Ladies and Gentlemen,

We have just arrived back from our hunt in Tanzania.

Details and photos will be posted in the next day or two, but here is a short note on our hunt.

We tried several times to connect to the Internet, but, the usual Walterhog curse prevented it.

Sad news about our PH, Pierre van Tonder, he has decided to go look for another job - something like a beach bum he said - after suffering Walter for 18 days.

The problem started the first day of our hunt. We went out to shoot bait. I shot an impala and Walter attempted a shot at one of his relatives - an old warthog.

We thought he missed it, but when we went where the warthog was, we found tiny piece of meat. We followed the tracks. We found very little blood, and a little broken bone.

The warhog tracks lead to a hole, which lead Pierre to think the warthog was inside.

We tried a few tricks to make the warthog come out - like stomping on top of the hole, demolishing most of it, setting fire to it, firing a shot into it, but no warthog materilized.

Pierre then thought the warthog must have gone in, and then come out.

Walter was not satisfied with this performance, he wanted his warthog.

Walter: "Mr. van Tonder, a warthog is composed of 4 parts. Meat, bone, blood and skin. I have conveniently provided you with meat, bone and blood. All you have to find is the skin, and the warthog will be right there too."

I looked at Pierre and saw him look at Walter with absolute amazement. He was speechless!

I thought of trying to at least save the day by saying "Pierre, Walter is kidding, as usual"

Walter: "I am not bloody well kidding! I want my warthog! This is a conspiracy! First you refused to let me bring my deadly Blaser, and then you take me hunting with a Dutchman with a French name who cannot do his job properly. I want my warhog"

Walter did get his warthog eventually - on teh last day of the hunt. He managed to miss two, and wound the last one. Which went into a hole, jus like the first one, and one Pierre passed by, he charged him!

Pierre shot it between the eyes.

Walter and Ray got on so well we christened them the "Sunshine Boys".

Ray said he has NEVER, EVER been on a safari as this one, and was not sure yet whether he wants to endure another one like it.

We had lions visit our camp, and eat our bait, but did not see any large male to shoot.

We shot most of the plains game, like zebra, congoni - which Walter managed to re-name cojones!, Impala, puku, reedbuck, crocodile, hyena, hippo and 12 buffaloes between us.

Welcome back Saeed, Ray and Walter!

Twelve buffalos!!! Wow, is that great or what!

Welcome home guys! I, as all of us, look forward to more stories and photos.

Welcome back! It sounds like you folks had a great time. Maybe Mike B. told all the adult lions to go for a vacation, huh?

Get some sleep and we'll hear from you tomorrow.

welcome back, Saeed...

I feel sorry for your PH!

Now....about the new video

Glad you had a good time.

Welcome back guys...

We missed you.

Welcome back, Saeed. How could you put up with BOTH Walter AND Ray? One would be enough to drive most people crazy!

George

Wonderfull! Looking forward to pictures gentleman.
You too Ray.

Welcome back, Saeed! We are looking forward to hearing all the stories - and I'm sure there are a few.

Cindy

Ho Ho Ho! Walter and Ray the "Sunshine Boys?" That is an "Odd Couple" if I ever heard of one! More like Abbott and Costello wasn't it?

Great to think of 12 buffalo, and what about any practical jokes that may have been suffered at the hands of whom? Perpetrated upon whom?

Welcome back, I can't wait to see some pictures of the buffalo!!

Mike

Sounds like a great time. Ray is old enough to make his own choices. I'm sure hunting with Walter is a once in a life time experience.

s

Welcome back - yes, we can't wait to see pictures and videos of your adventures.

Congratulations on your trophies!

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I am in the process of selecting a few photos to post here, in the meantime, I will tell you about a little excitement we had shooting a buffalo.

Most of the area we hunted is covered in high grass, which apparently the buffalos love to hide in.

We were driving along in the afternoon, when Pierre van Tonder, our PH, thought he saw something dark moving in the grass a few hundred yards away. He looked through his glasses, and so did Sekasa, our Game Scout. Both announced BUFFALO!

Walter and Horst were left to guard the truck, while Pierre, Alan, Sekasa, Abdu and myself went after the buffalo.

As we got closer to where we had seen the buffalo, we saw a herd of elephants, but no buffalo. We did not loose hope, as all we could see was the elephants backs, and thought the buffalo might be right there with them.

Pierre climbed a tree to get a better look, but could find no buffalo.

Both he and Sekasa insisted they had seen at least two buffalos.

The elephants drank their fill and left. A very large warthog was surprised to see us, just as we were surprised to see him. We frooze! Not wishing to scare him into running, which might scare the buffalo. The warthog got rather curious, and started walking closer to us.

Pierre was whispering "where is Walter when you need him?"

