16 August 2009, 03:23
Sally's DadTwo cats with Karl, May-June 09
Two Cats with KarlI had a great leopard hunt with Karl Stumpfe this year, from May21- Jun12. I also had the chance to take one of the Kalahari lioness that Karl had advertised earlier this year, along with a bunch of plainsgame. It was a great hunt, my third hunting trip to Africa, and this trip was much more than I expected. Thanks to everyone at AR that helped me with this hunt, I’ve been reading for awhile. Big thanks to Quickshot who gave me last minute advice after his successful leopard hunt with Karl.
Took the usual fun flight from Dulles to Jo-burg, stayed at the Afton that night. The Afton had overbooked, but they put me up in a nearby place so I still had the chance to have that great steak dinner and meet some other hunters before heading back to bed. I wasn’t traveling with a rifle, but waited while the other travelers cleared theirs in Jo-burg before going to the Afton. Even with all paperwork complete or pre-done by a service, it still took a long time to get everyone through. Thanks to a really nice loaner from Karl (7x64) I got to avoid that hassle!
After a bumpy landing in Windhoek, Karl picked me up and said we’d start a day early instead of overnighting in Windhoek, so off we went. After meeting the ranch owner and stowing bags we headed out. After a few shots Karl’s rifle was spot-on for me so we went looking for my list of plainsgame. We saw lots of game, but nothing was big enough for day one, until a big kudu hopped out in front of us. After a bad shot from me, a second shot put this guy in the skinning shed. What a first day! Food that night was great, and Rose the cook kept us too well fed for the whole trip!
Load up the dogs and check baits in the morning, we find a small track that’s probably a female, and then set a few more baits out. The nice thing about hunting with dogs is that you can set a number of baits out in likely travel areas and not be too picky about the set-up. A trail cam is also set up on the bait with the small track, and later photos show it’s a female, as well as a honey badger and possibly a larger male. It’s pretty cool to see a track the first morning, even if it’s too small to follow.
Later in the day we look for plainsgame again, and I’m lucky enough to make a much better shot on this old hartebeest. He just about drops at the shot, one of the longest (250yd?) and more difficult I’ve ever taken due to the brush and tall grass.
Same story on baits the next morning, and then in the afternoon we look for more game. I end up taking a nice cow gemsbok after some more bad shooting, the only good part being that after my initial bad shot I connect on my first ever running shot and put her down. Later that day we see a beautiful black mamba, it’s lying across the entire road, so it’s at least 6 feet long and looks closer to 15 feet long when I try to take a picture. Okay, he’s still only about 6 ft long, but no photo as he gave us the same look a cape buffalo does and then slid away. I only have the chills a few times later that day as we walk through the tall mamba colored grass…
On the fourth day we load up again and head out. The first bait we come to has been hit, and it looks like a good track.
The dogs are dropped out and off they go, the track is warm enough to work. Karl heads off with the dogs, but has Gottfried and I head down the fenceline to see if the cat has crossed onto the neighbor’s property. About 5 minutes later we hear on the radio that they’ve seen the cat, and it’s off to the races. We blast sand and head back. We catch up quickly, and then notice the dogs have the cat stopped not far away. As we close in, it’s apparent that despite numerous trees, the leopard has hunkered down in the grass and is holding the dogs off. We can’t see him with the height of the grass, but we can hear him- wow! He sometimes rears up to take a swing, then flattens again. Time to get close.
