African Safari 2012 - The update thread

[Rob]

Well, about 55 weeks ago, I made the decision to return to the Dark Continent.  And 39 weeks from today we will have returned from our first full day of hunting!  Somehow being in the same calendar year as the hunt makes a big mental difference.  Only 39 more Saturdays left to get ready for the trip!

Only a couple updates.
1.    I am 99% sure that I will be shooting the Cutting Edge Bullet BBW#13’s in Solid and HP configs on the hunt from both my 375 HH and 450 Dakota.  I pretty much have the 375 HH loads ready, although I may try to see if I can increase the velocity without decreasing the accuracy.  In a disturbing development, Barnes recently suspended their manufacturing of RN solids due to come conflicts with the BATFE and some ridiculous concern that they could be used in handguns as AP round…  Silly BATFE agents!  Anyway, in fear that this irrational stance could spread to other manufacture’s bullets, I picked up enough to allow me to mess with loads, bring to Africa, and have some left over to spare.  Anyway, I’ll spend some time over the next couple months working up loads for these two bullets.  The goal will be:  Develop a load for the 420 grain BBW#13 NonCon HP and 450 Grain BBW#13 Solid that are at least 2400 FPS, have Points of Impact at 50 and 100 yards that are +/- 1 inch of each other across both ranges, and group sizes of less than 1.5 inches at 100 yards.
2.   After about 8 months of waiting, I got a Christmas Present from Leupold!  Or rather, Bethany (My 450 Dakota) got an unexpected Christmas Present from Leupold…
I had been working with Leupold to get, via the HEI program, a VX6 1-6x24 scope for Bethany.  I had seen a prototype at the January SCI show in 2011.  I ordered one via the program, but they were not available yet.  Initially they were due middle of the year, then in September, then November, and finally Q1 2012.

All year I have been listening to Bethany whine and snivel about how she does not like her current VX3 1.5-5x24 scope and wanted the new VX6.  You know how women are…  Something about:
-All the other rifles in the cabinet who are ANYBODY, all have shiny new Leupolds on them
-How it offered true 1x magnification at low power that allowed for rapid target acquisition at close range
-How amazingly fast the target acquisition was with true 1x magnification which allows for the shooter to see front iron sight in full focus at the same time things 500 feet in the distance are also focus!
-How it can be easily used with both eyes open
-And most importantly, how TOTALLY much better the field of view would be given that at just 5 yards a full 6 feet is in the scopes FOV!  And furthermore how at 100 yards her VX3 only has a measly 68 foot FOV whereas the VX6 has almost twice the FOV with an UNREAL 114 feet!  More than any other Leupold scope!
-It also made her look fat (her words, not mine, I think she is beautiful)
Basically, If I really loved her, I’d get her a VX6.  Sheesh!  Such a princess

Anyway, I came home from work on the 22nd, and there was a package on my doorstep!  Merry Christmas from Leupold!  Finally there can be peace in the gun cabinet.  I pulled out the 30mm quick release Tally rings that had been sitting in a drawer for 6+ months waiting for this day, lapped them and fit Bethany with her new scope.  Victoria (a more practically minded 505 Gibbs that was up until now, scope-less) was the proud recipient of Behthany’s Vx3.   I simply love the new scope. I had a rather difficult time getting it sighted in though.

My in-laws were in town for Christmas and wanted to learn to shoot-having never fired rifles before.  So the morning of Christmas Eve we headed over to Kenmore for a couple hours.  I brought Bethany who was sporting her new scope.  Once I got them set up on the .22 lr, and a 204 ruger, I snuck in a few rounds with Bethany.  First shot at 100 yards was not on paper.  I did it again with the same results.  I removed the bolt and sighted down the bore, and when I moved to the scope, it too was pretty much on the bull’s-eye.  I took aim at the bottom of the target and proceeded to cover the entire target with mud splatter from where the 6,500 foot pounds of energy generated by the Barnes RN solid hit the dirt below the target…  I took a few more shots and finally gave up for the day since I really needed to focus on the in-laws and we were on a timeline (the Little Lady arranged for all of us to catch a play at the 5th Avenue theater - Cinderella, oh Joy! It was not bad actually…)  Anyway, I got back to the range the following weekend and tried again-only at 50 yards this time.  First shot, again, did not hit the target.  I took a second shot low and saw dirt move in front of the target.  Assuming I was low, I took aim at the top of the target holder and finally found the bottom of the target.  So it was about 25 inches low at 50 yards.  Two more shots and I was in the bull.  I moved to the 100 yard range and adjusted down 3 inches to be dead on at 100 yards. 

