Ladies and Gentlemen,

This was one of the buffalo Ray shot this, and as you can see, he could not have found an older one!

He will tell us the details of the hunt, and hopefully we will get the right story this time.

Ray did start to tell us whay happened, then both Pierre and Walter got into the act - both of whom wewe not present when he shot this bull. But this did not seemt to matter to them of how the events occured at the time.

Ray just gave up and let them continue their own argument!

Ray,

Annelie sends her love. She came over with her mother and sister last night and had dinner with us. Anna Marie and Horst were here too, and Anna Marie says she really feels sorry for you sharing a tent with Horst for 3 weeks

No kidding he's skinny! His ribs are showing!

Those Northfork cup points really tear them up...

Well, the truth is that Richard Lemmer (PH and Pierres brother in law, Annalies brother)and I were hunting bachlor bulls in some thick stuff in the bottoms and looked up on a high hill and this old dugga was looking at us..He was a long ways off, so we put a stalk on him and got within 108 yards according to Richards range finder, but we could get no closer and he was looking right at us..The brush was incredibly thick and it seemed impossible to get a shot through that stuff and my luck had been running bad indeed, with Saeed and Pierre shooting 3 buffalo out from under me in what was a weird set of circumstances, if I have ever seen weird circumstances, and their constant giggleing and cackling laughter had taken its toll on my once great skill as a rifleman!! ..On top of this brother Richard and I were shooting iron sights, my 470 and Richards 458 Ackley...but it was now or never so Richard said you shoot then I'll shoot, use a solid...

The bull appeared to be looking straight at me, and he was up very high on the hill, He was a blur in the thick jessy, so I held on what I thought would be the sticking spot, hoping for a heart and spine shot and I pulled the trigger, Richard shot as the bull turned and ran..

We climbed the mountain and tracked the bull for about 200 yards and found no blood or any indication of a hit, so we abandoned the hunt, based on the fact that the brush surely turned the bullets or we simply missed...

The next day Saeed and Pierre were hunting the same area, as we had seen a number of buffalo there, and saw the vultures I suspect, and found the bull...He was shot in the sticking spot and the bullet exited behind the shoulder, Richards shot went in the flank and exited the center of the rib cage..He went a mile or better according to PIerre before he expired..Apparantly the Lions were better trackers than our boys, which were not so hot at tracking, but they were hired as a driver and camp boy, soooooo...

Anyway that evening we show up in camp empty handed after a long and uneventfull test of ones fortitude, I'd guess about 10 miles of worn shoe leather, and Saeed and Pierre are bragging about this nice old dugga boy that they shot and how much better hunters they were than us, and by now both Richard and I are at a point to believeing this could be true, and that I am about as snake bit as one can get, we also allowed that the witch doctor Bula Bula (Walter) medicine the night before had not removed my hex and that he was surly a fake, a charleton, a counterfiet witch doctor..

Then Pierre and Saeed insisted that I go to the skinning shed with them and view this nice bull which I did, but only at their insistence, while they were taking pictures and filming all this on video, what the hell is going on, I'm getting real scared, you can never let your guard down with this bunch and you are always prepared to run like hell...

Needless to say they had their way with me for about 30 minutes before they finally and reluctantly broke down and confessed they had actually found my bull from the day before and shot just like we had planned it..These black bulls never cease to amaze with the amount of killing they can sometimes take, we were probably lucky he didn't chose to fight with all that toughness left in him after those two good hits..albiet he was probably at an angle that I only got one lung, don't know.

Needless to say Walters ability as a witch doctor impressed me and I will continue to use his services, but he won't make house calls? A brain surgeon he is not BTW.

No wonder Saeed couldn't find a shootable lion; he was eating Ray's buffalo.

Ray,

You should have known from reading previous posts here on this site that them .470's ain't no good..Especially them side by sides.

It never fails to amaze me how some of these ole dagga boys can take one or two or more major calibers through the boiler room and still go on and on and on.

You gonna shoulder mount that one?