Karl decides it’s too dangerous for the dogs (and us, hopefully!) in the grass, so we pull a few of them back and as fast as gold lightning, the leopard takes off, with a couple dogs in tow. The dogs are let go, and again, with a few trees to choose from, the leopard stays on the ground, burrowing into a bush. Most of the dogs are pulled back, and in we go. At about 25 yards I can’t see him on the sticks, so Karl says to fire into the dark part of the bush. Miss on the first shot, Karl says to aim lower. Next one obviously hits the leopard as he goes nuts! Karl pulls us in close, about 10 yards now with a truly unhappy, but visible leopard. Another shot, another hit. We get closer, round the bush, and Karl hand me his .450 with a solid in it and tells me to hit him again, since he’s alive and growling. This one is at about 8 feet, and I’m nothing but adrenaline right now. Even with the adrenaline I feel the .450 kick, but the leopard expires as I work the bolt. Karl reaches in and hauls out a monster leopard for me to marvel over. I can’t believe this has happened, all by 7:30am. I’m spontaneously laughing and smiling for the rest of the day.
I had originally booked a 14 day leopard hunt and 7 days of plainsgame, and 4 days in I have an awesome cat. Earlier in the year I had read about lion hunts that Karl had available for the fall, so asked him if that was still and option. He said it might be, but he’d need to check into permits and if the rancher was open to it. We packed up and headed to Windhoek to check, which took a couple of days, but I had the chance to enjoy Windhoek and meet Karl’s wonderful family.
The lion permit and camp permissions worked out, we headed south again. It’s a great camp on the border with Botswana and South Africa, adjacent to the Kalahari Transfrontier Park. Ken Barr went with us as he had finished early on a dik-dik hunt with another PH and was interested in some plainsgame, to be guided by Gottfried, before heading to an elephant hunt. It was nice to share a fire and some of his stories, he’s been just about everywhere and hunted just about everything, and has some great fireside tales.
The first morning we head our separate ways, looking around to see if we can find any lion sign, and it’s a plainsgame bonanza! Gemsbok, steenbok, giraffe, eland, springbok- the game was everywhere and over every dune. We topped one dune and a nice steenbok stepped out. He manages to give us the slip, and as we head back to the truck Karl says, “Chris, look at the lion.” Way too calm, that guy. I look up, and there’s a lion walking down the next dune toward us. He’s a young male, and then there’s another, and another, and the total is 4 young males and a female in the distance.
The males are all fairly young, not much mane, but one looks better than the others. I knew from the offer that they’d be younger males, as they pride has gotten large and the landowner would like to reduce the overall numbers on his land. The lions can pass back and forth between the ranch and the park, but with the game on the ranch, they like it there. I believe that a few of them have been there at least nine years, as some of them are collared and known.
After much chasing, tracking, driving, walking, losing, finding, and dodging about, we’ve been very close to them multiple times, but the better male has been pretty elusive. I’m getting less nervous about being within a 100 yards of the cats time and again, but still pretty jazzed. This probably helps, because suddenly all hell breaks loose! I can see two of the males about 70 yards away, and Karl is pointing over the edge of the dune, and as he says, “I think one went that way” a roar breaks out about 12 yards away and a lioness pops up and comes for us. Karl is about 9 feet in front on me, to the left, and I can see the lion as he says, “Shoot, shoot.” My first shot hits left of center, breaking a shoulder and hitting a lung. She turns, and Karl tells me to shoot again, and I hit her in the shoulder, but high. Luckily she drops, and we walk up for a final shot between the shoulders. Not the male, but I’m pretty sure that shooting a lioness on the charge that close qualifies as plenty for me! Karl was half a trigger pull from shooting her, but was controlled enough to let me do the shooting. I can’t believe he held out, since he was 3 yards closer than I was. Big thanks for letting me get the full experience!
We re-created the scene (truck wasn’t there, okay) in this photo. I’m standing on the left, the man next to me is where Karl was, and if you look into the bush you can see another guy (Ricardo) standing there where the lion charged from. Close enough, eh?
As we’re heading back to the lodge, a steenbok jumps up right where we’d sent the one in the morning that started the lion episode. This is too perfect, and this time he ends up in the truck as well.
