Mason's First Safari

When I was in South Africa in 2009 I started planning for the day when I would take my son to experience the wonders of the Dark Continent.  I wanted to take him on Safari when he turned 16.   I discussed this with my good friend Gary Lewis, of Gary Lewis Outdoors, and Willem Gerhardt Van Der Gryp (Wighardt) the PH that we hunted with in 2009.  Over the last 5 years I had been eagerly anticipating the day when I could watch my young son enjoy the experience of hunting in that special place. 

I started last year by taking Mason out to shoot my Winchester Model 70 .375 H&H Magnum with Kales 1.1 x 4 scope.  This gun is the stainless and black synthetic stock model and has served me very well on many hunts.  Not only has it served me well, but on every hunt I have been on to date someone in my hunting party has borrowed my gun because it simply gets the job done.  I initially had a concern that Mason would not be able to handle the recoil of the .375 H&H and was considering a 30-06 as a backup plan.  I took him out to the range at our hunting lease and let him shoot it and he said he felt comfortable shooting it so we decided to opt for “old reliable”.  After sighting in we made several trips over the few months preceding the hunt for him to practice.  We practiced all of his shots off the sticks in both standing and sitting positions. 

We arrived in South Africa on July 8th, 2014.  We were hunting with my good friend and outdoor writer/producer, Gary Lewis and his camera man Sam Pike; Jim Linder, a childhood friend that I have known since I was 10 years old and Wighardt.  Our first stop was in the Orange Free State where we would spend the first day and a half hunting birds and waterfowl.  This was a wonderful experience and the details will be the subject of a later article. 

After we had our fill of the freezing cold temperatures in the Orange Free State and had an excellent time of quality wing shooting we headed to the Limpopo Region to hunt plains game animals.  We were near the border of Botswana and near the towns of Alldays and Pontdrif.  The area we were hunting had not been hunted in several years and we had reports that there were high quality trophy animals on the property.  The name of the lodge we stayed at was the Lucca Lodge.  We arrived at the lodge late in the afternoon of July 10th after a 7 hour drive from the Orange Free State.  Being further North the weather was much more temperate.  The lodge was first class.  It was situated on a large rock hill that overlooked the plains below with a watering hole at the base of the hill for wildlife viewing.  There was a beautiful fire ring and sitting area built into the side of the hill that allowed us to enjoy the view of the plains below.  There were a series of 6 huts with grass thatched roofs built into the hills as well that would serve as our lodging for the next 8 days.  Everything had recently been renovated when we arrived and we were the first guests to use the newly renovated accommodations that I would say were the equivalent luxury of a 5 star lodge.

The next morning we headed out to the range to check the zero on our rifles.  Once everyone was satisfied with the sighting of the rifles we headed out to the hunting area.  There were three professional hunters with us including Wighardt.  Mason and I were hunting with Corne Bossan and his tracker Evans.  I was not shooting on this trip, I was completely content hunting with my son and watching and helping him have the experience of a lifetime.  First on the docket was an Impala.  There was an abundance of good Impala Rams in the area and it was a good place to “break the ice” and this was also my first Africa animal taken.  While we were in the pursuit of the Impala we came across a beautiful 33 inch WaterBuck and spent the morning tracking it and trying to get close.  He was very wary and we were not able to close on him and headed back to the lodge to have lunch.  Later that afternoon we headed back out with the intention of hunting Impala and  were able to have several stalks and eventually closed the deal and Mason took his first African trophy, a beautiful 22 inch Impala Ram at about 80 yards in the thick bush.  It is a wonderful thing to see your 16 year old son make a good shot with perfect shot placement off the sticks and watch his face light up with excitement.  We prepared the animal, took pictures and returned to the lodge for a celebration by the fire and an excellent steak dinner. 

The next day we started out at about 7 a.m. with the intention of hunting Zebra.  Mason was excited about having a zebra skin rug for his room back home.  We spent most of the morning trying to put a stalk on a big stallion with two mares.  They were in a open area with a lot of space between the trees which made the stalking quite difficult.  We finally were able to get within 150 yards and decided to take the shot because the wind kept wanting to change directions.  He took a steady aim off the sticks and made an excellent shot.  The zebra stumbled and took off and ran 300 yards, practically in a circle and then fell dead.  He had made a perfect shot on the front shoulder with a quartering shot that went clean through and hit part of the heart and lung coming out midway on the opposite side.  Just goes to show how tough those African plains game can be. 

