Burkina Faso
Feb 2-12 (7 scheduled hunt days)

Travel: Delta to Paris - Air France to Ouagadougou

Temps: mid 90’s as highs, and mid 60’s as lows.

Rifle/Scope: Winchester Model 70 Safari in .416 Rem – Nikon 2.5x10 Monarch 7 scope
Ammo: Handloaded 370 gr CEB Safari Raptors over 75.5 grains Varget powder

Clothing/Boots: Cabela’s Guidewear synthetic fishing shirts (worked great in hot
temps) – Cabela’s XPG synthetic shorts- Russell Thula Thula boots **HUK
“buff” type face and neck gaiter (helped a lot with the dust in the air)

Bino: Nikon EDG 10x42



This trip started out by me doing a lot of research and finding a place in B-F that had catered almost exclusively to Europeans, and only a couple of Americans had hunted there in the past. We would be in Singou and Ouamou Concessions in the southeast part of the country.


Our group consisted of Russell Marshall (bwanamrm), Jay Cohea (bwanajay), Skip Nantz (Skip Nantz), and Steven Thurman (thunder head); all posters here on AR and a great group of guys. Mike Jines (mjines) was scheduled to go with us, but had to postpone his trip by a few weeks, and he was definitely missed by all.



Everyone knew this was an “exploratory” hunt as I had not hunted with the operator before, but the price was indicative of an exploratory hunt and everyone had all of my research, etc.

Upon arrival, the air looked yellow, and I was to learn that the Harmattan Winds out of the Sahara Desert blow dust down on B-F this time of year, and this was to be something we dealt with much of the hunt.

I ended up going in a day before everyone else to do a bit of filming for our new show, INSTINCT (starts in late June on Sportsman Channel), in Ouagadougou. I must say it was the craziest place I have ever been, period. 3 million people, and it seems like 2 million scooters/motor bikes, dust and fumes everywhere, and in general chaos. It was an eye opener, and one day was plenty.



The other guys arrived the next evening, and we stayed at a guesthouse in the city. Gun import was prearranged and a breeze. Russell and Jay’s rifles didn’t make it with them on Air France, and were delivered a couple of days late coming from Paris.





We got a late start on our drive the next day to the concession, and it took a while longer than normal as the last 2 hours were in the dark. The road is mainly tar, but the pothole situation is incredible, so it takes what seems like forever. The ride back took us about 5 hours which I think would be an average travel time.



The first day since we were 2 rifles short, Russell and Jay jumped on the truck with another hunter. We checked our rifles first thing and then were off to hunt. Jay went with me, and though we didn’t shoot anything, we did see 5-6 groups of roan, numerous kob, hippo, elephant, and a number of other species. I was surprised at the number of roan, and we saw a couple of good bulls, but the wind was always wrong for the good ones.

That first day Skip killed a stud of a roan (the best of the trip) and a nice kob. Steven got his buffalo after about 3 hours of tracking, so we had a good first day as a group.
I am not going to attempt to tell the stories of everyone’s hunts or post their trophy photos (unless they give me the OK to go on and post their photos). I don’t want to ruin their stories that can better be told in first person. I downloaded everyone’s photos all to one big folder, so the photos I do post are likely to be taken by someone else, and I am certainly not trying to take credit, as I am not much of a photographer.

A quick note on lunch…our trackers would usually shoot a handful of guinea fowl and/or francolin in the morning, and at lunch we would have a pasta, or rice or couscous “salad”, boiled eggs, sardines and bread, and the guys would grill up the guinea/francolin to add to the mix. I really enjoyed the grilled birds.









One really nice thing was that there are no tsetse flies or mopane bees to deal with, and besides the occasional mosquito in the evening,(that always bit me and stayed away from the others) insects are not much of an issue.

Day 2 we all got an earlier start (again 3 hunting parties) since we didn’t need to check rifles, and we hoped to get on buffalo before the temps got high.

First thing in the morning we spotted a loan bull roan and did a stalk. With topography, we got to about 75 yards as he fed unaware of our approach. After looking him over for a while, we decided he was probably about 25”, but not terribly heavy, so we elected to pass.



About 8:00AM we spotted a good sized herd of buffalo a few hundred years in front of the truck, so we backed up, made a loop to get the wind right, and we moved in. It took a while but we got to 35 or so yards from much of the herd looking for a good bull, but an old cow finally made us, and off they went.

We ended up moving in on the herd about 3 more times during the morning, but we could only see young bulls and cows up close. There were 50 or so in the group, so often they were strung out over 75 -100 yards. Once a lion bumped them, and when we were able to get back on them, the lion growled at us from the tall grass within 40 yards. That certainly kept us on our toes and alert!

