Incredible photo's!! Thanks for sharing.

Thanks to all that shared this safari with the rest of us.
Hopefully I will have just returned from my Zim safari when next years party breaks out.

We are back home with our families.

At least Walter and I are.

We left Tony, Roy and Rene at Dubai International Airport last night, to continue their journey to their respective homes.

I have started preparing my Hunt Report on the plane from Dar, and will start posting parts as I finish them.

Thank you all for participating in this adventure with us here on AR.

I have a bag full of CF and SD cards with videos from various cameras, in addition to the hunting videos.

We took a number of GoPro Hero 3 cameras, and Garry took some interesting videos with them.

We also had a Phantom Quadrucopter - it is a small drone that carries a GoPro Hero 3 camera.

We had lots of fun with this too.

Shukran

I have had requests to add some details to the photos posted above.

So you might wish to look at them again.

It will probably take me a while to do all the photos though.

Thank You Saeed for all the hard work so we can share in your pleasure. Really appreciate it.

Outstanding photo's, some of the best ever! Thank you Saeed!

We got the idea of cooking a buffalo from the inhabitants of the Pacific islands.

Where they cook their pigs in banana leaves.

Here we are preparing to cook a whole cape buffalo.

It took 28 hours of very slow cooking for it to get ready.

The taste was some of the best buffalo meat we have ever eaten.

Walter and Rene would not tell us what spices they added.

I know Rene bought quite a lot of spices when she was here.

Saeed,

As ever, you did a wonderful job sharing your safari with us

Cant wait to see the videos

Silly me, I though that the above photo was a pit trap that you caught the buffalo in.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I have started adding video clips of our safari, linked on the opening post of this thread for your convenience and enjoyment.

All video clips and a complete Hunt Report will also be linked on this page.

Saeed,

Cannot thank you enough for all the your time sharing with us your safari.

The best,

Mike

I have added a few videos at the beginning of this thread.

quote:

Originally posted by Saeed:


We got the idea of cooking a buffalo from the inhabitants of the Pacific islands.

Where they cook their pigs in banana leaves.

Here we are preparing to cook a whole cape buffalo.

It took 28 hours of very slow cooking for it to get ready.

The taste was some of the best buffalo meat we have ever eaten.

Walter and Rene would not tell us what spices they added.

I know Rene bought quite a lot of spices when she was here.

LOL Hope the cruiser didn't get stuck despite all the branches

Mich,

We managed not to get stuck while loading and carrying our animals.

Trouble was we did get stuck in the mud many times.

In fact, I think we had only 2-3 days of normal Selous sunshine while we were there.

The rest of the time we had mostly cloudy days with spattering of rain.

Some of the areas had that horrible black mud which water will no penetrate. It becomes like a suction cup for the truck.

I have plenty of video showing that which I will post here.

What leaves did you end up using? Those don't look like banana leaves.

Just gotta love these live reports.

quote:

Originally posted by Saeed:
Mich,

We managed not to get stuck while loading and carrying our animals.

Trouble was we did get stuck in the mud many times.

In fact, I think we had only 2-3 days of normal Selous sunshine while we were there.

The rest of the time we had mostly cloudy days with spattering of rain.

Some of the areas had that horrible black mud which water will no penetrate. It becomes like a suction cup for the truck.

I have plenty of video showing that which I will post here.

That sure is an amazing difference from the weather we had last year at the exact same time (35deg C and sunny)!

Walter was telling us how they load live bulls in trucks in Chile.

He was daring us to do the same with a cape buffalo bull.

He changed his mind when we told him he has to show us, as we have no experience of doing that1

He kept scratching his head and muttering "Hmp, I have to think about that"

Caught me off guard to read the hunt is over.
Gosh, figured it would last another month at least.
Many thanks for sharing all the fun and hunting with us.
B Nelson, I want to thank you for explaining who this joker Walter is. That's impressive. Now we'll all look at him with much more respect than when in the dress. Thanks again for that.

