The decision has been made, and is now "Cast in stone": Some buddies and I are going to hunt buffalo in the Zambezi Vally in 2006.

We plan to go to the auction in Harare and bid on some of the hunts. The main objective will be to get at least three buffalo on license, all other trophies will be regarded as incidental. Once we have the camp and additional buffalo we want to then do the rest in a "self catering and self reliant" manner. We have sufficient camping equipment and 4x4 vehicles as well as experience of doing such things in Botswana. Now we need some, actually a lot of, help from those who have been there and done it.

Our main questions revolve about a few factors that is just difficult to go and get first hand information on. These include questions such as:

1. Which is better: Early in season or late? Why?
2. Which camps have best supply of buffalo?
3. I have a whole number of other questions, but these two are probably the more important ones to get some info on. Does anyone have GPS coordinates of the camps?

I'm sure that a discussion on "How to Plan your own Zambezi Valley Hunt" will be of tremendous benifit, not only to our little group, but to the AR members in general. So, PLEASE help and make your suggestions.

Thanks a lot.

Andrew McLaren + Rabie Bekker + Dave Mansfield

Chap

Unless you know the inside track on the chaos that is now the auction since they took it away from Ian Ferreira and gave it to a retired politico... you could get burned hard on the exchange rate.

Email Don Heath at the African Hunter magazine (fishunt@zol.co.zw) or look up Ferreira's Auctioneers and get hold of Ian

Don't bother bidding on Sapi- Chifuti plan to buy the whole quota again and have proved they can out bid anybody else.

That leaves Nyakasanga. Nice area, good buff.

August camps are expensive as all the locals want those to take the family on holoiday/fishing whilst they do some hunting.

Totally agree with Ganyana.
It was difficult enough when Ferreira's were running things. Especially if you had an agent bidding and forex had to be available immediately.
If you were unsuccessful in bidding then getting funds back was often costly and took time.
The fact that an operator bid on all the Sapi camps and have set up a permanent camp there goes against all the principles of the original idea of the auction camps as far as I see it.
Sapi was great for fishing as well.
I have hunted Sapi twice on successful bids, the first in 1984. In between I had several trips to Chewore.
The last time in Sapi was 1999 and I felt that at that time trophy quality had dropped substantially as well as there being much fewer buffalo around. We hunted very hard with a lot of ks driven looking for tracks and an average 18k per day walking for 10 days.It was my worst result ever as on the last afternoon I took a reasonably long shot on a bull through the bush.
We tracked them most of the afternoon until the herd split and we lost his tracks amongst the confusion.The only buff I have evr wounded.
I spent most of the time educating the game scout as where the water holes were from a topo map and GPS.
I also remember that you needed to up before first light looking for tracks as there were 2 other camps operating at the same time - all of us having a hard time locating buff due to their low numbers.
I had a mate who was a farmer and excellent hunter who cohunted and provided infrastructure.
It was really great to actually hunt yourself but there is also much to be said for local knowledge and experience. It probably took us a week to get a "feel" for the area and the game movements.
Finally - if you are successful you will have to probably carry ALL you fuel in from SA.Or go early enough to head north to Zambia and fuel up there and return through Chirundu?
I have just had report from some old friends who went back recently and they had to keep crossing into Zambia for fuel and just made it back south by borrowing a jerry can from a safari operator to get to Beitbridge.
The one advantage you do have is you can attend the auction personally if you decide to proceed.
Another crucial point is that with 3 hunters you will need to be a succesful bidder on 2 camps with the same dates in the same area. Either that or 2 camps one after the other and swap cohunters about.
Unless things have changed there are only 2 hunters allowed on each camp. There is usaully 1 buff bull per camp also so an extra would have to bid upon as well.
The bottom line for me was that it ended up less hassles and similar expense to go with a good operator who I had a great relationship with.
Good Luck

Andrew,

I have never bought a hunt on the auction, but I have hunted the Zambezi Valley. If you have been there you will see that there is a hell of a lot of logistics involved in the remote areas.

If it is for yourself - do it, but if you intend of doing it to sell the game off again, contact me and I will give you a couple of reliable outfitters there.

It is some experience to do the Zambezi Valley. Good luck.

With the present socio political environement going on in Zim's I would think you are a braver man than most of us to even contemplate that scenario, or are you (just wanting) a DIY adventure with the thrills it might produce.

I take it you are willing to gamble with your money and if it falls through you will not be perturbed at all and just laugh it of as an experience .

Wishing you very good luck in the endevour

Cheers, Peter