Once we finished with the pictures and loading of the animal we decided to take up pursuit of Blesbok as they were in the same area as the Zebra.  We glassed the heard and we decided to try to take a White Blesbok that was the largest male in the group.  We estimated it to be about a 16 inch mature animal.  We spent the better part of an hour trying to stalk and get within range and finally decided that he needed to take the shot as there were proving to be quite difficult to get close to.  Mason put the gun up on the sticks, and took a frontal shot.  The animal dropped in its tracks, did not take a step.  It ended up being a 175 yard shot, and in retrospect I believe I would have been nervous about him taking a shot at that range on the second day, especially a frontal shot on a small animal.  I had not realized it was that far away; that did wonders for his and my confidence in his shooting ability.  I have to admit I was a bit nervous about a 150 pound 16 year old shooting a .375 H&H magnum with a 300 grain bullet and 4 power scope, with no muzzle break and a lighter weight rifle at that.  I could not have been prouder of my son.    After lunch we moved on to an area with high concentration of Kudu with much thicker cover and saw a lot of quality animals, passing up shots on several as we wanted to concentrate on an excellent trophy. 

We spent the third day in the continued pursuit of the Grey Ghost.  We made many stalks and Mason enjoyed learning more about the craft of stalking and pursuing animals.  Corne did an excellent job in teaching Mason and letting him participate in the “hunting” of the animals and not just the “shooting”.  Corne also did an excellent job of letting us hunt for a quality trophy, passing up opportunities of several very nice bulls to let us experience the anticipation and challenge of going after the very best specimens.  The trigger was not pulled on the third day of the hunt, we went back to the lodge for fellowship with our friends and would be up early the next day to get after it again. 

On the fourth day we continued the pursuit of Kudu, walking for miles in the Kudu habitat, having many close calls, however never being able to “close the deal”.  At lunch we decided to try a new tactic and sit in a hide near a watering hole that we thought the Kudu may visit.   We made a few modifications to the hide and settled in to wait to see what came in.  Almost immediately a cow and two juveniles came in.  This was pretty nerve racking because I was certain she was going to blow our cover, as she looked like she was suspicious that something was not quite right.  They kept wandering in and out of the cover just on the edges of the water hole then finally came in and seemed to relax a bit more.  After what seemed to be an hour of this we heard movement behind the blind and three bulls came in.  They were mature bulls and they kept to the edge of the area in the bush, just giving us a glimpse of their horns.  We estimated one bull that may go 50 inches, the others in the 45 to 50 inch range.  Not quite the trophy we were looking for.  This went on like cat and mouse for what seemed like another hour.  I could tell Corne was getting impatient and he leaned over to me and asked me if I wanted to take a walk.  It was already about an hour and a half before dark and I suggested that we sit tight.  I had seen a group like this with four bulls, the fourth one being very big.  I suspected that there was bigger bull that may come in and would wait until right before dark before he moved in.  Not 10 minutes after Corne and I had had that discussion, I looked through the slot in the blind to the right and saw a huge bull coming straight in.  I thought he was going to walk straight in front of the blind at 15 yards; however he stopped short, made a right turn and went into the bush on the opposite side of the water hole.  He was about 40 yards from where we sat.  He was the one we were looking for.  He had deep curls and was very wide.  I think I was more nervous than Mason was.  He slowly stood up, put his gun on the sticks and watched through the scope for the perfect opportunity to take a shot.  He had to wait for 3 or 4 minutes to get a good shot though the bush.  He had to take a frontal and slightly quartering shot.  Corne whispered to Mason the proper shot placement and he squeezed off the trigger.  As he did the inside of the hide filled with smoke and dust and we heard the Kudu take off and then heard a large crash.  That was a good sign.  Mason was shaking from excitement, thankfully after he had pulled the trigger.  We left the blind and within a few minutes the tracker found his Kudu dead in the bush.  Mason had a beautiful 53 inch Kudu Bull. 

