Originally posted by Michael Robinson:
CAMEROON 2023 HUNT REPORTWe just returned from a two week vacation/hunting trip, which we began with a two day stay in Paris and finished with a 12 day safari in northern Cameroon.
OUTFITTER: Club Faune, a/k/a Fauna Safari Club.
HUNTING DATES: February 18 through March 1, 2023 – 12 days, shortened to 11 because of a delayed domestic flight from Douala to Garoua on Camair-Co.
BOOKING AGENT: None. I bought an abbreviated version of this hunt at auction at the 2022 SCI convention, then upgraded it with the outfitter at the convention.
TRAVEL AGENT: TWG – Steve Turner. Thanks, again, Steve, for your excellent service!
GAME TAKEN: Lord Derby Eland, West African Savanna Buffalo, Western Roan, Korrigum, Sing Sing Waterbuck, Western Hartebeest, Bohor Reedbuck, Central Kob and Western Bush Duiker.
GAME SOUGHT BUT NOT TAKEN: Harnessed Bushbuck.
AIRLINES: Air France and Camair-Co.
Air France performed without a hitch at every step of the trip, from Boston to Paris to Douala and back. We flew business class. Service was superb and the food and wines were excellent.
We had no problems with any of our luggage, including my rifle and ammunition. TWS played a big part in that, by making sure that Air France’s and the Cameroonian government’s requirements were met at every step along the way.
Camair-Co, the domestic Cameroonian airline that flew us from Douala to Garoua and back, was not so good. Camair-Co is known (both actually and satirically) as
“L’étoile du Cameroun” – the star of Cameroon. It is a star in the same way that Rosie O’Donnell is a star.
The Camair-Co business class seats were comfortable, but both our inbound and outbound flights were delayed by nearly
four hours. Each time without explanation. We hoped that they weren’t waiting for the pilots to sober up.
At least we got to drink some fine, original American Cola in the airport lounges.
As a result of the delay on the front end of our trip, we missed a full day of hunting. Happily, as things turned out, that did not cause any problems.
On the back end of our trip, our Air France flight out of Douala to Paris left at a quarter to midnight, so not even a four hour delay in our arrival at Douala from Garoua kept us from making our connection.
RIFLE: On this safari I took my veteran Blaser R93 Synthetic in .375 H&H Mag. with a Schmidt & Bender 2.5-10x56 mm Zenith variable power scope mounted on top in a Blaser saddle mount.
Disassembled and placed in its Negrini take-down case with fitted cover, it is not recognizable as a rifle and is as handy and easy to carry around as one could wish.
I am happy to say that I had no problems bringing my rifle and 50 rounds of ammunition into and out of Paris or Cameroon.
There is no special or complicated process in France, as long as one’s paperwork is in order. See below for more on this.
On the other hand, the process in Cameroon is expensive and tedious. The importation permit must be obtained in advance, along with a Cameroonian visa, by an agent one must hire to travel from Paris to and from the Cameroonian embassy in Brussels, Belgium. With those documents in hand, one must submit to multiple inspections of his rifle and ammunition in both Douala and Garoua. These are time-consuming, but not at all difficult to accomplish, at least in my experience.
Our outfitter had good people at the airports who knew the government officials (customs and police) and the local procedures. Based on my experience, I am very happy that I brought my own rifle and ammunition.
PARISOn the way in, we scheduled a two day layover in the City of Lights, one of our favorite cities in the world. We simply picked up our luggage, including my rifle and ammunition, from the Air France baggage carousel at CDG and went straight to our hotel.
Vive la France!We took a self-directed walking tour of the city on both of our days there. It was a bit gray, but the sun did poke through from time to time.
We enjoyed an entire afternoon at the Musée d’Orsay, saw many of the familiar and famous sights, and enjoyed some of the best dining to be had on earth. I think we walked about 15 miles in two days. Good practice for buffalo.
View from the ancient Egyptian obelisk at the Place de la Concorde toward the Eiffel Tower:
View from the same place toward the Arc de Triomphe:
The Musée d’Orsay seen through the mist on the left bank of the Seine:
Notre Dame de Paris, still under reconstruction after the terrible fire there in 2019:
The neighboring monumental bronze sculpture of Charlemagne and his Paladins, which I have always admired:
We had a great time in Paris. I highly recommend a stopover there before hunting in Cameroon to anyone who has the time.
