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Here's the beginning of the story of my elephant hunt. I'll post more as I write it.
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The Elephants of Sankuyo

He looked at me. I looked at him. One of us had to blink and with the out side air temp at +100, humidity damn near in minus numbers, the chances were good it was going to be me.

But he was carrying a full load of ivory and looked like his teeth hurt, so I guess it was my duty to relieve his pain and suffering. He’d been on this earth around 45 years and it showed. His thick hide was a mass of wrinkles, ticks and scars. The bottoms of his feet were worn smooth from the thousands of miles he had traveled. He had a smaller elephant with him who was acting as his askari, or apprentice/helper/companion.

Minutes crept by. It felt like I could see the sun move through the sky. He was real comfortable with us standing there. The wind was from him to us and we were back of some thorn trees and bush, so his poor eyesight wasn’t doing him much good. But he was faced just wrong and I didn’t have a good angle on his brain. He went back to eating, we went back to waiting.

Waiting wasn’t exactly what I wanted to do. This was my first elephant hunt and I was wound up tighter than a Rolex repro. Plus I had time to realize I was thirsty and the water was three miles back in the truck. Things one thinks of whilst waiting on a bull elephant to move.

As long as I was griping I might as well have a word or two about my rifle. Ah yes, my rifle. It was a .577 Nitro Express double Rifle built by Searcy Enterprises in Boron, California and loaned to me by Butch Searcy himself. We had met a while back and while we weren’t quite best of friends, yet, he offered to loan me the rifle if I would mention it in this article, which I was happy to do.

The .577 is quite a piece of work. Searcy’s double weighs in the 12-12-1/2 lb area, I think (I never asked and never weighed it.), is built on an Anson and Deeley action, and is made from stainless steel. It carries a set of 24 inch barrels, has double triggers and a non-automatic safety, which is the only way to have a safety on a double rifle in my opinion. A new rifle can he yours for probably a year’s waiting period and $19,500 base price. Of course engraving, custom case and the like will significantly bump the price.

A .577 bullet weighs 750 grains and exits the muzzle at 2050 fps and packing a tad over 7000 ft-lb of muzzle energy. It dates back to the 1890s and was used by professional ivory hunters extensively during the first thirty years of the 20th Century. It traces its antecedents back to the original .577 Black Powder Express from back in the 1880s.

... more to follow

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