Finally on the 5th approach, we got in front of the herd, and a couple of younger bulls filed by at about 25 yards, and the whole herd was in tow. The 4th buffalo was a nice, very red bull, and my guide Oually told me to take him. I let him get inside 30 yards and hit him low on a quartering to angle. It was a perfect heart shot and he bucked and took off. He didn’t go far and was down, and I went up and put one between his shoulder blades for insurance.

I really wanted a red buffalo, and he had great color. He was fully mature, but he wasn’t what I consider a really old, over the hill bull, which I would have much preferred. The language barrier between the French speaking staff was a challenge, and if I could have asked, I would have asked more specifically about the buff being really old, but since it was the first bunch of savannah buff I had ever seen live, I went with their call. They did waive off some younger bulls, and this one was certainly mature, but just not over the hill. All in all I am still very happy with him. I love his color and he was mature, plus it was a fantastic hunt that ended up very close.





That day Russell got his Kob as well.

Day 3 I was looking for roan, and even though we saw a good number of them, we didn’t get a crack at a mature bull. We did see a lion, and lots more buff among other things. The other guys had better luck than I did.

Russell and Jay both had received their guns, so we all split up, and they killed their 2 buff. Jay also killed a great kob. Skip got his buffalo, so he was tagged out on the 3 animals he was hunting. Steven killed a nice reedbuck and an old roan, so he to was filled out by day 3 as well. We weren’t even half way through the hunt, and we only needed 3 animals for a group of 5 hunters to be finished.



Day 4, about 9:30AM my group spotted two bull roan together a few hundred yards out. We glassed them, and there was one bull that I immediately said I would shoot without a second thought. The other just looked smaller, and I didn’t pay much attention to him as I was focused on the heavy one.

We drove on for about a half mile, got out, quartered into the wind and began stalking and trying to locate them. Oually found the tracks, but we didn’t seem to be making much progress, when out of nowhere, up went the sticks, and I had a bull broadside at 100 yards. His head was turned looking straight at us (for a good while), so I waited for the thumbs up to shoot. Just as I got the OK, he turned and took off. I knew that was our chance, and we had been too slow.

We slowly worked toward where he had just run just over a small rise, and soon the sticks went up again. This time he was walking quartering towards us with his head lowered in front a bit, and I could see it was the big bull.

When he cleared a dead tree, I punched a CEB low in his right shoulder, and he took off obviously hit hard. I was going to shoot again, but my guide ran somewhat out in front of me, so I got the barrel to the sky, and we walked toward where we had last seen him.

He was down but moving his head, so I put a finisher in him. He was done on the first shot, but I wanted no suffering. I am amazed how tough roan are. He took the .416 CEB through the heart and still went about 75 yards.

The bull was magnificent. I couldn’t have told you if he was 24” or 29”, but I knew he had 2ndary growth (as all the bulls we took did), was heavy, scarred and old. He was perfect.







When we left the concession, the forestry guys measured everything for their records, and he taped just over 27.5”. Not that I care at all, but I guess it is nice to know for reference, especially on animals I am not very familiar with.

I was only hunting buffalo and roan, so I was finished. That evening, Russell and Jay both came in with very nice, heavy old roan bulls, so our group was completely done in 4 days. That was with Russell and Jay not really hunting the first 2 days. They generally run the hunts there as 2x1, but we chose to do 1x1 just to make sure we had plenty of time. In hindsight, if I went back, I would do the hunt 2x1 for the camaraderie, and I would feel very confident that both guys would get their animals.

If a person did a 1x1 hunt, you could be incredibly picky on buffalo, roan and kob, and I believe you could come away with super roan and buff trophies if you wanted.

I am also working on some packages for next year where a hunter can take 2 or 3 buffalo in 7 days for a smoking deal (as in less than most 1 bull Cape buff hunts). I feel very confident that you could take 3 good mature buffalo in 7 days unless you just struck some very bad luck. I will post these deals, hopefully this week, as soon as they are finalized with the concession.

The next 2 days we tooled around camp and the concession taking photos, visiting the locals, taking photos and video, etc.












This was 1 of 2 nomads we met that travel the Sahara region with no recognized borders, etc. I found this quite interesting.


We decided to go back to Ouagadougou a day early to make sure we were there for flights, etc., but before we hit the road, the local chief and a village elder came and spoke with us. They told us of the troubles of their people, how they had built a small school but were trying to expand it, etc. We all chipped in for a donation to the school fund, and through 3 interpreters, we exchanged best wishes, appreciations, and goodbyes.