ON THE ROAD TO CAMP: The Club Faune hunting camp is located 170 miles from Garoua, which makes for a bumpy seven hour drive over roads ranging from decent to very poor. Owing to government restrictions, no charter flights are possible.
The sights and sounds on the roads of Cameroon are colorful and interesting.
A local village restaurant:
Sitting and waiting (which seems to be the national pastime):
A typical roadside rural residential area:
A family in town in their finest attire:
Traffic on the roads was dominated by tiny motos and huge trucks. I suggested to our driver that we pass this one on the left:
PROFESSIONAL HUNTER: Yann Le Bouvier was our PH. Yann is also the manager of the entire Club Faune hunting area. He is responsible for everything, including devising and implementing the outfitter’s very active and effective year-round anti-poaching efforts.
Yann maintains several anti-poaching teams in the field at all times, and continued to do so even during and throughout the COVID pandemic. He was personally present in the hunting area for much of that time.
We rendezvoused with two of his teams during our safari as we traveled through the bush. Their effectiveness is proven by the abundance and undisturbed nature of the game in this area.
I learned a lot from Yann on this trip, about the hunting area, the local game, how to hunt them and hunting in general.
SIGHTING-INI had zeroed my Blaser at home so that my bullets would strike point of aim at 150 yards. Of course, at home this time of year the temperature ranges from well below zero to 30-40 degrees Fahrenheit.
We had internet connectivity and decent Wi-Fi in camp, although the bandwidth was low. We could therefore manage to get the weather reports from the nearby town of Tcholliré on our phones. It was hot. During our stay, the daily temperatures ranged from 98 to 111 degrees F.
So, I was delighted that my Blaser, after I had taken its component parts out of its case, assembled it and mounted my scope on top, had retained its zero, with no need for any adjustments.
HUNTING AREA: Club Faune’s hunting area is known as NiwaSafari Camp, and consists of approximately one half million acres of land in the North Region of Cameroon, adjacent to Bouba Ndjida National Park.
In the local Fufulde language, the word “Niwa” means elephant. In the past, many elephant inhabited this area, and they were hunted here. But sadly, because of commercial poaching in the ‘90s and early 2000s (before Club Faune’s tenure), those days are gone. The location of the NiwaSafari area is shown in red on the map below:
This hunting area simply abounds with game. On this safari, we saw many, many animals of nearly every local huntable species, including many old bulls.
Roan in the bush:
Red-throated bee eater:
Big bull eland, sauntering away in the forest:
Hartebeest, bolting across the two-track ahead of us:
More hartebeest:
Curious broken-horned Sing Sing waterbuck bull:
Bold giraffe (not huntable):
Baboon:
Marabou:
Another fine bull eland in the bush:
We were met in camp by Yann, our PH.
We would learn that Yann is an excellent hunter. He is intense and passionate about his work. That is especially true of his robust anti-poaching work, which is so necessary. Plus, Yann also has a great sense of humor.
Yann, pausing before delivering a serious remark or a punch line (one can never be sure with Yann):
At one point, my wife, Lindy, decided to take over the PH duties. It was sort of a mutiny. Those of you who know her will understand.
She and Yann always kept things light, not to say hilarious. I think I laughed more on this safari than just about any I have ever had.
We had a lot of fun.
But when the time came for serious hunting, Yann proved himself to be one of the very best PHs with whom I have ever had the pleasure to
faire la chasse.
HUNTING CAMP: Club Faune runs a first rate camp.
Our chalets were fairly rudimentary but comfortable, and included an
en suite toilet in its own room and a sink and shower in another. The shower did not have hot water. For that, we had to leave the chalet and use one of two communal hot showers located outside and behind it.
As often as not, I just used the shower in the chalet. It was so hot outside that the “cold” water never got much colder than lukewarm.
We would run the air conditioning (yes, we had A/C, a first for me in an African hunting camp) to cool down the chalet between the time the camp generator came on, at around 6 PM, until it was shut down, at around 9 or 10 PM. This kept us cool all night.
Here are some photos of the camp.
Breakfast laid out in the dining area:
Communal sitting area and bar, where we would get together in the evenings:
We were pleased and fortunate to make the acquaintance of another PH in camp, who was guiding another American hunter and his wife.
