BOTSWANA: Another NKWE SAFARIS Adventure

Werty

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This is my second trip with @NKWE SAFARIS. My two brothers and sister-in-law were there in May 2022. We had such a great time that my dad, brother @Aaron.F and I went back this time.
I left Bozeman MT a few days earlier to hang with my family before the big trip. It was nice to have a little of a break between all the flights and to repack and shoot my bow and rifles before the big flights.

We flew from Detroit to Atlanta, Atlanta to Johannesburg, Johannesburg to Maun Botswana. All the flights went well till Air Botswana canceled our flight and connected us to Airlink. Unfortunately there was an issue with getting our guns onto Airlink so we missed our flight the next day. We eventually got it sorted out. I would like to thank Henry at Rifle Permits for the quick response and willingness to come help us out, if we needed to leave a gun in South Africa.

We had too push back our helicopter ride with Helicopter Horizons back to last flight of the day which worked out great. Jaco who is NKWE Safaris picked us up from the airport and took us to Maun Lodge to drop our things and run us back to the airport for our Okavango Delta tour. The Delta was very low compared to the last time we were there. They are in a very serve drought right now and it shows. After our flight, we went back to the Maun Lodge where we had a very good buffet and they had a traditional native dance for an evening show. This was Wednesday 17th of July.

We got up early Thursday morning so Jaco could take into Moremi Reserve for a game drive for the day. We didn't see any predators or Cape Buffalo, but we saw everything else. It took awhile to get to where the water was finally flowing in, you could tell it had just started. Those drives are long but worth every second.

Friday morning found us up early so we could breakfast and get on the road to Ghanzi to NKWE Safaris camp. Its a couple of hours to Jaco's camp. We were informed that once we get to camp, we will get our luggage to our tents, eat lunch, shoot rifles and head out that evening to hunt. My brother and I talked that we both would be hunting with our father, so one day your solo and the next your hunting with dad.

Jaco and I went to a waterhole and set up a ground blind. It was nice to finally be hunting and not running from here to there, which anyone who has done this understands. We had a couple of small warthogs come in at 20 yard and Jaco told me to pick one to shoot. I brought my video camera with me and Jaco was able to get the shot on video, the pig ran 90 yards and pile up.

That evening my father and brother went out with Quentin, nothing was harvested.

Saturday Jaco and I go to a property I haven't been too, north of Ghanzi, its an awesome property, very large and also has enclosed blinds. We sit a couple of blinds through out the day with lots of animals, but I'm really after a Kudu bull with my bow. With darkness approaching we notice an old broken tusk boar coming to the waterhole, Jaco says to take him. The boar is only 20 yards and after looking at the footage of the video it shows I shot just under him. Fortunately for me the boar ran around the waterhole and I was able to double lung him at 32 yards and he ran off. With it getting dark we decide to push it and go after him. We jumped him from laying on his side, he runs a hundred yards and lays down and is about dead, but I put a finishing shot into him so he doesn't suffer.

Dad and brother went out with Quentin, Dad was able to shoot his first Kudu bull and he was proud as he should be.

Sunday Dad and I are hunting with Quentin. We make some stalks on Impala and Wildebeest, but couldn't seal the deal. We ended up sitting a waterhole for kudu that evening with no luck.
Jaco and Aaron went out and were successful, they got a Gemsbok and nice Waterbuck.

Monday morning finds Dad, Jaco and I on the property north of Ghanzi, making our first stalk on a real nice Kudu bulls. We put a 3/4 of mile stalk on these bulls, we get about 300 yards for the bulls, he gets on the sticks and makes a shot but you can hear a ricochet. We look for blood but nothing.
We make our way back to the 2 track and truck. We drive maybe 1/2 mile and look to our left a there standing is a really nice Kudu bull. Jaco tells my Dad to grab is gun and get ready. I grab my camera and start to record. The truck stops and Jaco says take him! Dad puts the gun up and settles the scope and boom! The bull drops in his tracks. We all jump out of the truck and run up to the bull which is 250 yards or so. Dads shot was a little hi, so he puts another one in him to put him down. This is probably most excited I have ever seen my dad, which is an awesome thing to experience. This bull measured out to 58'' which doesn't really matter, just a beautiful bull.
We spend the rest of the day hunting waterholes, chasing the elusive Kudu with a bow, and nothing showed. Still a great day of hunting, spent with my Dad.

Hope you enjoy!
will add more later
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Excellent! NKWE sure has been providing some great hunts.

And has knocking down some outstanding Kudu for sure!

Looking forward to the rest…

:A Hi Five:
 
Excellent! NKWE sure has been providing some great hunts.

