So it just happens that I have been looking for at forum like this for the past couple of years. Thing is I have been a very active member of similar forums before and I always felt that it was time well spent with lots of shared experience with people whom had this one interest in common but otherwise where as different as people can be. One thing I remember from that other forum (which was for pokerplayers) is that the posts where people shared "their" story happened to be some of the most memorable. So here's my story, I hope it is worth your time.

the extremely short recap for the ones who prefer to scroll for pictures or whom would like to know what it's all about:

Scandinavian hunter whom bought a cancellation hunt in B.C. at 19 - that lead to a lynx hunt in same area - I got hooked on biggame hunting and joined a coworker on a plainsgame hunt in Namibia - ran out of cash :-) - stumpled on online poker while it was booming - had the flair, became professionel poker player and got a small glimpse of the american dream - spent a substantial ammount of my winnings on various hunts - that took me to Kyrgyzsthan, Spain, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Cameroon, Hungary, Poland and Sweden - the market for poker got tougher and I opted out - Now I'm studying medicine.

I intend to write this story divided in chapters over the coming week or so, since I currently have some time off in between classes at the university.

First of all I'm thrilled to find a forum where hunters share stories, photos, experiences and everything in between on the subject biggame hunting. I really need this just to get a little "fix" :-) as I can't expect to continue my past years of hunting in the coming years.

How it started:

I was always a birght kid however when I was in highschool I had zero motivation as I had nothing really that I wanted to do with my life. I was good at whatever classes we had but I didn't understood why I needed to atend. Eventually I dropped out and got myself a job (fastest way to money made sense when I was 17). To some extend it was good for me since I got responsibilities and coworkers whom depended on me doing my job. The work was 3-shifts at a major pharmaceutical company. During the night time most of the time we just had to observe the manufacturing process and this one night I was surfing the internet and stumbled upon this cancellation hunt in the northern B.C. 3 days later my plane left from Copenhagen and my final destination was Stone Mountain Safaris where I would be hunting moose, elk, bear and caribou. Within a week after booking said hunt I had bagged what was only my fourth or fifth tropy bearing animal.

A few teaser pictures and tomorow I will tell how it felt doing a horseback hunt in another part of the world when your only 19

Cool, looking forward to the rest

Hunt at Stone Mountain Safaris:

As I recall it, I found the internet advertisment of the hunt on the night between sunday and monday, got some sleep after my shift and around midday monday I had booked the hunt, which had me scheduled to fly out sthe coming thursday!

So I spent most of tuesday at various hunting stores getting some gear for the trip. I had a ton of worries about my gun, as I was shooting a .308W and since my biggest prey thus far had been a few roedeers, I was unsure wether it would be adequate when I would be changing to both longer ranges and way way larger animals on this hunt. Eventually I opted to change the bullet and I bought three packs of Norma Vulcan in 13.grams (200 grains). Thursday came and went and Friday morning I boarded a small plane that took me the last part from fort St. John to Fort Nelson where I was met by Diane Weins (previous owner).

I had my fingers crossed and hopes high on bagging an elk on this hunt, thus when the plains in front of the lodge at Stone Mountain Safars filled with some 150 elk, I got really excited :-). the date was just around 1st of October, so the bulls where still doing some bugling.

The next day I was set to ride into camp as a blizzard prevented all flying. Fortunately the weather cleared some and I had an awesome time riding further and further into the mountains. Late that afternoon we reached the tetsa camp.



I was still having some trouble with jetlag and at one point I was up and awake in the middle of the night. My bladder forced me out of the tent and here I was suprised to find it quite bright outside. A big fullmoon provided some light. So while I stood there doing my business, I suddenly heard this wolf howling at the moon. Jeez I wish I had a larger vocabulary when it comes to sitautions like these as it really was something out of this world. At least it was for me.

