Hunters: The Sultan Family



Area: Mokore and Umkondo Block, Save Valley Conservancy.
Dates: 17th to 30th July 2015
Outfitter: Mokore Safaris (Booked Directly)
PHs: Lou Hallamore for Elephant (My Father’s Hunt) and Douglas Duckworth for Leopard.
Rifles: 470 N.E., 375 H&H, 300 Win Mag, .222 and .22 Hornet.
Animals Hunted: Elephant, Leopard, Kudu, Zebra, Giraffe, Hyena, Klipspringer and Baits.
Animal Hunted but not collected: Leopard and Klipspringer.
Animal Seen: All of the big five and just about everything thing else the Save valley has to offer, the area is loaded with game.


Objective of hunt: The main idea of this hunt was to have some fun time for the whole family in African bush. We wanted to hunt an area where we could enjoy nature with some luxury in presence of all Big 5 within the area. We had 2 members of our family i.e. my wife and my younger son that were going on their first hunting safari.

Traveling: We took Emirates via Dubai and Lusaka to Harare, as usual, Emirates was a treat to fly with. We arrived at Harare in evening and cleared the immigration and rifles in a breeze. Mokore’s Manager Don was waiting for us outside and took us to their guest house in Harare, which is basically an annexe of Barry Duckworth’s house where Mokore also have their Harare office.








The next day we took the 5 hour drive to save valley conservancy, which was uneventful.





Mokore Camp: Beautifully set on the bank of Turgwe River Mokore is a very well appointed and managed camp. Overall if you combine ambiance, scenery, facilities, food and service it is perhaps the best safari camp that we have stayed in.









View from Camp











PHs:


Lou Hallamore, the name says all, he is one of the few living legend in hunting industry and he showed us why is this on our hunt, thoroughly enjoyed hunting with him.


Doug Duckworth, Doug is a hard working young PH who puts the extra effort to make sure his clients are in comfort.


The Hunt: Ours was a large party, we had 2 first timers and we had our limitations, we had missed chances, wounded lost animal and at times it was frustrating but we all never let the smile go off our faces and we all enjoyed our time. Doug was very patient and very professionally handled the novice hunters.




My father had to leave early (after five days) in the hunt due to an urgent business meeting but we continued.



We used Lou to work separately to find us the trophy Bull elephant and assist us with baits checking and management. My 2 sons took turns to shoot bait impalas, while the wife also put her share in baits by additionally shooting Zebra, Kudu and Giraffe.






















I was hunting Leopard, I already have shot 2 Leopards and on this hunt I only wanted shoot one of the XXL cat that Save Valley is famous for. However, the XXL cat showed us how he survived and got that big and outsmarted us. We had 11 baits up out of which 9 were hit and 6 were fed on by multiple cats. Did manage to see male Leopard from blind and it was a satisfying experience.








One of the two Machans that we spent nights in.






On one of the bait we had a secondary blind about 120 yards away from the walk-in blind, which was 40 yards bait tree. It was couple of very interesting nights that I spent here with my son, we had heard of Buffalo, Zebra and Elephant came very near to us. Then there were Lions in between our secondary and walk-in Blind that in addition to three different Leopards in the bait tree accounted for some great excitement.

The walk-in Blind.



The new hunters were having a blast shooting baits.



Can't think of a better hunting tutorial for the young man.


We saw group of Dagga Boys while driving couple of times, we put a stalk on them but we were unlucky not to shoot the bigger bull that was estimated to be around 40-42 inches but again it was fun experience for everyone.



I wanted to shoot a Hyena, so we made a plan to call them during night. Doug told me that I will have to be very quick in taking the shot as they will not stick after we put the light on them. We called, they came answering in, the kids thought it was very creepy. In the pitch dark we could see nothing, as soon as the light was switch on all I could see were three Hyenas running at full gallop, one of them was running across in a clear area so I picked the rifle up, acquired him in scope and fired hitting him on back part of body and breaking a leg. The Hyena sort of semi collapsed then gathered and started running again, I reloaded and was about to make a proper second running shot with lead but the Hyena went behind a thick bush, I fired in the bush anyway as I thought that any shot in this situation will be better than no shot. We took all the torches and headlamp out that were originally meant for the Leopard hunt and went in for the follow up. We saw blood, lots of blood we followed and followed the blood trail was there but called it off after 1 hour. The next morning we were on tracks again and the blood also continued, we followed for couple of hours leading us on top of hill and we saw where the Hyena stayed in a small cave with a pool of dried blood in it. We tracked the Hyena down the hill and 2 more hours going strong. After five hours we had to accept that we will not catch up and this has to a wounded lost trophy.

On the Last day Lou managed to find us a decent Ele bull, he called us in. We tracked it and I shot it from 20 yards frontal brain shot.





Conclusion
Mokore Safari provided us with exactly what we were looking for. Must appreciate the whole of Makore back and front team that paid attention to all the little details and were prepared to go the extra mile to make this a wonderful trip for all of us.



All in all it was great experience and provided the kids an opportunity to learn about Nature, challenges faced by wildlife and its management and how to patiently persevere for their goals, their efforts were amply rewarded. The area is loaded with wildlife both Dangerous as well as plainsgame.