The first photo is the VX3, the second one is the VX6.

So now I am all set to get moving on load development!

[fvh40]

Hi Rob
I usualy start at 25m and then move back, don't waste expensive amo. My 

Ferdi

[Rob]

Makes sense Ferdi.

I have just never had a rifle I bore sighted not even hit paper at 100 yards before.  (and my range does not have a 25 yard rifle range either so 50 or 100 yards were my only close range options)

The ammo is not cheap, but I do reload which makes it affordable.  There is no way I could afford it if I bought pre-loaded ammo.  The only place I can find it for sale pre-loaded charges 11 dollars per shell.  I was shooting A-frames.  Bullet costs $1.28, powder runs about 42 cents, primer is about 3 cents, making a reloaded round about $1.75. 

More than say a 30.06, but still pretty affordable over all.  I'll be more conservative with the Cutting Edge Bullets as they run closer to 2.50 per shell loaded. 


Ferdi, any chance you will be at the Dallas Safari Club show next weekend?  I am headed there with my Dad. 

[fvh40]

I bought 2 packs of factory load 375 ammo just to get cases, will do some reloading myself.
Rob,I have to much work to do with my Buffalo and Sable herds that I won't make it to the Shows this year, would have been nice to meet some members there

Ferdi

[MidgetIdjit]

So it was about 25 inches low at 50 yards.  Two more shots and I was in the bull.  I moved to the 100 yard range and adjusted down 3 inches to be dead on at 100 yards. 

I didn't realize you had to adjust nearly 50 MOA to get on target! I figured you were shooting at your typical 3" targets and missing. 

Something's not right there. Methinks that the new scope is allergic to Bethany. Perhaps it should find a new home. Say on a 350RM?

[Rob]

So it was about 25 inches low at 50 yards.  Two more shots and I was in the bull.  I moved to the 100 yard range and adjusted down 3 inches to be dead on at 100 yards. 

I didn't realize you had to adjust nearly 50 MOA to get on target! I figured you were shooting at your typical 3" targets and missing. 

Something's not right there. Methinks that the new scope is allergic to Bethany. Perhaps it should find a new home. Say on a 350RM?

Letmethinkaboutthatforasecond,no thanks!

[Rob]

Back from the Dallas Safari Club show.  My Dad and I spent an hour or so with the PH and booking Agent, and then went over and talked to Shawn Kennedy of Gracie Travel.  We got our travel all booked.  We are good to go!

More on that later.  Next post is my notes from the event.

Left to right:  Me, Terry Anders, Mark Young, my Dad.

[Rob]

 
Meeting notes from Dallas Safari Club Convention
Thursday January 5th, 2012
10 am to 11:30 AM:  Mark Young of ACST and Terry Anders of Savuli Safaries
Shawn Kennedy of Gracy Travel (12:00 pm & 3pm

General Notes
Weather
•   Expect Hot 90 to 100 degree weather.  (I did not ask about humidity-I will do so).
•   This is the end of the rainy season so we can expect to have the hottest weather, and the least amount of vegetation. 

Terrain
•   Terrain is rolling hills with valleys and a few rugged “mountains” in the middle.
•   Roads in this concession are a bit different than others.  Most concessions are set up in grids.  On Savuli, however, due to both the terrain and fact that the roads were created by cattle ranching activities, they tend to meander around a lot more.
•   The terrain allows Savuli to hold more water during the hot season so many animals that are not found there in the cooler weather are found there in high numbers in September/October. 
•   Once the rains start, many animals leave Savuli and head to the flatter plains land.
•   The high “mountains” on the land will hold Kudu and Zebra due to good grazing grasses that grow there.