We arrived back at the guesthouse in late afternoon, had dinner and prepared to leave the next day. Getting back out of the airport was a bit of a circus as all ticketing, gun processing, etc. is behind the security area, so our fluent English-speaking interpreter could not come with us to help. The concession owner’s son was able to go with us, and he spoke enough English and had enough influence there to get us through all the red tape, ticketing, etc., and on our way.

We flew out on Air France, went to Lome in Togo, made a 1-hour stop and then on to Paris. There we split up as a group and went to Atlanta, Houston and Detroit.

As Russell mentioned in the Africa Hunting Forum, this is a real adventure and you need to shift gears and realize you are seriously on “African Time”. This is not southern or east Africa. Not speaking French was probably the largest inconvenience, but hunters speak “hunt”, and we got by fine. We all had been to Africa a number of times, knew the drill, and just smiled and reminded each other, “it’s all part of the adventure.” No doubt it was a great trip; we took some wonderful animals, learned a fair amount along the way, and had a lot of fun and laughs in a very different land. This is not a hunt for the first time African traveller or someone who expects everything to follow a rigid schedule. If you can be flexible, willing to deal with some heat, dust, and look over a few animals, this is one of the best deals to be found for both good buffalo and roan. It was one of the most unique trips of my life.

As a side note, after the terrorist attacks in January, we were all somewhat concerned with the trip, but I never felt unsafe at all either in the city or in the rural areas. Grant it, I did not walk the streets at night, but things were fine on the safety front.

Sounds like a very successful hunt and some nice trophies.
Congratulations.

Great stuff. I used to live in Ouagadougou and it bought back a few memories.

Superb western Roan you got there and good colour on that buff.

Good to hear that there are still good numbers of game.

Congratulations magnificent animals I got back from Burkina Faso on 28 January hunted on Arly concession . I was flying in during the terrorist attack always felt safe you are right . It is a great Hunt but not for the first time Africa hunter. Very much an adventure Posted my report on AR

Jim

Outstanding Tim!

What a great trip, congratulations on an excellent roan and I also loved your buff, some great pictures ant thanks for sharing!

Awesome adventure, Tim and Co!

Great hunt thanks for sharing. A 2-3 buffalo deal would be very interesting.


Good hunting

Carl Frederik

Great report. Thanks for sharing!!

Great report Tim....

I'm going to miss those sardine and francolin lunches.

Well done guys!

Thanks for sharing Tim! Looks a great trip.

An excellent recounting of our adventures Tim!

Wow, that looks great!

Just a side note:
I spent 4 days in Paris with the wife ahead of the hunt. I did not have any problems taking my firearm along thru france.

If you look around enough there are things to interest the hunter in the big city.


Day one,
We spent a couple of hours driving around before the guys found fresh enough buff tracks. We had only gone 3-4 hundred yards when the sticks went up. There was a buff at about 40 yards. When he raised his head I knew this was a big savannah buff. I tried to slide up on the sticks but the guide blocked me. Apparently they were afraid I would shoot to soon. (this appeared to be a theme throughout all the teams) My shoulder was touching the guides chest and I could feel his heart racing just like mine. Unfortunately the wind swirled and off went the buff. We ran to an opening but they did not pass thru. We returned and picked up the spoor. We had only traveled a short distance when we busted them out of some thick brush. This time the ran along way before stopping. We tracked them for 2-3 miles before we caught site of them out ahead of us. We made a big loop down wind to get in front. Soon they were headed right to us. There were 5 buff in the group. A cow and calf, a half grown calf and two bulls. The guys were trying to tell me which one to shoot when one of them lay down. My tracker placed his hands by his face in the universal sleep sign. I examined his body position thru the scope and decided I could spine him through the shoulder blade. At the shot he rolled over and stuck his legs straight out. I ran up and put one down thru his back and out the sternum. We celebrated with lots of back slapping and hand shakes. It was obvious that this was not the bull I first saw, he must have peeled off at some point. Still he had a roman nose was missing plenty of hair around his eyes and appeared to be plenty old enough. Later Glaser would deem him an average old bull for the area.



Interesting way to get one in the truck. Beware they will drag the hair of a cape if you let them.