Morning came and soon me and my guide Jesse was in the saddle. I had explained Jesse how a trophy elk was my biggest priority and that morning we did hear the odd bugle every now and then. Eventually we managed to find one in the scope on the opposite hillside. It was some distance as you would see the bull in the scope leaning his head back and doing the bugle just a moment before the sound reached us. Plans were made and moments after that we crossed the creek that ran in the valley between the hillsides. Ain't it something when you pass water on the backside of a horse, I've only done it a handfull of times but something about it just feels nice. We never found that bull again and neither did we hear any bugles. When we decided to call it a day we had a close encounter with a decent bull moose. Thing is the area had a three "tine" point rule and this bull was carrying only two and thus not legal.



That night Jesse explained that the moose was rutting at the moment and thus most of the time wasn't very cautious. So he suggested that we tried to look for moose the next day. Well who was I to argue with my guide, and getting close to that bull sure had got me excited. I explained Jesse my worries on the gun and caliber, and to my suprise Jesse thought that perhaps the elk had even more shot resistance than the moose had. At least it made no sense to worry about one but not the other.

Snow had come during the night and the landscape seemed picture perfect to me this second day of the hunt as we crossed another hillside.



Late that afternoon Jesse picked up on a sound that was unfamiliar to me at the time. We hadn’t seen the moose however we heard the antlers cracking. Moments after that, a cow and a nice bull appeared on the edge of a patch of pine-trees. We lost vision of the pair while we approached the trees and snuck up around the corner. Here the moose appeared to be gone and right about when we figured they must have moved out while we couldn’t see them, they caught our scent and started to flee. At some 150 yards they stopped and here was my shot. It seemed far too me so I opted to hold just on the spine and managed to make a total miss and shoot over a moose!! Second time he wasn’t so lucky (or I improved) and his legs stiffned from the shot and seconds later he was on the ground. The cow left and I was out of my mind when we closed the distance. I couldn’t believe my luck and just the sheer size of the 12x12 palmated antlers was amazing to me.






It was rather late in the afternoon and we had a couple of hours ride back to camp and therefore had to leave the animal for next day when we came back with a packhorse. Unfortunately most of the meat had been spoiled by then due to a grizzly claiming his share off the animal. As my guide and the wrangler packed the meat they instructed me to be on the lookout for the bear. He never came right there however he still had a role to play in this story. As i got up the next morning (we slept late) I met with Diana Stone in the at the stove of the cabin and she informed me that Terry Stone at the moment was out looking for my antlers!! Apperently the bear or atleast a bear had come into camp during the night and had pulled the antlers down from the meat shed. Figuring they where playing me I didn't believe the story till I saw the claw marks and a small toth mark on the bones as Terry brought back my trophy.

After that we lost a few days due to bad weather. Eventually one elk where bagged in our camp however it went to the father/son team and after that I believe we never heard another bugle. We spent some time trying to find a legal caribou but the ones that where legal according to the point rules really weren't mature at all.

I got somewhat frustrated when we where left with few options aside from crossing fingers that the elk would return to our valley again before my time where up. At that time Jesse did me the favor and explained me that if I wanted 100% hunting I should have gone to the serengeti and not a true wilderness hunt :-)

During my 10 days in Tetsa I saw just about every type of biggame animals possible, aside from blackbear and wolf. I sure had a true adventure and just the part when I flew out was a memory worth keeping.





Back at the stone mountain lodge I was actually presented with the option of going back out again doing another 10 days. They have had a cancellation and I could buy/take it for the airtransfer costs and trophy fees. It was however tough to reschedule my airline ticket back home and I wasn't sure wether it would be fine with my job and all. Still not doing that haunts me in the same way it does when you miss a perfect chance on a really nice girl :-)

This trip was a true adventure for me and I came really inexperienced and everything was just so much more and something else than I had dare to hope for. I returned to Denmark with somewhat of a changed mindset. If I didn't knew before what I wanted to do, atleast now I knew that truly amazing experiences where possible to have and I sure wanted more.

I didn't have to wait all that much before another hunting opportunity presented itself. Doing this trip sure created a lot of fuss back at work and it turned out that one of my co-workers did quite a lot of biggame hunting himself. He had booked a plainsgame hunt in Namibia, however his wife where having seconds thoughts on coming due to all the long flights. He asked if I wanted to come a long and I said fine if I could hunt a bit aswell :-)

Naesse,
Great story and welcome to AR.
I'm also looking forward to the rest of your report.