Saeed, JDollar and a couple others check your pm's.
Enjoy being home, all of you.

Fantastic hunt stories and pictures. Can't thank you enough for sharing with us.
George

I have started posting detailed hunt report on the opening page of this thread.

quote:

Originally posted by georgeld:
Caught me off guard to read the hunt is over.
Gosh, figured it would last another month at least.
Many thanks for sharing all the fun and hunting with us.
B Nelson, I want to thank you for explaining who this joker Walter is. That's impressive. Now we'll all look at him with much more respect than when in the dress. Thanks again for that.

Saeed, JDollar and a couple others check your pm's.
Enjoy being home, all of you.

Fantastic hunt stories and pictures. Can't thank you enough for sharing with us.
George

Georgeld,

Thank you for your words and for seeing Walter differently. Now that you undressed him you need to treat him like an onion...one layer at the time! hahahaha

I´d like to thank Saeed for sharing the experiences and pictures, which are better and better as the years go by. The same with the videos which I have already downloaded and enjoyed.

Hugs to everyone!

Nelson Balladares

I am processing our video footage, and came across Tony with his rifle ready on the shooting sticks, and Dillon behind him watching a herd of buffalo feeding.

Dillon had a grass stick, which he kept tickling Tony's ears with, and Tony thinking it was a fly.

When Dillon needs his hand to look through his binoculars, he put the grass stick on Tony's hat, and then repeats the fly trick

Saeed,

Excellent photos and reports.

I would like to know which rifle Alan uses? The muzzle looks pretty big in the videos. I am guessing it is a .458 Lott?

Best-
Locksley,R

Is Alan using a 450 Vincent built by Roy? Or the 450 Ackley?
IIRC, they had both in 2010.

Funniest caption: "Walter is giving Dillon instructions on walking."
Something about "Not too fast or far?"

Great reports. Videos too, the "trailers."

Love this picture of the hard bosses with tree bark rubs:

Nelson:
You guys are the ones that undressed Walter I sure wasn't in on it.

Last night the zebra fat vid wouldn't open at all. Tonight much improvement. Said it'd take 2hr9min. I'll just let it run til I'm ready for bed and see if it's done or not.
May end up having to wait til the sticks are mailed out to watch 'em.

No matter the camp, or where the hunt in. There's got to be a Joker in the crowd somewhere. Might even be a horse thinking he could buck hard enough to dump his rider in the ice cold crik water but, there WILL be a Joker
somewhere, count on it>

Thanks much,
George

George,

Use your mouse to right-click on the file and save it to your computer.

Or better still, get yourself a download manager, it will speed the download process.

There are many available free on the Net.

I am using Internet Download Manager, and it works great. But this one you have to pay for.

More videos have been added.

I would like some feedback from those who have downloaded the videos and seen them.

What is your opinion of the quality?

Just this minute watched the zebra skinning and it was super sharp and clear with good sound. Anxious to watch them all. Thank you for this sharing!

Questions have been raised on why I have changed the scope on one rifle.

I heard so much about NIGHTFORCE, I thought I will try one.

Also, I was hoping for a little more magnification than the n8 power I have on the Leupold 2.5-8, for those long distance shots.

We tried looking through both scopes just before sunset with Roy, and sadly were disappointed not to see any difference whatsoever between the old Leupold and the new Nightforce.

In fact, it seems the Leupold had a slightly wider view when set at 8 than the Nightforce set at the same power.

Walter loved the Nightforce, so I will keep it on the second rifle, and will keep my old Leupold on my own rifle.

The Leopold is a great scope. "If it's not broke, don't fix it"

If it does break, you can also consider the rugged little Nikon 3-9 'Inline' with 5" eye-relief. Not that you need to worry about eyerelief, but some of your guest shooters may appreciate the 5" buffer.

Some of the pictures have an unpleasant yellow-greenish tone to them.This has been the case for the last 3??? trips.

quote:

Originally posted by shootaway:
Some of the pictures have an unpleasant yellow-greenish tone to them.This has been the case for the last 3??? trips.