The following day we decided to take up pursuit of Gemsbok as we had seen some good mature bulls in the area.  These bulls liked to hang out in the same area as the Zebra and Blesbok, however they were very hard to get close to in the open area so we came up with a plan.  We noticed the general area that they liked to go to when pushed out of the open areas so we went into the bush on the edge of the open area and sent the tracker with the truck to “bump” them into the cover where we could track them and maybe get a chance for a shot.  The wind seemed to be in our favor on this day for that tactic if we could make it work.  We waited on the edge for quite a while and noticed the trackers were trying to push some animals towards us; however it was the wrong group of animals.  That group entered the bush about 100 yards from where we were staged and then later the bachelor group we were after started to move to the other side of us about 250 yards away and disappeared into the bush.  The plan did not work exactly as we envisioned; however at least the animals were in cover that we had a better chance of making a stalk than in the open area where they were previously.   We found the track of where they entered the bush and proceeded to track them.  This process took quite some time and we continued on for several miles into the thicker cover.  I was beginning to wonder if we would ever catch up to them, and then Corne whispered to me, “Do you know the word meandering?”  I told him yes I knew what meandering meant, so he said the tracker said they are relaxed now because they were not going straight anymore and were meandering from side to side in the bush.   About 10 minutes after this we caught a glimpse of one in the bush.  Corne set up the sticks behind a bush and had Mason take aim through a window in the brush ahead at an animal.  Corne instructed him not to shoot yet.  He told him that was not the bull we wanted, however he thought that one would move and the larger bull would step up into the same place.  We waited for a few minutes and the other bull moved up and Mason squeezed off.  Not long after the shot we heard the “crash” and we knew he had him.  We proceeded on the track and 30 yards in behind where the animal had stood laid his Gembok.  Mason had just taken his 5th African trophy.  He was beside himself with joy. 

Mason was now on cloud 9 and I could not be prouder of him.  All the pressure was now off because he had five beautiful quality trophies and had accomplished what he wanted to accomplish.  We loaded up the Gemsbok after pictures and we proceeded to the skinning shed to drop off his trophy for preparation.  While at the skinning shed we decided to check on a field that was close to the area for pigs.  When we checked the area out we saw some warthogs on the far side of the field.  We decided to make a stalk.  We took our time and were able to close to about 185 to 190 yards.  There was one decent pig in the group.  This area did not have exceptional warthog trophies; however this pig presented Mason with his longest shot of the trip so far and it was a respectable trophy.  We shortened up the sticks and he took the shot from a sitting position at 185 yards, broadside shot.  The pig dropped dead in his tracks.  Mason is now thinking that the .375 Winchester Model 70 has magical powers and he informs me that he want to hunt with it in Alabama for deer.  Corne had also taken a “liking” to my gun and was continually hinting at wanting to purchase it from me.  I would have considered it, as he would have loved to have that firearm; however I could not bring myself to do it because I believe it would have broken my son’s heart.  

We spent the rest of our time relaxing and trying to help my lifelong friend Jim get his Kudu.  He did get to shoot a nice bull; however the bullet deflected from hitting a limb and the animal was injured, but not mortally.  We spent two days tracking that animal before finally calling off the search.  On the last day Jim decided he want to take a long shot with this .375 H&H at an Impala.  We went with him and Mason took his rifle as well.  On the way to look for the Impala we came across the exceptional Waterbuck bull we had tried to stalk on the first day of the hunt and had not seen now in several days.  Being that it was an exceptional trophy I told Mason he could hunt him. The wind was right and he had not seen us and was feeding, by himself.   We proceeded to make a stalk on him.  We got within 250 yards of him and Corne wanted Mason to take the shot, as he was pretty difficult to get close to.  I was a little nervous about that shot on the last day and convinced him to try to get closer.  We were able to close the gap another 50 yards and the Waterbuck started to look a little nervous.  We decided it was now or never so Mason took aim on the sticks and squeezed off.  The animal went straight down.  As we approached and were within 30 yards he made an attempt to get up and he gave an insurance shot.  Mason had now bagged his 7th trophy.   He had a beautiful 33 inch Waterbuck bull.  That was certainly a great way to end a wonderful trip and shortly after that my friend Jim was able to make a 300 yard shot on his Impala Ram. 

I am sure this hunt will always be one of the most memorable hunts I will ever do.  I never pulled the trigger at a big game animal on this trip; however living this adventure, step by step with my 16 year old son, watching him become a man and watching him fall in love with the things I love is one of the highlights of my life.