Typical day
•   Typical Agenda:
    o   Get up pre-dawn and have a light breakfast
    o   Hunt till 10 or 11 am and return to camp for lunch and a rest
                During the heat of the day, the animals disappear and are difficult to find making hunting less productive.
    o   Return to the field in the afternoon and hunt till dark.
•   Night hunts can be done if desired.

Videography
•   Terry can arrange for a professional Videographer to tape our hunts if wanted.
•   Cost is 200 per day per videographer.  Can be shared with different folks if desired.

Clothing
•   Due to the heat, cotton is best.
•   Heavier cotton is nice so that it deflects brush and thorns better.
•   Wear light tans / olives-dark Olive is too dark for the vegetation this time of year (per Terry)
•   Terry wears Camo so bringing one camo shirt would not be a bad thing.
•   Long sleeves that can be rolled up are nice

Bugs
•   No tsetse flies
•   There are some mosquitos-not lots of them though
•   Malaria pills are good of course
•   We will be sleeping under mosquito nets.

Side trips
•   If there is a desire to do a side trip, Terry can arrange one for us.
•   Suggestion was Victoria falls.
    o   Drive back to Bulawayo, then drive another 5-6 hours to Vic Falls.
    o   From there, spend a couple days of sightseeing (Devils pool is accessible this time of year)
    o   Fly back to Jo-Berg from Vic Falls.
•   We did not price this out as we were not interested, however I would assume there would also be a flight change fee to do this since our flights are booked..

Firearms and ammunition
•   Not necessary to bring many solids
    o   They will probable only be used for Buffalo and possibly Giraffe.
    o   As stated in the Varmint Section, consider a few solids if you want to take and mount any of the small game like varmints or members of the “tiny ten”.
•   450 Dak/375 HH combo is fine for Rob.
•   416 Rigby/7mm SAUM is fine for Jerry. 
•   Mark feels the 350 Rem Mag Novelty cartridge will do wonders with a 225 to 250 grain bullet on plains game.
•   Not sure what Ray’s second rifle will be, but I stated I thought it might be a 308.  Terry said that would be perfect.
•   It is perfectly acceptable to bring 3 rifles
•   Ammo must be limited to 5 Kilos total
•   There is a shotgun and shells in camp we can use if we want too.

Notes on animals
Trophies
•   Per Mark, we may want to consider having some of the skins tanned in Africa.
•   For example, tanning the Giraffe skin there will significantly reduce the weight for shipping it back to the States.
•   I would want assurances that they tan skins, not pickle them and I would want to talk this out with Huffaker.

Buffalo
•   Expect to walk 4-5 miles a day maximum
•   Buffalo will be in the lower valleys and flatter areas.
•   Terry seemed to prefer we use expanding bullets for first shot-if not all shots.

Crocodile
•   Expect shots as far as 100 yards
•   Any firearm that you can shoot accurately will be fine including the 375 HH
•   Use expanding bullets
•   The process is:
    o   They contact locals from the populated areas, and find out where the Crocodile sightings have been
    o   They go to the areas that are said to have “big ones” and set out baits
                Big is relative to the villagers-They tend to view any croc as big
    o   If the areas with the crocs are in sparsely populated region, they will leave trail cams on the bait.
    o   They return and either check the cams, or look at tracks to determine if a hunt-able croc is present and hunt accordingly.
    o   10 to 11 foot crocs are the expected sizes

Nyala
•   These are hunted by stalking them along the river banks.
•   They are not nocturnal.