My wife also enjoyed the experience a lot and to the question if she will go again on hunting safari replied that she will definitely go again but next time she wants to shoot the Leopard herself as she will show me how it is done and on next trip I can shoot the baits for her……

Lovely report and photos. You are a lucky man.

Outstanding report and photos, thanks. Wish we had had a cup of coffee at the Harare airport together.

Great report and looks like a great outing for the family! Congratulations.

Thank you for sharing your hunt with us. You're blessed to have a family who wishes to share your hunting with you!

Great to see the whole family in the field, great job!

Excellent report and pictures.

Mike

You are a blessed man. To experience having your Dad and wife and two young sons go with you, then to see your wife and younger son take in Africa for the first time, not just observe but get in a lot of shooting to boot. What a trip that was. Congratulation and thanks for sharing it with us.

Ahmed, this is great fun to have all the family on safari, excellent report and great pics.
Congratulation for collecting many more trophies, kids are so happy with their trophies, it would be a great memorable hunt for them too.
Regards
IH

Well done Ahmed!!!
Fantastic to share a DG safari with all the family.

Congratulations to the outfitters and all involved a well.

Cheers

Nick

Great

Very nice! Nothing like a safari with your family. Thanks for posting.

Excellent report, Ahmed. I hope to have my granddaughter with me when I return to Namibia in 2017. She'll be 13 then, and it will be the trip of a lifetime for her.

Well done. What a trip with your family.

GOOD daddy!!!

Always enjoy your reports Ahmed.

Great job!

Nice pics and report, and a lovely family.
Cal

Congratulations on your safari. Great pics and report.

I'm so happy to see you have passed the torch on to your wife and children. What fun you are yet to have!

Best regards, D. Nelson

Well done Sir . What a wonderful way to spend time with the family. Great report.

Thanks for the Report...Very Nice

Nothing better than having your family with you. Congrats great report!

Congratulations

Ahmed, what a wonderful report. The photos are super and the family affair is the best. Loved the smiles on those young African hunters.
The best to you and all the hunters'

Mike

Congratulations!

quote:

Reply

COngratulations. Sounds like a great trip!

Looked like a great family adventure Ahmed! Well done and thanks for taking time to post a report.

what a privilidge to have your kids with you! Congrats.

Ahmed thanks for the very nice report. It's a real pity about Mr Spots ,hopefully next time!
Thanks for choosing Mokore for your family first hunt together.

Ahmed,

Very nice family safari and there's not better outfit to do it with.

Congratulations!

Mark

Great report and pictures. Thanks for sharing.

Ahmed..great report ..thanks for posting.

Ahamed Bhai

Great hunt and great post. Congratulations to your family.

The kudu is an awesome trophy with perfect configuration of 2.5 curls and out pointing ivory tips.

Thanks everyone for the nice comments.

quote:

Originally posted by PSmith:
Outstanding report and photos, thanks. Wish we had had a cup of coffee at the Harare airport together.

Yes Paul, we all wanted that too after realizing that you guys were also returning from a hunting trip. Pity we couldn't locate you after immigration.

quote:

Originally posted by Neil Duckworth:
It's a real pity about Mr Spots ,hopefully next time!

As you said Neil, Leopard hunting is unpredictable but really impressed with the number of Leopards on bait, have not seen that many cats anywhere before. Doug certainly tried more than 100% but it was not meant to be and that is hunting. It certainly has given me something to look forward to

quote:

Originally posted by Nakihunter:

The kudu is an awesome trophy with perfect configuration of 2.5 curls and out pointing ivory tips.

Thanks Nakihunter, yes the area not only had great number of Kudus but there were good trophies there too. Saw at least 4 that would have made upto 55 inches.

Great Family Safari Ahmed

Better luck next time on a big SVC Tom (for your wife, of course!!! )

quote:

Originally posted by Ahmed Sultan:

quote:

Originally posted by Nakihunter:

The kudu is an awesome trophy with perfect configuration of 2.5 curls and out pointing ivory tips.

Thanks Nakihunter, yes the area not only had great number of Kudus but there were good trophies there too. Saw at least 4 that would have made upto 55 inches.

Ahmed..what was your impression on buffalo quantity & size?
Did you see any big herds?

quote:

Originally posted by Safari2:
Ahmed..what was your impression on buffalo quantity & size?
Did you see any big herds?

Although we had Buffalo on permit but we never went Buffalo hunting. We did see Dagga boy herds of 5 to 7 animals on 3 different occasion while driving. They were mostly hard bossed bulls with the biggest that we saw would have gone 41-42.

We saw signs of big herd on regular basis but they preferred the thick Mopani during the day time. Once when we were sleeping in our open secondary blind for Leopard a very large herd of buffalo came feeding all around us, we could hear buffaloes all around and our blind was open from two sides, very interesting time we had with double loaded and ready in hand.

We had another hunter in camp who hunted Buffalo for 2-3 days after getting his lion, he was successful with a very nice Dagga Boy on the last day of his hunt.

Just saw this report. Congrats my friend! Outstanding report and pics!