to find it and take it out. My leg looks like ****.

As the evening is approaching we decides to try a last pig with the bow at a feeding place and it doesn’t takes long before I have my chance. I can see that the arrow is placed perfect behind the shoulder going forward in the lungs, distance about 15 yards. We find blood but it takes time to track and when it gets dark we have only got about 150 yards. The day after when we are back in South Africa they are supposed to put a tracker on the spoor.

The sun downer is delayed because of the tracking and we can’t enjoy the view from Fly Camp. After dinner we heads for the border again and after spending less then 24 hours in Zimbabwe we are back again in camp Evelyn at eleven pm with no problems at all.

To be continued….

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Christer Hansson

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