Varmints  (Caracal, civit, Genet, Porcupine, Honey Badger, etc).
•   These are strictly animals of opportunity
•   Mostly hunted at night with lights by driving around or putting out bait.
•   Caracal are very rare to see and do not bait well
•   If you have lights that you wish to bring, I’d recommend doing so.
•   They have truck based spotlights if needed
•   Jerry has a scope mounted green light that Terry indicated would be an asset to look for animals off the road.
•   If you want to shoot varmints with a plan to mount them, and don’t bring a varmint gun (or even if you do), and you may want to consider solids as they do less damage to the pelts.
•   Terry was happy to set up night hunts for us.

Hyena
•   Good chance to get a Hyena if you want one.
•   They are mostly baited in at night
•   These are quota animals and he only gets one
•   If anyone wants it, best to speak up ASAP, otherwise it may not be available in October.

Getting There
Travel Schedules
•   We need to plan to arrive in Bulawayo as early as possible on the 30th of September.
•   We will take the 5-6 hour drive from there to camp, and, time allowing, sight in so we can hunt on the 1st of October. 
•   For our arrival flight, we will want to check our bags to Jo Berg as we need to collect them and take them to our rooms the first night.
•   On the return trip we should check them all the way back to our final destination so we do not need to mess with them in Jo-Berg on the way home.
•   Due to our stopover in Jo-Berg on the way to Zimbabwe, we will need to get letters of invitation from Terry to allow us through customs in South Africa.
    o   Terry is aware of the need for this and can take care of it-but we will need to make sure this happens.
    o   I am checking with Mark to determine the best way to get these.
•   We will stay at the hotel in the Jo-Berg Airport so we do not need ground transportation.  We can walk to it.
•   Our flights will all route to Atlanta where we will meet up and take the long trip to Jo-Berg.
•   Economy Plus will give us an extra 4 inches of leg room, and seats that recline further.  $320 dollars round trip for the upgrade.
•   Gracy Travel representatives will meet us at the gate in Jo-Berg
    o   They will escort us through Security and clear our rifles.
    o   I think they do this for the check in the next morning as well (need to check on this).
•    Gracy Travel has an emergency phone.  Should anything go wrong, anytime of day, we are asked to call this # for assistance.  (i.e. trouble checking rifles, lost luggage, canceled or rescheduled flights, etc)
•   I recommend checking our cell plans to see if they will work in Jo-Berg and Bulawayo so we have it for emergency purposes.

Rifle Permits in South Africa
•   Gracy Travel will take care of this for us and will send us the paperwork and do the pre-clearing of our guns in South Africa
•   We need to get the paperwork to them no later than 4 month prior to our departure.  (i.e. May 28th).
•   There is a form that we need to get filled out at the Department of homeland Security.  This must be done in person.  There is an office in DT Seattle.
•   We need to send in payment for this at the time we return the forms (135 per person with rifles, plus 80 for meet and escort services that can be split 4 ways)

Insurance
•   Three levels of coverage.  Note that the costs below may not  be 100% accurate as we did not look at them too closely.  They also vary based on age.
    o   Cancelation insurance of airline plus medical evac and care R170, J 460)
                Since we booked more than 30 days after our safari was booked, no pre existing conditions are counted for us.
                Booking this early is advisable as should anything occur to make you need to cancel for medical reasons, it will not be covered if it happens prior to you booking
    o   Cancelation of hunt insurance (illness inability to travel ue to death of immediate family member, terrorist act (not military, Civil or political unrest).  This was about 1,000 for Jerry
    o   Change your mind insurance – for any reason you can cancel and get ½ the trip back (can’t recall if it was airfare only, or deposit) another 1,000

[Rob]

Well, if the trip was not feeling real before, it sure is now!  Something about having airline tickets in hand and paid for makes it seem like there is no going back.
Ray, his dad and I will leave Seattle at 9 am on Friday 9/28.  From there we will meet up with Dad in Atlanta.  We will leave Atlanta at 8:35 PM and fly non-stop to Johannesburg South Africa, arriving at 6:25pm local time.

We have arranged with Gracy travel to have them meet us at the gates and walk us through the rifle permitting process for South Africa. They will then escort us to  a hotel in the airport where we will stay the night. 