Good story,
looking forward to the next chapter`s

So the previous hunt was done in the fall of 2002 and now at the spring of 2003 the terrian had changed some as me and what was fast becoming a good friend from work was hunting Niambia some 600 km north of Windhoek.



While prepairing/looking forward to this hunt, I had set my hopes on the oryx antilope. I still think they make for a majestic trophy with the long slender horns and the black, brown and white skin color.



The hunting agent whom had booked this hunt for us had asssured us that it was free ranged and that we wouldn't be seeing any fences. Upon arriving at our destination, the owners had a somewhat different approach to the fence issue. They had acces both to a free ranged area and a fenced area, and as they said, they where happy to let hunters hunt at the free range area however usually they where back in the fence within a day or two. We skipped that part and got used to the fence. I won't be going in to a big discussion/debate here about hunting in high fences or not. Hunting is a very personal thing and for most things this included there is no right or wrong it is all up to the individual IMO. The hunting sure was good and still exciting, but returning with your desired prey within a weeks hunting must have been close to a sure thing. Still none the less Africa completely wiped my legs off the ground :-)



We where hunting at Osonjiva hunting safaris, and like I would expect in a majority of Namibian lodges we saw numerous Kudus, Oryx and Red Hartebeest. Also steenbok was seen on a daily base along with packs of wildebeests. The first day we had a really nice stalk on a few wildebeest and Jorn bagged a nice bull. Judging from that hunt I wouldn't mind doing something similar myself, so the very next day everyting went very fast as we came around a corner and spottet a few wildebeest females. I took my shot from the car (again I have since passed on this but have no intend to start a debate/discussion). It happened fast enough that the "rush" didn't hit me till we where on the ground trying to recover the animal. Few minutes later I had a hand on the horns and my looks on the grey-/blueish hide.



On the third day Jorn had tremmendous success as he bagged a warthog in the morning and we had lots of good hunting/stalking in the bushes finding a real shoot opporunity on an oryx-bull in the afternoon. As light was closing in Jorn squeezed the trigger on a nice Kudu aswell.

That left a lot of room for me to get some hunting aswell and one of the days I was dropped off along with one of the trackers and we made our way into the bush to try and intercept a pack of oryx. Sometimes expectations/hopes manages to match very well with the real thing and this was one of those instances. The pack would move in and out of sight in the bush and we kept sneaking ahead until we found a clear patch that allowed us the shot. The herd came and a nice cow presented itself however only the neck was free, and she turned it at the same time I let the shot go. Somehow Ben the tracker managed to get me another chance aprrox ten minutes later and this time the bullet connected.



Througout the entire hunt we had daily encounters with steenbok antelopes and I was so close a lot of times, and thus it felt good when all pieces finally where put together one of the last days. Jorn also managed to find a red hartebeest and that concluded this hunt at Osonjiva. Everything had been nice and smooth, however I do supose a majority of these hunts does go without a lot of hazzle. If/when I am to return to something similar I believe I will add a little extra challenge, by demanding that we walked/stalked a lot more than we did. With the ammount of game present it should be doable and still maintain a good successrate.

We proceeded to spend a few days at Etosha National park before heading home. My advice, place the national park as an appetizer before going hunting and not as the dessert. What happened to us was that quite a few of the animals present at the park where also the ones that we had been seeing daily during the hunt. Also we had very few sightings of the big 5's. Still Etosha sure gave me a couple of nice photos.







Just as the Jackal on the last picture I sure was hungry for more hunting :-)

Naesse,
Wow, 19 years old and starting international hunting, congrats to you.
I've hunted with Stone Mountain 3 times (sheep twice, goat, (2) moose and (2) elk. I love that part of the world and I've booked another Stone Sheep hunt with them for this fall. I certainly can relate to your story.
Great stories.

quote:

Originally posted by Alaska Hunter:
Naesse,
Wow, 19 years old and starting international hunting, congrats to you.
I've hunted with Stone Mountain 3 times (sheep twice, goat, (2) moose and (2) elk. I love that part of the world and I've booked another Stone Sheep hunt with them for this fall. I certainly can relate to your story.
Great stories.