We walked up to one of the many anthills to get a better look. Still no sign of the buffalo. We continued walking towards the water hole, and managed to get to an anthill that over looked it.

Still no sign of the buffalos.

Suddenly, we heard them running, and soon after we could see some cows and calves running from BEHIND AND TO OUR RIGHT! We must have passed very close to them in the grass, and never realized they were there.

Pierre told me to get ready, and whack any decent bull that shows himself, as we needed lion bait. A few more cows came through, and a bull followed. He stopped to look back, at around 200 yards. I put a 300 grain Walterhog bullet into his chest. He turned and ran off for a few yards and stopped to look back at us. I put another bullet into his chest from the front.

He took off again and disappeared from our sight.

We went to look for him, and found quite a bit of blood. We followed the blood trail into the grass, then it showed where the bull came out into a clear area, then decided to go back into the grass.

Rifles ready, we took a step at a time listening for any movement - as there is no way we could see him at more than a barrels length from us.

Pierre was to my right, and suddenly he turned and pointed his rifle right in front of my feet. I jumped backwards and landed on my backside! It was a false alarm. Later Pierre said he thought he heard some noise coming from that direction.

We continued our search, and a few yards further, we saw a black patch. We did not want to shoot, as at that distance one gets only one shot, and we wanted to make sure we hit him in the head. Pierre moved some of the grass with his rifle barrel, while I had the bull covered. I could see that he was lying on his right side, with his head towards us. I fired one shot into his chest, as I wanted to see how our bullets perform at very close range.

We recovered two bullets from this bull. The second shot into his chest while facing us weighed 289.4 grains, which is 96% weight retention, while the last one at close range weighed 236.1 grains, which is 78% of its original weight.

We recovered a total of 15 bullets altogether. I will post photos and details later on.

[ 09-12-2003, 19:49: Message edited by: Saeed ]

Saeed,

Another amazing hunt! When will we see a video..?

Congrats!
Dave

Saeed,

It's good to have you back. Too bad about the lion, but it sounds as though you had a good hunt anyway. I look forward to the pics and more stories.

Jim

Saeed,

Good to have you back ... in good shape given the Buff story!

Glad you had a good hunt.

mike

[ 09-12-2003, 16:50: Message edited by: mstarling ]

Saeed,

Welcome back. Good to hear you had a great time and interesting as useal with Walter! Will be looking forward to hearing more about the hunt.

Good Hunting, "Z"

Welcome home Saeed! Sounds as if your hunt was a great experience. Wasn't a day I wasn't thinking about the hunt and I anxiously await the
video and hearing and seeing all the details.
Give Miss Hessa a hug!!!!!!!!!!!
Mary

And it gets even better! Pictures of recovered Walterhog bullets to follow! Should be quite interesting.

Cheers!

Welcome back.

Sounds like fun.

Playing with fire naming your bullets "Walterhog".

Welcome back. Can't wait for pics and more stories.

Welcome back, Saeed! Glad to hear your hunt was a wonderful success and lived up to all the anticipation. The stories so far are great...can't wait to hear more.

Cheers,
Canuck

Very welcome back!

Please don't post any pictures or stories, or I might not be able to resist booking a safari for myself any longer...


Regards,
Martin

[ 09-12-2003, 23:38: Message edited by: Marterius ]

Twelve Buffalos!....Ohh my,Ohh my,Ohh my !
Handsum Jed

Welcome back. Looking forward to the details..

Ladies and Gentlemen,

This is the buffalo mentioned above.



Horst, myself, Walter and our long suffering PH, Pierre.



We are in the process of trying to recover teh bullets.



Two bullets recovered from this bull. The first shot went through, the second, at around 250 yards into the chest from the front, is the one on the left.

The one on the right was shot into his chest as he was lying down, dead.

Saeed:
What did you folks do to Pierr'e? He looks 25 years older than when I left him a month ago? Ray looked pretty old before he left. I'll bet he has a beard down to his knees!

[ 09-13-2003, 15:46: Message edited by: JudgeG ]

Welcome back guys, can't wait to see the pictures and read the stories

DGK

Saeed,
Welcome back and glad to hear you had a good hunt. YOur package will be on it's way on the 15th and should be there this week.

JudgeG,

Pierre is going through a major crisis right now, and Ray stayed behind to try to fix him up.

We all tried to make sure he understood Walter, and I think we were getting good results, until Walter asked him if he could come hunt with next year one on one!

Pierre freaked out.

Chic,

Thank you very much, I appreciate all your help. Walter cannot wait to get into action.

Excellent buffalo hunt and home-grown bullet performance!

Post traumatic stress disorder for Pierre, eh? Walter, eh? Must be more to tell. I will stay tuned.

Aloha