My rule has always been: I take my own rifle(s) and ammunition. (My only exception was wild boar in Italy. But never any rifles but my own in Africa.)

As Saeed has said, my rifles and chosen ammunition are like my family.

I have gotten to know them well, and they have my total trust and confidence.

Otherwise, I would only say go where you have always wanted to go without regard to cost.

Life always runs out before money, or you have not lived it very well.

Be prepared to have a Plan B. Like your clothes or ammo or rifle(s) not showing up because it can and will happen. If you do have a minimum amount of the above you can still operate till things level out. Voice of experience.

Here is another point.

Avoid multi airlines.

Avoid connecting flights if at all possible.

Agree totally about changing airlines. Hard to avoid connecting flights out of the States, at least out of Houston. I generally fly to Amsterdam with a connecting flight to Arusha and then to Dar, if I didn't get off at Arusha. Depends on the year.

And may I suggest you practice shooting off hand?

And try acquiring your target quickly and fire?

One of the biggest mistakes I have seen hunters encounter is slow shooting.

This can lead to lots of missed opportunities.

Another advice I always follow is to not use binoculers while actually hunting.

I have seen it many times.

The PH points out an animal among a group.

The client is looking at it with his binoculars.

He gets on the shooting sticks, the target animal has moved.

Then off the scope, and on the binoculars the client gets to acquire it again!

I never use binoculars.

I use my rifle scope.

Once an animal is idetified as target, I never lose sight of it.

Makes hunting a lot easier.

Thanks for that tip Saeed. My PH Dean suggested the same thing and i was just wondering if I should bring binos on the hunt anyway. I'll bring them to camp to sightsee but won't carry them with me on the actual hunt.

I bought the same shooting sticks Dean uses and will be doing the most of my practice off the sticks or offhand.

Are you hunting with Dean Kendal?

He hunted with us several times.

A great professional and a fun guy to have at camp.

Yes, Dean Kendall. We will hunt the Mozambique camp. I'm really only targeting buffalo.

Give him my best regards.