Jean Bernon is an excellent hunter, and a bartender
par excellence besides.
It was a pleasure for us to share camp with and get to know Jean and the other couple.
HUNTING:When Yann and I discussed my goals and preferences, I told him my priorities were, in this order, Lord Derby eland, western roan and western savanna buffalo. The rest of the game we might find would be gravy, in my view.
I also told Yann, as I always do with my PH anywhere these days, that I valued old bulls and rams more than younger but bigger ones.
To me, size is a plus, but old is essential.
Yann told me that he agreed and would do his best. His best was simply incredible.
TYPICAL HUNTING DAY:But first, a few words about a typical day in the field. We would leave camp after a spartan breakfast at around 6 or 7 AM, depending on how far we planned to travel. We would hunt for several hours, and invariably return to camp for lunch, usually by around 1 PM.
Then, we would have a siesta, which for us meant a shower and a nap, if possible, or if not, just relaxation with a book or while checking emails, etc., on the phone.
This down time is necessary, as the afternoon is the hottest part of the day. As I have said, the temperature was generally well over 100 degrees F. Not a good time to hunt. At 4:30 or so, we would head out again in the truck, and hunt until dusk. Then we would head back to camp for sundowners, dinner, some conversation and bed.
Besides being bloody well hot, this area of Cameroon is dry and dusty. Yann explained that the Harmattan winds blow fine dust and sand down from the southern Sahara into the Gulf of Guinea, and along the way and in between it covers and permeates everything in very short order.
It was necessary to keep my scope lenses covered at all times, other than when shooting; otherwise, a thick film of dust would build up on them. It was also necessary to clean the dust off of my rifle every time we returned to camp from the field.
Two showers a day were a necessity for us. I found that a wet but wrung out bandanna folded and tied around my neck was a welcome comfort in the heat and dust.
Yet the game animals here are in their element. They are thriving. They were everywhere we went in great numbers.
In the first six days of this safari, I ran the table on everything I was after and more. I killed nine fine old bulls and rams in six days.
I’ll discuss the hunting in the order we found and killed each of these animals.
DAY ONE – CENTRAL KOB AND WESTERN BUSH DUIKERWe spotted a small herd of kob on the morning of our first day. Kob are everywhere in this area. They were by far the most numerous of all of the game animals we sought. They are also amazingly calm, not to say generally oblivious to any external stimuli.
When we saw these kob, we simply jumped out of the truck and moved off a short distance. From there, we glassed the herd. Then Yann set up the sticks, I leveled my rifle and killed the biggest ram in the group with a bullet through the heart.
The distance was about 75 yards. The kob was a representative old boy, and I was happy to draw first blood.
As we were admiring the kob (and congratulating ourselves), Yann saw movement on the other side of the road. This happened less than five minutes after I had shot the kob.
Yann grabbed the sticks, ran toward what he had seen, and set them up. He had moved maybe five yards. I followed.
He whispered that he saw a bush duiker. I raised my bino and saw it instantly. Just standing there in the grass. Up on the sticks once again and once again bang and dead. Two animals in five minutes on the first day.
I had killed duikers for the pot before, but this was my first one for the wall. They are strange-looking little animals, but good to eat. I was told that this is a good one.
DAY TWO – BOHOR REEDBUCKThe next day, we spent the morning tracking two old dugga boys over hills and across and along mostly dry rivers but to no avail. We got close, as we could tell by the freshness of their tracks and their wet dung, but we never saw them.
Then, in the late afternoon, we spotted a reedbuck all by himself about 50 or 60 yards from the side of the road. We quickly found a spot with a clear line of sight to him, where Yann set up the sticks, and one shot through the heart later, I had my reedbuck.
He was also a representative old male of the species.
DAY THREE – TRIFECTA – WESTERN ROAN, SING SING WATERBUCK AND KORRIGUMWe planned to find some buffalo tracks and chase buffalo this morning. But it was not to be.
As we were driving along a two-track early in the morning, Yann and our trackers saw a lone bull roan deep in the bush on my side of the truck. I picked him up using my bino just as Yann said, “Let’s go!” We stalked him for about 20-25 yards when a shot opened up.
I got on the sticks in a hurry. A second or two later, I fired, and we suddenly had a heart-shot, dead western roan antelope on our hands. They are very large animals, and this old boy was a beauty. My Blaser and I were definitely in a groove.