Day two, Since BwanaJay did not have his rifle yet i invited him to ride with me. The plan being we would hunt roan unless we saw buff. Well it didn't take long to run across some buff. I handed Jay my rifle and said lets go get them. We spent the morning in amongst a big herd of buff. It was a great morning that was ended by a sharp eyed cow. The rest of the day was uneventful.
Day three, we rode for hours not seeing a lot. About lunch we got off to check out a group of Roan. When we got back to the truck one of the guys noticed a reedbuck laying in the shade. I got up on the sticks and shot him. He didn't bleed much and did a death leap in the tall grass. We almost didn't find him.



We saw my roan headed to a pan and we were able to cut him off after a short stalk. The first shot killed him he just didn't get the message. After a few more shots we had filled our bag for the trip.



This hunt is an adventure for sure!

Way to go nice animals did you see any elephants or crocodiles

Yes I saw elephants every day except one. We saw crocs and hippo every day, and I saw a lion.

Great report Tim, thanks for sharing.
Great Advert for WTA (World Wide Trophy Adventures)
Wish you guys all the success for the future. Sorry I missed you at the WTA/CABELAS Booth in Vegas.you were obviously hunting, but next year maybe
Cheers

Here are some more trophy photos from the guys who told me it was OK to post...

Jay:




Skip:

Monster Roan


Now we just need to get Russell to post his photos when he gets caught up...

Interesting trip and beautiful roan and buffalo!

Although the roan isn't on my wish list -- he's on many others' -- I recognize those y'all took are outstanding!!

Congratulations to you all on a great hunt and some wonderful trophies. West Africa seems like quite the adventure I'd never considered before.

Nice hunt and interesting area-congratulations.

The multiple buffalo and roan hunt you mentioned is extremely interesting.

Looks like you guys had a great time and did very well!

Well done guys! Great report on an extremely successful safari!

Best regards, D. Nelson

Great photos. Thanks for the report.

Well done guys!!! Huge thumbs up!!!!

And now my $.02 worth...

When I received Tim's email about the opportunity to hunt Burkina Faso he had started it with " Russell I know you traveled to Benin and shot these same trophies but I thought I would see if you had any interest in a safari to Burkina Faso?" Seriously? A chance to travel to a country in Africa I have not hunted before at a fantastic price? And with a group of like-minded hunters? I was in immediately.

And it was a great adventure with a great group of guys! Almost all of the reports have said, this isn't for the first time hunter... you guys get that. This safari is also not for the guys who need everything to run on queue. The trip brought new meaning to "roll with the flow" and "doing things on African time". But if you can bring a large dose of patience and the ability to chuckle at the humor in how events sometimes unfold... this is seriously good safari country at a seriously good value!

Some of the issues I had to sit back and laugh at...

The term "bed and breakfast" for the lodging we stayed in while at Ouagadougou.
The term "the bus will be here in two minutes" really meant two hours.
The fact my rifle didn't show up until the third hunting day.
The fact that the camp wait staff were also "working girls". The French guys didn't mind this at all!
Being on three different trucks with different hunting crews in four days.
Having our landcruiser give up the ghost on Skip and my first hunting day and catching a ride back to camp with Tim, Jay and seven other people in their truck!
Need I say more?

It was fun and it was one of those hunts where the stories will only get better with time. Now on with the report...

I owe Skip for sharing his cruiser with me the first two days. I was able to make the stalks with him while he killed his huge roan the morning of the first day and his kob that afternoon.

The second morning, Skip was up if we ran into buffalo and I was able to stalk roan or kob if we ran across them. I made four or five stalks on roan that day but we could never close the deal. DeGaulle, Skip's lead hunter in his crew was quite good and both he and Daniel whom I took to be the tracker had excellent eyes and understood we wanted mature trophies.

As we broke for lunch that day, while the rest of the truck was setting up for lunch, DeGaulle made a sortie around the river we rested by and was soon back and motioning for us to grab the rifle and follow him. I carried Skip's Winchester Model 70 in .416 loaded with CEBS. We were after a roan bull headed to water but spotted a kob ram that DeGaulle must have thought was a better trophy. We made a short stalk and the sticks came up as he began to quarter away from us at 75 yards. I shot him just before he walked behind a bush and we saw him running away. Both Skip and I thought it was a hit but our team wasn't so sure. A brief follow-up and we found blood which led us to my first trophy of the trip.


Daniel, DeGaulle and I with my kob

That afternoon when we got in Jay and I were pleased to find our rifles were in camp. I had brought my American Hunting Rifle custom .375 RUM shooting factory CorBons loaded with 300 grain Barnes TSX bullets.

The third morning I was introduced to my new head honcho, Petite Wally, not to be confused with the other Wally in Tim's crew. He and his group were excellent hunters and despite his Elmer Fudd hat he was serious pro in the bush. After getting into the park and shooting my rifle to make certain of it's zero we were off.