I'll just come right out an admit that envy those people who come back to Stone Mountain again and again. I also met a couple of likeminded hunters while I was there, and the place is still some of the best hunting I have had, although I suppose now that I think of it, it really makes sense what an older hunter said to me on the plane going to Zambia: "Alaska is Alaska, and Africa is Africa". (i had asked him what he prefered when it came to hunting).

Should you by any chance meet the Stone family (Terry, Jesse or Diane) up there, please send them my regards.

Actually I also happened to return that very next fall. About 1½ month later in the season since this was a test hunt for lynx. We where using traditional hound dogs, and all of it was completely new to me. I almost hadn't heard about that type of hunt till they contacted me and offered this test hunt, at what was extremely good conditions IMO.

During that 1½ month the temperatures had dropped significantly and was now hoovering around -18 Celcius (0 Fahrenheit) in the day time and -24 Celcius (-11 Fahrenheit) In the nighttime. This was cooler than anything I had previously experienced and I still think it is today. Everything was covered in snow and the mountains where still spectacular. (They always are, Denmark is to a large extend equally flat as is Holland).




Aside from the first day where we hunted out of 4x4's we hunted from snowmobiles, and during a full week of hunting we managed to cover quite a lot of ground and clear fallen logs etc. We where a fair ammount of tracks however the quide kept saying that they where to old and that it was better for us to cover more ground and wait a fresh one out.





One of the days I tried to shoot a small bird sitting in the top of a tree. To my suprise I missed, the shot however had felt really steady. We laughed some around this and I kind a hinted that I would like to sight the rifle just to make sure, as it might have gotten bumped during all the time on the snowmobile. I completely understand my guide when he shook it off and said that theres a lot of room to miss on a small bird.

Days went by and we continued to drive the snowmobiles in a loop riding over the frozen creeks and on small cleared patches in the forrest. Everyday we would spot animals at the main road as they came in to lick the salt. Thats where I got a decent photo of a rather nice stoneram. quite dark in the fur with full curl and all :-)



On the fifth or sixth day we let the dogs loose for the first time. Less than 45 minutes later we where running for the pack of barking dogs. Closing the last distance was really tense and exciting :-) The cat got a bit of a photoshoot before my time and even more so the cats time was up. I steadyed the rifle on a tree and gently squeezed the trigger. The cat went numb and fell, what appeared to be, lifeless to the ground. As we let the dogs have their share of the victory all hell broke loose. The cat sure wasn't done for and now he was leaving scratch marks on the dogs noses and even pierced one of their ears. It was only a matter of seconds before we had got things right, however it was a bit of too much action and the cat sure had deserved a clean death and not this. However hunting is hunting and in the long run part of the charm is that it won't go as planned every time. It makes it all the more enjoyable the times when it does tho. We found the shot right at the bone of the right front leg, explaining why the cat had passed out from the shock however it weren't lethally hit at all.





All my thanks goes to Marty and Dan (posing on the last picture) for arranging this hunt. In case they hadn't invited me, perhaps I would have never gotten to experience this exact type of hunt. I'm not the right person to ask, but it did seem to be very proffesionel when they kept waiting for the right track and then we had a cat treed the very first time we let loose. The shooting part of these hunts is what it is, and just like any other type of hunt where dogs play a major role, the dogowner/trainer probably gets the most from the hunt. None the less I had a blast during this week and I should expect to come back to B.C. for a mountain lion later on in life. I had a really cool finihsing experience when we one night drove to a hot spring in the mountain. The water was sligthly too warm when you entered it, however soon after I had to put on a hat to cover my ears as otherwise the steam would stick and freeze on my ears as it was -24 celcius (-11 fahrenheit) outside. Since it was a clear night, we also had the northernlights as the icing on the cake. It was really neat and a nice way to finish this B.C. adventure.

P.S. About a month later I recieved an email from Marty stating that he had shot the rifle I had borrowed during the hunt, and it was way off.

Now the cat is the prettiest of the trophies that I have on display in my flat.

