I have a new top five book. I have studied and pondered this book for the past year. The price at $125 per copy for a standard issue (not limited issue) was a stretch for me as I am used to paying a lot less for a book.

My mind has changed. This book is easily worth the price plus a nice bonus for the thought provoking words of Mr. Denker. I read a lot. I read for content, for fun and for speed. However, this is a book I devoured, digested and ruminated on. About half of the book is about hunting and various interesting stories of stalking and organizing various hunts for himself and for clients. THe other half is a series of discussions about why we hunt, why he hunts and the joy he finds in it.

Mr. Denker is a purist and a seemingly non-negotiable, non-compromising purist. He hunts simply - no range finders, open sights, very sparse camps. He believes that the manner in which you pursue the game (especially elephant) reflects your respect for the animal as well as for yourself as a hunter. He is not into "body count". He describes several self directed hunts in the Cameroon for bongo. He has yet to succeed because he feels he must "hunt" the animal on its terms and not along roads or with dogs. He went on a 21 day full bag hunt to Tanzania and come home with a bushbuck, a lesser kudu and a buffalo. His goal was to hunt, on foot and by tracking in very tough terrain. His PH gave him a lot of grief over it but he stuck to his principles and was pleased with his hunt.

I have been aware of Kai-Uwe for sometime as I have tried to justify elephant hunting in my own mind. I have no interest in a "drive by" hunt and want to expend the effort to "earn" the trophy. His methods are severe and demand the extreme from his clients - but in the end, if you are successful in killing an elephant - it will be "earned".

I highly recommend this book. I rate it a 10 out of 10 and above nearly all that I have read. For adventure and taste of yester-year - read Selous or Bell or Sutherland or Boyes. For hunting stories- read Ruark, Boddington, Nychens, Everett, Harland, Marsh or Manners.

For food for the soul - read this book.....

He will be at booth #5000 in Reno.

If you come up with the coin to hunt with Kai-Uwe, just remember that he selects the animal for you to take and there is no discussion about it. I can certainly respect his position but he would not be able to sustain that type of philosophy if he didn't have what is probably the best ele concession in all of Africa (including Botswana).

Because of the above, he will always be more popular with the Euro clients than the Americans. I would love to meet him but I'm not sure I could hunt with him. I could keep up with him but in the end, I want the final decision to be mine. That's the priviledge of the one who is paying the bill (just as you disagreed with your TZ PH). Sorry Kai-Uwe, but in that we disagree. I still love your book though and highly respect your experience.

From African Indaba

Kai-Uwe Denker’s “Along the Hunter’s Pathâ€
Reviewed by Gerhard R Damm

When I received Kai-Uwe Denker’s book, I thought first “oh well, another professional hunter who writes down his daring exploitsâ€, but after I had listened to his speech at the Rowland Ward inauguration (see pages 2-4), I realized that this man lives hunting, that he is deeply concerned about the direction some so-called hunting activities are taking, and most of all that he recognized that the time has come to stand up and be counted. A couple of weeks later, during the year-end holidays, I had time to delve into the book and it kept me spell bound from the first to the last page.

“Along the Hunter’s Path†is not an easy book to read, especially for somebody like me, who is probably just as passionate about hunting as Denker. You need to pause, reflect; you remember your own actions, your own hunting experiences. Denker forces you from the start to self-evaluate, but he also achieves to reinforce your dedication to nature conservation, to the intrinsic beauty of stark landscapes, to the thrill and adrenalin-pumping moments of the chase and the soul-searching moments after the quarry is down.

Denker is well known as uncompromising, dedicated hunter – and one of a select group who do not bent the rules, who do not or rarely fail their self-set high standards. He is not shy to be confrontational; he does not seek the convenience of political correctness to suit the Zeitgeist. Denker does not want, he does not need, to please.

Page after fascinating page he gives such an honest record of the lone and far places in his starkly beautiful Namibia that few readers will be able to withstand a yearning to hunt and explore this country. Denker writes with a passion, with simple honesty, weaving hunting stories and the history of the places and the people along his hunter’s path into an intricate pattern of mounting tension few of his writing peers can match.

He does that most brilliantly and in a deeply personal way in the chapter about Bernhard Tsao, an intriguing tale from the “West of Khaudumâ€, Denker’s hunting grounds in the late nineties. His interactions with the people of Samagai-Gai, the bushman trackers and with the feared Bernhard Tsao – all this whilst guiding his first overseas elephant hunter in the Khaudum concession – play out towards an almost classical tragic ending.

There are pages in Denker’s book, where I feel uncomfortable, where his passions are running out of control, but at least he is honest about it, he doesn’t offer excuses. The mad running after game, forgetting the world (and his client) in the adrenalin rush of the chase don’t appeal to me, although I do not argue an occasional necessity. With his rigid stance about hunting equipment, however, I draw the line between personal preferences and choices. I have no problem with Denker or anybody using iron sights, but a hunter using a telescopic sight or a range finder is not necessarily a bad hunter. It’s how we use our modern equipment, not that we use it. Otherwise we would be still chasing game with hand held pieces of flint. Since the Palaeolithic, hunting weapons and techniques have evolved and continue to evolve. How we use them is a different story.

Denker softens his stance in the concluding chapters when he talks about trophy hunting and the obvious and subtle nuances which differentiate a trophy hunter from a subsistence hunter, although he contradicts himself on occasion in the characterization of the “noble savageâ€. Nevertheless, I can and will subscribe to Denker’s admiration for an outstanding trophy animal, his yearning to make this trophy his own and to his justification of trophy hunting.

Last not least, the many photos in this book don’t only make good illustrations, they help the reader to understand Denker’s way of thinking – and the photos are excellent!

This is a book was written by a real hunter for real hunters. It was also written for those who are still searching for answers. It will not offer easy access to these answers, but it will hopefully offer some intellectual challenges, make readers contemplate why we are hunting and help them exploring the ethical and moral aspects of hunting.

Isn’t it all about what Jose Ortega y Gasset said more than half a century ago: We don’t hunt to kill, but we kill to have hunted!

What others had to say about Kai-Uwe Denker’s book:

"This is not a coffee-table book; it is a book to be read and savored and passed down to those you want to inflame with a passion for hunting. I recommend this book like no other I have read in some time." - Don Causey, Hunting Report

"It is a big book interspersed with the largest collection of top-quality, page-size color photographs that I have seen in any book. …. The majority are of life animals, San Bushman, or scenes of the countryside in which he hunted – a lot of them scenically breathtaking." - Brian Marsh, Man Magnum

"Probably one of the most significant Africa books of the last decades. Along the Hunter’s Path is in my view the book on African hunting par excellence, the creed of a thoroughly passionate professional hunter." - Anno Hecker

"Along the Hunter’s Path is like a breath of fresh air. This publication with its compelling text and magnificent photographs comes highly recommended." - African Outfitter

Along the Hunter’s Path by Kai-Uwe Denker

The thoughts and experiences of a thoroughly passionate professional hunter as he hunts in Namibia, Mozambique, Cameroon and Tanzania. The original version of this book was published in German under the title “Entlang des Jäger’s Pfadâ€


Seloushunter

I agree with Mr. Damm 1000%