Maybe a better picture of this old stud. The ridges were nearly worn off of his horn bases. The European method of photography really emphasizes the trophy. My first roan anywhere, ever.
If you are getting the impression that hunting in this area is not terribly strenuous, you are not mistaken.
Except for buffalo bulls, which, being buffalo bulls, must be tracked, we spotted every other species of game we were after rather easily from our seats in the truck. I think that this is because of the abundance of game and the way Yann & Co. have laid out the roads. They have been placed so as to take advantage of natural game trails, rivers and other water sources, and known game concentrations.
On the way back to camp with our roan, we came upon a beautiful bull Sing Sing waterbuck. He was placidly staring at us from a small rise on a river bank, about 50 yards away.
He moved, and so did we, right after him.
After we spotted the bull once again, we set up the shot. I lost him in my scope, and then found him again. As he quartered toward us, facing slightly to his right, all I could see were his neck, head and horns. But my God, what horns!
I shot him at the base of his neck. He dropped where he stood.
To say I am happy with this huge bull is an understatement.
I think Yann may have been even happier than I was! He told me it was the second biggest bull they had ever taken.
We took the morning’s bag back to camp and delivered both bulls to the skinning shed. After our lunch and siesta, we headed back out seeking whatever chance might offer us.
Shortly, we found an entire herd of korrigum, or giant topi. These animals can be hunted nowhere other than on the Club Faune concession, where they are numerous. Two of the korrigum bulls in the herd were fighting for dominance. They butted and banged their heads and horns together and churned up vast clouds of dust.
After another brief stalk, we managed to get within 150 yards of the pair. Yann judged that the one on the right was the better of the two, and a good, old bull. He presented an easy broadside target. He and his opponent were so occupied by fighting each other that they did not even notice us.
So, up went the sticks, and one shot later, down went the bull. The korrigum has a reddish-brown coat, and his head and sides are covered and streaked with bold, black markings. This old bull was quite beautiful, in my estimation.
DAY FOUR – LORD DERBY ELANDOn the morning of the fourth day, we again hunted for buffalo tracks, found them, and tracked two dugga boys for many miles over hill and dale.
Tracking was necessary on this safari only when we were chasing buffalo. Unlike spotting and stalking, tracking in the heat of the day is hard work, and we certainly did our share, including on this day for the entire morning.
We caught up with our bulls at about 11 AM. I saw only one of them. He was a big reddish-brown bull, but too young and soft between the horns to shoot.
Yann caught a quick glimpse of his partner, a much better, mature black bull, but I did not. We had to break off the stalk as the heat of the day was beating us to death.
In the afternoon, as we were driving the road looking for buffalo tracks, Yann and the trackers spotted a herd of ten or twelve eland a few hundred yards to our right, moving parallel with us and in the same direction.
We had seen eland from time to time before this, but we had never been able to close the deal.
But this time, Yann said he knew where these eland were heading. We glassed them, and saw three big bulls at the back. Yann floored the truck, and we sped down the road for perhaps a quarter of a mile, where Yann stopped.
Out we jumped. We ran a couple of hundred yards over rather open ground to our right, and found a large tree, which we stood behind. I put my rifle in the sticks and we waited.
Sure enough, in about five or ten minutes, along came the line of eland. I could see that they would pass us in single file at a distance of about 100 yards. First came the cows. They were alert and acting as sentinels. But we did not move and they did not see us.
Then came the bulls. The first was an ancient, black-faced and black-necked old bull, with a huge, flowing dewlap. The two behind him had longer horns, and were themselves great bulls, but I knew instantly that I wanted the old one.
I told Yann that the first bull was the one and took my time with the shot. The bullet struck the bull and he ran a short distance, stumbled and fell.
Our tracker, Abel, shouted,
“Il est tombé!” He fell down! My bullet had pierced his heart, and the old bull was dead.
This bull was not particularly large in body size or horn length. He was an old, worn down warrior. Yann estimated his age at between 13-15 years.
He might have had a half dozen teeth left, all on one side of his head. His front teeth were broken and loose. No doubt from fighting for dominance.
Yann reckoned that if I had not shot him, this old boy would have died of natural causes during the next winter.
Later, when the skinners had caped him, we saw that so many years of browsing and chewing with only one side of his jaw had deformed his very skull.