Great report. Thanks for sharing

Fast foward to the spring of 2004. Here I opted to max the creditline i had established when I went to Canada the first time around. I can't reccomend borrowing money for hunts.I have since done some calcs and even though I got my hunts on favourable conditions it was all eaten up by interest. Still though if I hadn't done this I had probably bought a car, those are equally expensive (at least they are in Denmark as the state taxes them some 175% on initial purchase price).

The reason for maxing this creditline was that yet another cancelled hunt had come up. This time it was a 3 day hunt for a beceite ibex in Spain. I was longing to try a mountain hunt and couldn't help myself :-)

This time I decided to as my now x-girlfriend to come a long with me. I was going to rent a gun for this hunt since it normally takes some time to get papers sorted for Spain.

Two other hunters where coming for this hunt aswell and actually one of them where a representant of the agency. As we where waiting for our luggage at the airport in Madrid he approached me and said something like:"... Could you please not mention the price you paid for this hunt to the other client as he have paid the full ammount." This I found to be really odd since I found the price from their online advertisment where it was free for all to see, and why should I hold back on what price I paid, it's not like I was going to be mocking another guy but if he asks why should I be keeping secrets/lying just because the agency would prefer that?

We drove quite a lot during this hunt since we did stay at a hotel in a decently sized city which left us with more than 1,5 hours driving just to get to the area.

The hunting area however was really nice. Again beeing from Denmark mountains are nice. Most of these mountains had a lot of pinetrees on them aside from the tops and we spent a lot of time glassing the clearings.





Days went by, however with few sightings of ibex. Before the last day the outfitter decided to switch area and this did change things however on my side the trophy Ibex was still evading us. The hunt was for a bronze medal CIC ibex and no larger, these are done in order to harvest some of the males that doesn't have the genes to develop the really big horns.

That last day of hunting in the new area sure was nice however I was a bit unsatisfied with the fact that the whole hunt was only 3 days and during the first 2 we had spent the best part of the hunting-time driving to and from the area. I speculate this was due to the other hunters going out for drinks in the evening, otherwise I don't see why we didn't stay in one of the small villages in the mountains.

We had lunch in one of those villages one of the days and it was to date the best tapas I have had ever. Don't say that hunters don't get any culture while traveling, this was really authentic and both me and my GF enjoyed dining with a handfull of guides of which none spoke english :-)





Speaking of the guides. My main guide Pablo was nothing short of awesome. He would light a cgiar before we started climbing the mountain, and still there was no stopping him :-)

Late afternoon during the last day my GF, Pablo and I came down from one of the mountains and here we learned that a medium sized Ibex was spotted not far away. Pabloand I conversed a bit on the subject and I was actually giving the option to return later in the season for free and have another try. In the end I opted to go for the medium sized ibex. Wether it was because I wanted to share this with my GF or why exactly I'm not sure. We had already had a good time thus far, and I should really have opted to come back again later on. Perhaps my economy really was running low at the time and the time and airfare was worrying me.

In the end I made a 170 yard shot at a bedded 7 year old ibex. First shot was just fine but I put in another one just for safety.





It was nice to finish the hunt with clean shots, after that lynxhunt. Also it had been fun to deal with some mountainous terrain which was new for me. It also was for my X-GF and I kinda think that I did the right thing by bringing her however the hunt perhaps wasn't the best for this. At least my experience is that you need a reason to keep climbing up and down the mountain sides otherwise it is only fun so many times before you want to go for a slower pace or not climb altogether.

Magic photos, mate. Congratulations on your adventures.

During the christmas holiday prior to my trip to Spain I had decided to deposit a whopping 10$ into an online pokersite. To those familiar with the game I was playing NL-texas holdem for a buyin of max 2$. Around that time rumors in Denmark was that some people where playing this and making a fair ammount of money. I talked about it with my brother in law and we agreed that if we deposited those who where making the money would just make more :-). Being naturally and sometimes slightly too curious as I am, I ended up depositing anyways. Two months later when I was about to go to Spain I had turned the 10$ into 100$ and the game had gotten my attention. In the airport I picked up a pokerbook that explained some math and some fundamentals to fixed limit holdem. I read it and changed to this game as I got home.