This is the first that I have heard of anyone not seeing the photos correctly.

If you are experiencing this, you might need to check your monitor.

Great movie's Saeed, I think the quality is just great, thanks for sharing

Just on Saeeds NightForce. Having ever only used cheapie Bushnell scopes, I really liked the NightForce. It's good looking, trim and the reticle, I thought, made for easy use. I used the 10 power to get my first buff as it allowed me to see through the bush it was standing behind, and we weren't that far away from them. It certainly cured me of my open sight fetish I have at the moment.

Friend Saeed,

You cannot trust that shootaway is not toxic on psychotropic medication, thus his color vision problem.
All pictures great here.

All the videos worked great except video "buffalo2" gave a mediaplayer error message at 10:19, i.e., did not play the last second of the 10:20 (10min20sec) video. Just thought you would like to know.

Proof of life on the videos:

buffalo1: 8:02
There is an abrupt transition from initial video-glassing of the herd to the walk-up for the insurance shot. No killshot captured on video. If cameraman fell asleep, I can understand that, especially if he was jet-lagged, ZZZ ... Things got better fast.

buffalo2: Great shot placement video and shooting stick technique. Now using bamboo tripod shooting sticks as Alan got tired of carrying the 2x2 timber bipod. Saeed grips the forearm of the rifle ahead of the point where it rests in the shooting sticks crotch. Very good technique.
After shot: Cameraman turns camera skyward as if thanking God, captures video of flying birds. No insurance shot required. Video ends abruptly at 10:19 looking at lion wound on back of the buffalo. Bad wound, likely would have become septic. Mercy killing. Lost last second of this gory view.

buffalo3: 8:37
Great shot placement video. Lots of video glassing of the herd after the death bellows began, buffalo herd looks toward the out-of-sight bellower for a long while before they run off ... interesting to watch ...

eland: 10:16
Great eland bull ambushed just as he was starting to get frisky with a cow.
Quarter mile away? First shot was a foot below vitals into left upper leg. Subsequent shots into chest and neck after Saeed got his Tennessee Elevation figured?

hyena: 2:42
Another quarter mile shot? background audio while inspecting the kill: "Well done Saeed, nice flinch with the first shot, thought you were going to bend your trigger." Apparently Saeed did remember to push the safety forward and made a one-shot kill after practice flinching on the hyena with his safety on?

kudu1: 6:08
Impressive kudu-across-the-valley-and-through-the-timber one-shot kill.

kudu2: 1:50
Outer Circle Club Kudu.

lunchwithhippos: 5:13
Hippo asleep on his feet with nose in the sand finally lies down in the sand for a midday siesta. Natural history at its finest.

waterbuck: 8:36
Cameraman got wobbly and out of focus just in time for the shot placement to be obscured. Otherwise ... "royal" waterbuck.

wildebeast: 5:17
Nice wildebeest. Well done all.

zebrafat: 5:33
Fascinating look at a zebra fat-storage anomalie that apparently does not detract from the good juju potential for the local witchdoctor's use in folk medicine.

Outstanding.

RIP,

Sadly. sometimes the video camera is not ready when things happen on our hunts.

We hunt, and take a video of our hunts.

We don't go with a prepared story line and make a video to fit it.

So on many occasions, things happen when the video camera is not ready, or the camera man is in the wrong place.

WE are using Canon XF305 video cameras, which use CF cards for storage.

WE use CF cards of 32GB, 64GB, and 128GB.

It seems the camera takes longer to come on line after being switched on and ready to shoot the larger the CF card is.

Some shots did not even get videoed, as the camera was not ready.

We are trying to find a way to make the animals co-operate in this, but we are not having much success so far.

Also, the position of the camera sometimes make it impossible to see what is being hunted - look at the kudu for instance.

In fact, I only saw him pass through a small gap following a cow when I shot him. That could not have lasted more than a couple of seconds.