I just got back from my first safari, so I'll probably have a lot to talk about over the next few weeks. I promise, however NOT to become an overnight super-bwana with advice for everyone. I still feel like a knucklehead after all the things I saw and learned over there...pictures to follow soon!

How about this:

I was up EVERY DANG DAY at 3:00AM, and sitting on a hyena blind. Each day we freshened the bait with the day's bag, re-swept the trail in (1 mile or more) and sat, listening to bones crunching until dawn.

One day, the baboons saw us and blew our cover. Another day, a parks department truck rattled down the road while we were sitting there. Even though it was a mile away, it sounded a dump truck full of rocks in that dark blind. We had lions, leopards and everything else feeding, but slinking out before shooting light.

The part that I didn't understand was, WHY IN THE HELL DO YOU GET AN UNBEARABLE< NEARLY UN-SUPRESSABLE COUGH in your throat as soon as you get comfortable?

I was using mind-over-matter, biting my tongue, pinching my throat, squeezing my eyes shut, and shaking like a little girl to keep from making a peep. I've never experienced anything like it in my life. HOWEVER, at exactly 6:30AM, when it was time to leave the blind, it went away.

Can anyone relate?

Gibson probably put a muti spell on you.

His first requirement is to try to get everyone to try to shoot hyenas. He hates them.

I have passed up dozens of them there because he wanted to charge me an inflated trophy fee (gov't fee + profit) and I always pass. I think he is permanently ticked-off at me.

I saw one there that was as big as a lioness. Biggest hyena I have ever seen. It was huge. Just sitting there looking at me in broad daylight. God, Gibbo was pissed!

I don't like hunting in the dark. With lions, hyenas, and leopards feeding close by in total darkness, I figure you are lucky you didn't cough, sneeze, or chatter your teeth for your first safari.

They have a quota of some (35) hyena in Chewore North. When I was there in April, Andy Hunter had shot 5 or 6 already w/clients, leading the Hyena Cup. If you were hunting them close to camp, they were hammered hard by the time you got there and had smartened-up (or been shot). Although even then a guy in camp who really wanted one hunted them for 5-mornings without getting a shot. He was pissed at the end as the one day when they went to the blind the PH (not one of the Zambezi boys) heard lion at the bait and turned around saying it was too dangerous.

But the sounds and smells of the blind are great, aren't they! It is an uneasy feeling walking to/from the blind in darkness, but once you get in there it is even worse, and you realize how out of your element you really are. My biggest concern was the elephants who trashed one of our blinds, luckily when we were not in it. When in the blind, I fended off many an imaginary attack ("okay, if he comes from over there I'll do this, over there I'll swing this way, back there he'll get Fred...").

Last year, I had a head cold while bow hunting in RSA. Everytime i got in a blind, I needed to cough and sucked on hard candy to keep it in control. Of course, I didn't have lions, leopards, hyenas, feeding in front of me.

N'gagi, when stand hunting in cold weather I make sure I always breathe through my nose as breathing through the mouth will dry your throat. Just sucking on a cough drop even when you don't need it should do the trick.