The next day (9/30) we will catch a 10:40 AM flight to Bulawayo Zimbabwe and land around 12:05pm.  We will be met at the gate by our PH and taken on a 5-6 hour trip via truck to the hunting camp arriving around 7pm or so.  If it is possible, we will sight in our rifles that night.  Otherwise we will take care of that in the morning. Either way we will be hunting the morning of 10/1!

I did not really want to overnight in Jo-Berg, but should bags or rifles be delayed, it will give us a day to allow them to catch up with us so I guess that is good insurance.
Total travel time, doorstep to camp will be from about 5am Pacific on 9/28 to 9 am Pacific on 9/30, so 52 hours!
No overnight on the way home, so that trip should be, depart camp 7pm Pacific on 10/10/12, arrive home 3pm Pacific on 10/12 for a total of 40 hours
Costs:
Tickets with travel insurance:  ~2950
Rifle Permits + gate meet:  ~165 per person
Overnight in Jo-Berg:  ~100 per person
Travel to Camp:  ~400 per person
Total:  $3,615 Dollars.  My original estimate I think was around 3500 for all these expenses, so That’s not too bad overall.

[Rob]

Some photos from the DSC.

This was my first trip there.  I was not as impressed with the DSC show as I was with the SCI shows I have been to in Reno.  Although from a functionality perspective, I got everything I needed from the show for a 20 dollar entry fee vs. the couple hundred dollar entry fee of the SCI show. 

Regardless, it was a lot of fun to go.  I did not take too many photos this time around.  The taxidermy was good, but there were not the amazing mounts that one sees at the SCI show.

[MidgetIdjit]

Gonna get your Giraffe mount done like the second one? I really like the natural eating position.

[Knocker of rocks]

•   Malaria pills are good of course
•   We will be sleeping under mosquito nets.

Africa is awesome.  I don't know if you have ever been to Africa, or ever taken anti-malarial medicine.  I would discourage anyone from taking Lariam.  I took it three times, and after the third time, I was done with it.  Fortunately, I had another course available to me.

My girlfriend continued with Lariam, and had years of depression and other issues which were not there prior to her two months of Lariam

http://www.askapatient.com/viewrating.asp?drug=19591&name=LARIAM
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2002/oct/24/health.lifeandhealth
http://www.lariaminfo.org/support/quotes.shtml

I don't make this recommendation lightly, and I hope you take it seriously.  If you have used Lariam successfully before, that is good and fortunate.  I hope this helps

[Rob]

Yeah, pretty sure I am going to go with the tree eating position...  I especially liked the realistic tounge grabbing leaves...

Regarding Malaria pills, I had not heard of the issues you describe.  Last time I went with doxacycline and I was planning on doing the same this time.    Thanks for the input.

[Knocker of rocks]

Malarone seems like the standard anti-malarial prescription for sub-Sahara Africa.  It is a daily dosage, and can upset the stomach and may cause issues at altitude, which won't be a problem unless you go to the Ruwenzori's, Kili, Mt's. Kenya or Longonot  .

If your med is prescribed as an anti malarial, and the Doc is familiar with travel medicine, you should be fine.  Travel med is something totally different than many doctors are familiar with, so don't be shy about consulting a specialist.  King County has a good system, although not as good as in years past.  The specialized Travel Medicine clinic at UWMC has been closed, and patients are now referred to the KCHD.

The thing to remember, if you feel bad on your return, to notify any Doc that you have been to Africa.  It is not uncommon for the patients who unfortunately pass away from malaria in the western world to not tell their doctor that they were recently in Africa or Asia.  By the time the test show a exposure to malaria (or dengue fever, TB, etc), valuable time has been lost

[Rob]

Good advise.

I plan to return to the Travel nurse I met with in 2007 to get ready for that trip.  He was over in Juanita, and did a great job of preparing me last time. 

I could not agree more - one needs to go to someone who specializes in travel.  They have access to, and know how to utilize, additional resources than others.