In early summer my bankroll as it's called was hoovering around 500$, here I decided to deposit another 500$ since a lot of sites was offering deposit bonuses and usually you would get max bonus if you deposited 500$. So this gave me some mobility as to where I was playing. The online poker economy was booming, I have actually been told that online poker grew faster around that time than did internet porn!

My bankroll started to boom aswell and I kept moving up the limits. Not only was I playing a lot, but I also spent a lot of time trying to study the game on various internet foras etc. Early 2005 my GF was going to stay in Vietnam for half a year helping out at a center for children with autism. This gave me even more time to focus on the game and when she returned in the summer I was closing in on 30K USD. So thats 510 in deposits into 30k in sligtly more than 1½ year.

A few pictures from when I visited Vietnam (very reccomendable BTW)






A lot of changes happened and me and my GF broke up and I also decided to leave my job as I had made a deal with one of my friends, that we would take further education next year. I the mean while I wanted to take my winnings and do some travelling. Well that is what I told people, but even more so I wanted to see if I could make a living playing poker.

Just as I left my job tho I was going with my father to Zambia. This was a 7 day buffalo hunt and once again I was able to make a deal so that I too got to do some hunting. This buffalo hunt had been my fathers dream hunt for as many years as I can recall so it meant a lot to me, to be able to join him.

We would be hunting with Kwalata safaris in lower lupanda area, just next to the luangwa river. This hunt was done late season around october as I recall and thus everything was xtremely dry and all the animals kept in close proximity to the river. We saw litteraly a ton of game every day. Pukus where very plentiful as where impalas. Zebras, warthogs and Giraffes also a daily thing. On top of this I managed to get a snapshot of the back of a leopard during the day.







Neither me nor my dad had tried tracking buffalo before and man we where in for a treat. We had rather large herd close the first day however we never found a decent bull. The next morning we where following two daggaboys. This took some 3 hours and got very intense as we intered some dry elephantgrass. here the bulls caught a sight of us, and ran. Sarge the guide however had an idea on where they would be heading and within 20 mins. we where on them agian. This time my father fired the .416 rigby and aprox. 80m from there he made a follow up to settle the hunt. He had gotten a nice 39" bull with decent boss and curves just the way he wanted it.

Man recalling stuff from that Zambia hunt sure feels nice. One of the evenings just as the fire was burning out and we where heading for the tents/huts a lion started roaring . It wasn't particular close but still the sound was really something. We had no luck finding a buff for me the next day, however on the way back to camp we spotted a male and female chobe-bushbuck. We got out of the landcruiser and began the stalk. I connected on an anchoring shot, and for some time I sat and admired this pretty antelope. I actually failed to notice that the rest of our group had put their attention to something else. I was quite suprised as I heard the .300 WM fired once more. It just so happens that around the corner from where my bushbuck fell a herd of puku's was standing in the tall grass. A nice male presented itself and my father and I got a very nice sort of a double in between us.



Following day we where on a small pack of buffalos. We followed them for a handfull of hours until we arrived at a small waterhole. At this time we where cathing up with the herd however there where so many tracks at this place that it we lost the track for some time. Quickly though the trackers made a plan to look for fresh tracks leading away from the whole at in a slightly bigger radiues. This showed good results and we where back on track. As we got closer the PH and trackers made us move fast in a half circle that had us slightly ahead of the herd. Few minutes later the bushes opened and the herd was moving slowly at 40 yards just parallel to our position. Eventually the bull presented himself with an almost clean broadside. He ran less than 50 yards and the insurance was done but not needed.

Tracking hunts are nothing short of awesome :-)





As this was the last hunt for the season, few licenses where left and some miscommunications with our agency ment that we had no warthog and zebra licenses. My dad however finished the trip with a nice old impalaram.



We left a couple of daggaboys, or really they where seen outside of the area on the road to the nearest village

That's a lot of hunting! Thanks for sharing

Thanks for the sharing your stories and photos.

Great story.
Hold on.
:-)

Best wishes.

Why you quitted poker.? I love hunting and poker as well. Both produce adrenaline like not other thing.

right on Man. Great stories and pics. Keep on hunting, best there is. Take on Jumbo soon. Best rush I ever had

Great stories and pics. Thanks for sharing.

Love the pics - congrats on great hunts. AIU