Fittingly, we found gardenias, the eland’s favorite food, strewn across the ground near where he lay.
DAY FIVE – WESTERN SAVANNA BUFFALOWith a beautiful eland in the salt, we decided that all we really wanted now was a buffalo. Despite many hours of tracking, they had eluded us so far. Today, our fortunes would change.
We left camp at 6 AM, just before dawn, and drove for an hour and a half to the far reaches of the concession. Yann knew of a river bed where buff liked to hang out. Not a sure thing; nothing is, but we had nothing to lose by checking it out.
Long story short, on this morning, a small group of western savanna buffalo bulls literally bumped into us, and nearly ran us down!
We were checking the road for tracks, when seven bull buffalo appeared on our right, walking quickly straight toward us. We saw them and they saw us at exactly the same time. Six red bulls led the way, and one black bull followed.
They stopped at less than 20 feet away and stared at us. I felt like the guy who wasn’t careful enough and ended up getting what he wished for. They were right in our laps!
Yann said, “Mike, the black one!” No time or need for sticks. The black one was standing as if frozen, quartering acutely toward us, exposing only the base of his neck as a target. In an instant, I raised my rifle and shot him just there.
He shuddered and flinched, and then he and his band of red brothers turned to their right and bolted away. Yann shouted, “Shoot him again!”
I fired a shot at him as he was running away and hit him in the spine. He lost his back legs when the bullet hit him, but he kept moving. I shot him again through the ribs.
Finally, we moved quicky to our left, caught up with him, and I dropped him for good with a bullet in the shoulder.
He was down for the count now, and would not rise again, but neither did he want to die. Our violent rendezvous had so adrenalized him that he twitched and kicked on the ground for minutes, despite having suffered multiple fatal gunshot wounds.
After reloading, we walked up on him from behind, with a handy small tree between us, whence I put a finishing shot into his chest, between his front legs. Only then did he bellow his long, mournful death knell and finally die.
We got all of the crew together for another photo. This photo was taken right after Yann told my wife to put some water on me to show sweat from “tracking a lot”:
These bulls are not as big as Cape buffalo, but they are just as ornery and tenacious.
Here is a photo of the bullets recovered from my buffalo:
Hirtenberger 272 grain ABC bullets are the best .375 caliber expanding bullets I have ever used. The gnarly one with missing petals was removed from the bull’s spine. The one on the left is the first bullet I fired, and was recovered deep in the buffalo’s paunch, after having penetrated nearly his full length, stem to stern.
DAY SIX AND THEREAFTER – PLAYING AROUND WITH WESTERN HARTEBEEST AND HARNESSED BUSHBUCKOn our sixth day of hunting, Yann spotted a good hartebeest bull just standing and looking at us about 75 yards from the side of the road. I jumped from the truck and crouch-walked to the nearest tree, so I could use it as a rest. The hartebeest continued to look toward me, but never moved.
My shot angle was blocked by brush, so I moved to my right, to another tree. I was sure the bull would bolt away, but he did not.
With a solid rest against the tree, I dropped him. My shot was a bit high, but luckily struck his spine. One finisher was needed, which did the trick.
For the rest of our trip, we saw the sights. We hunted bushbuck, but I was only half-hearted about it. In six days, five days really, I had filled my card.
Most importantly, Lindy and I had a blast in what is truly a hunter’s paradise. As usual, she participated in all of the hunting, but only with her camera. She is the one to thank for many if not most of the photos in this report.
Was it hot? Sure. Dry?
Bien sûr. Dusty? Of course. But this wild area has a vast population of exotic and unique game animals and was utterly new and enormously interesting to us. And as I say, we had loads of fun on this trip, which is, after all, what this is all about, at least for us.
Needless to say, I can highly recommend Club Faune and the NiwaSafari area in northern Cameroon for a classic, West African safari. Club Faune manages this fantastic area in a responsible, sustainable way, with low quotas, and with game conservation as the chief goal.
Club Faune’s anti-poaching program is second to none, and is one of the key factors in their success. I have no doubt that the very survival of these wonderful and iconic West and Central African species depends entirely on hunting and the revenue that hunters provide.
We are still in the planning stages for what we will do for our next African trip, but one thing is certain: Our experience in the northern savanna of Cameroon will be hard, if not impossible, to top.