We spent some more time in the Kalahari for gemsbok and springbok, and then headed back up north for warthog, mountain zebra, and to try for a second kudu. All goes well except the zebra and the kudu. After some decent shooting I start shooting low for most shots. The rifle checks out, but I can’t figure out what I’m doing wrong. The zebra starts it, and after the new Namibian record for shots on a single zebra, he’s down. He was hit 8 times, one of which was a solid that I managed to send from tail to dewlap (later recovered) that still didn’t do the trick. Wow! I told Karl that if anyone hit me in the leg I’d pretty much give it up on the spot, but this zebra kept going for 7 more. Dang! The taxidermist was curious about whether or not he charged us with all those holes…
As for the second kudu, I told Karl since we still had time we should spend it trying to find kuduzilla. After a couple days we spot one, and off we go. My shooting goes to hell at this point, low and low, and low. He disappears over a ridge, but not before looking like he might have been hit. We find a drop of blood, but after a lot of searching, no kudu. He’s gone, and I’m in shock over my first lost animal, ever. I can’t believe I’ve screwed up this badly. The gun is checked again, and my excuse is gone, I simply got kudu fever. I’m pretty silent for awhile, and Karl offers me another kudu at cost. I tell him that won’t make it any better for the one I wounded, but as long as we’re out here, let’s go looking. We see plenty of kudu, but I keep passing on them, until we see a nice one. The shot is ridiculous long for me, so by the time we get me solid and set up the kudu walks away, leaving me feeling just fine. I kept thinking I’d screw it up, my confidence was shot, so it’s fine with me that he walked away and I went home without an extra kudu. Still sick over the poor shooting.
The rest of the trip goes fine, and Karl and I have a good time while the week slips by. I made some of my best and worst shots on this trip, so it's a mixed bag of feeling good about my shooting. One cautionary tale- I hadn’t counted on the lion, so I didn’t bring cash for that, thinking I could draw off my credit card when the safari ended. I tried several banks in Windhoek, and they all tried, but my United card through Chase was denied time and again, despite pre-trip notification and on the phone confirmation while the banks were trying to draw. Basically, Chase left me high and dry, one minute saying everything is fine and the next declining the transaction. At one point they declined because they had already approved the transaction, even though that was after the bank tried- aaaarggghh! I spent 2 days in banks trying to make this happen, and no luck. I cancelled the Chase card as soon as I got home, thank god I wasn’t stranded or in jail, I would still be there! Karl was a gentleman about the whole thing and trusted me to get it wired from a family member a couple days later. A huge thank you to his wife, Noeline, for spending the day with me in banks trying to work it out!
At the end of the hunt my wife flew in and we went on a 2 week tour through REI Adventures. First, went toured Namibia for a few days, seeing the Dunes, Naukloft, and Zebra River areas. On the way over she stayed at the Afton as well and met a bunch of people from AR. Nice people all, she was really impressed with the community of hunters that AR brings together.
After Namibia we flew to Maun and then on to Moremi game reserve in Botswana. Wow! It was totally amazing! From Moremi we made our way down to the Chobe, overnighting and touring through Savuti on the way. I thought after the hunting I might be a little bored with 2 weeks of photos, but it was fantastic! We camped out every night, with wildlife running and roaring through camp every night- wow! Our heads were on swivels the whole time, so many new animals and birds to see. Our photo guide had been a PH in Kenya and Botswana long ago, and it was fun to not only see the animals but also chat about some of the more impressive animals.
We left the Chobe and headed to Zambia to finish the trip at Vic Falls. The Falls were nice to see, and we took the helicopter flyover which I highly recommend. The Zambezi Sun hotel was okay, but we both got sick from the buffet. That made the flight home a bit uncomfortable…
The hunting and then touring were great! I’d saved for several years to go on this trip, as REI (my employer) provides a month long sabbatical at 15 years of employment in addition to vacation time. No doubt in my mind, it was worth it! In fact, my wife, who’d been on the last hunting trip in South Africa, has said this was her last trip to Africa before we left the US. After 3 days in Botswana she looked at me and asked, “Can we do this again next year?” Enough said!
Thanks for reading!
Chris