Not an hour into the concession, we caught the tail end of a group of buffalo heading into a riverine thicket and the stalk was on. Always cognizant of the wind, PW led us on a wide sweeping stalk that had us back on the buffalo. We had to reposition a couple of times as they fed through the bottom and then lined out to head for their bedding area. PW got us ahead of them and we watched as they began to break into a large burned area. We set up the stick next to a tree and waited. As usual, the old bull brought up the rear. With Wally's blessing or urging, I know not which, I shot the old boy behind the shoulder at a bit over 100 yards out. The group turned and ran back about forty yards and circled the old bull. We watched him topple over and after a few minutes we walked out to run the herd off and gather our prize.


Petite Wally and the gang

Steve has some pictures of the way the boys loaded game, it was an interesting spectacle to watch and very effective. It does beat the old Zimbo heave ho by aces, spades and flushes!



First, find a suitable tree and drag the buffalo there leaving some spare rope to tie said buff in the tree without toppling the tree!



With steady acceleration pull buff into tree praying the rope doesn't fray or the tree limb snap.



Gently deposit trophy buffalo into the cruiser... easy as 1,2,3.

Another surprise on day 4... note the recurring theme.

I thought I had been matched with "my" team and I would be joining Petite Wally and crew again on this day. Because of the choking amounts of dust the cruisers churn up traveling into the concession we left in staggered shifts. I was the last guy to head out on this morning. So I am sitting at breakfast enjoying my last cup of coffee when Petite Wally loads up a French hunter and drives away. Feeling a bit underappreciated, I find the camp manager who speaks only French and try to sort things out... he merely points at his watch and shrugs. Not 6:30 yet, your ride is not here I deduce.

6:30 the cavalry rides in and I meet my third crew of the trip! This was Steve's crew and now that he was shot out... they were mine. Or I theirs. Whatever.

Joseph, Joel and co. at my service. Let's go roan hunting.

Off to Singou...

I had probably made nine or so stalks on roan so far in the trip. Lots of roan here and I saw a couple of monsters including the one Skip shot.

About 9:00, roan are late risers, we spotted a bull standing under a tree a hundred or so yards from the road. The guys are all urging me to shoot. I don't want to shoot from the truck and luckily the roan runs before I get my rifle out of the case. Off we go and close on the bull twice before I get a quartering shot at around 90 yards. We have only covered about 600 yards into the stalk. One shot behind the shoulder and he runs 30 yards and goes down. Hunt complete...



He is a nice, mature representative bull for this area.


All in all, did I enjoy this hunt with all of the surprises and occasional challenges? Absolutely.

Would I head to Burkina again?

Maybe, you can't find cheaper buffalo anywhere on the continent and buff are buff. Always a challenge...

But remember, bring your easygoing attitude with you. Don't get stressed, don't get in a hurry, just let Burkina happen.

Chances are, it'll happen just fine.

Congratulations on a great hunt, great animals thanks for sharing. You are right this is a great adventure but not for the first time hunter. On our trip things went surprising smooth guns arrived with us cleared no problem even though no one spoke English stayed at a great hotel in Ouga great breakfast and the cars to transfer us out tho the hunting area were on time and ran well . In camp things ran relatively smooth. Staff were great tried realty hard to please. I think that Burkina will become a well sought after destination with American hunters `

Bwanamrm;

Each hunt report is a great take on this adventure. You guys definitely stepped up to the plate and dealt with the ups & downs as true experienced African Safari hunters. I really enjoyed each perspective.

Congrats on your excellent trophies!

Best regards, D. Nelson

Great report.
Looks like a lot of fun. Well done. Thanks for sharing

bwanamrm,

That is a cracking buff and all of those Roan are first class. Very well done.

Great reports on a unique trip. Congratulations to all!

Wow! Great report.

I love all the pictures.

Glad to hear you all had a great hunt.

And thank you for sharing it with us.

Great hunt!! Thanks for the report guys...Congratulations

Nicely done, Gents!

Looks like a very unique trip with a fun group of guys.

Great hunt and adventure Tim. Another hunt to put on my bucket list, which isnt getting shorter, lol

Great hunts for you all, and a nice adventure somewhere new. Love the trophy pics. Congrats.

Well done Tim, Russell, Jay, Skip and Steve.

Unfortunately some health issues with my wife resulted in me having to miss the trip with the group. That said, I leave on Monday to hopefully write an epilogue to the story of this hunt. I can only hope that the story in the epilogue is one of success as great as the group's hunt was.