And has knocking down some outstanding Kudu for sure!

Looking forward to the rest…

:A Hi Five:
 
Nice kudu bull for your dad, congrats
 
Fantastic start. Looking forward to the next update.
 
Tuesday finds us hunting Jaco's camp. I'm hunting with Jaco and Aaron is hunting with Quentin. I've decide to hunt with a gun for the day. We head out to were we keep seeing a giant of an Impala ram. We put a couple of stalks on the thing but just can't seem to get the right angle and there on to us. It finally happens the Ram stands in the open with shooting stick up and gun across. I'm taking aim only to have a spider web and spider crawling across my face and shooting eye. I'm wiping my face and Jaco is telling to me "shoot, shoot him, what are you doing, shoot. I can't ". We were never able to get on that ram again, it had way to many ewe's with him.

We put a stalk on some wildebeest, but with no luck. During the stalk we did come upon Eland and Zebra. I'm unfortunately not interest is shooting them. I will admit, I would have shot the Zebra if I would have had my bow, we stalked with in 30 yards of a herd, with nice stallion.

After we eat lunch and take a rest, we head out to hunt the cattle ranch. Where we seen an absolute giant Kudu Bull in the headlights headed back to camp Monday night.

On our way out, a nice Steinbok is standing on the side of the 2 track, we stop and I shoot it, not my best work though. I knew I hit it, I hit low, shooting its front right leg and left rear leg off. It runs 200 yard and we finish it off. They can definitely cover some ground on 2 legs.

That evening we had a nice Kudu bull come out of the thicket about 150 yards, but Jaco said we can do better. There were a few Kudu cows and a small bull at the other end of the 2 track for most of the evening. We also saw Warthog, Guineafowl, Jackal and another Steinbok.

My Dad started to not feel well Tuesday morning and unfortunately never hunted the rest of the trip.
Aaron ended up getting a Wildebeest.

Wednesday finds us on a different part of the property north of Ghanzi. Jaco and I take my bow and go sit a waterhole that they have seen a real nice Kudu. We aren't there long before a bull Wildebeest and a bunch cows come in. We are holding out for a Kudu. Two Kudu bulls come in from the side of the blind to drink, but no shot do to no window there. We have a really good bull come in, but hangs up 100 yards out in the brush, I think he seen the camera lens. He stayed there for 20 minutes just looking. A few Gemsbok come in to drink.

Its time to go to a different blind, as we are headed out to the other blind. Standing next to the 2 track are the 2 Kudu bulls from earlier. If I would have had my release strapped on, I could have shot one. We drive forward and I get my release on and make a stalk, I got to with in 35 yards, no shot do to brush. So back into the truck and off to another blind.

We get the blind/waterhole I tell Jaco "I'm taking a nap, he gets first shift" he agrees. I wake up 45 minutes later and nothing has come into the waterhole, except the 3 ostrich that were there when we got there. I tell Jaco its his turn to nap ( getting up at 5:30am and not going to bed till 10:00 pm starts to make days long after a week). I'm watching the Ostriches slowly work there way to the waterhole. I mean its taking them 30 minutes to go 80 yards. They start to drink and I get up to look around and unbeknownst to me and Kudu bull had come into the waterhole from the side and was drinking 20 yards away. How he came in and I didn't hear him, still amazes me. I reach over and grab Jaco and show him the bull. Says grab your bow and shoot him. I dip below the window crawl to my bow that is on the other side of the blind. Jaco reaches up and presses record on the camera. There is some mesh on the side of the blind windows that allows you to see through. As I grab my bow and draw. I see the bull look up into the blind. I freeze, the bull relaxes and starts to walk in front to my shooting window. At full draw I slide to the left and put my first pin on his shoulder. I'm waiting for the bull to clear the Ostriches I don't want to hit one with a pass through. The bull is finally clear and I squeeze my release trigger. I watched the bull react to the shot and run back the way he had come. I did see the bull do a lunge and kick out which is usually a good sign.

Jaco and I are on cloud nine, the timeline in which all of this has taken place has been 60 seconds or so. I'm finally processing everything and letting the nerves wear off. As I start to replay the shot in my head I start to think I may have shot a little back, reviewing the camera footage it shows. The bull was walking and I never followed through with my shot, I stopped when I released my arrow. The footage shows I had a quartering away, the entrance was back but the exit should be good, just behind left shoulder.

We call the trackers, they arrive, I grab a gun just in case and we start trailing it. We go maybe 80 yards and find a small pool of blood where it stood, good sign. We go maybe 50 yards and there it goes running. I can't get a shot. The trackers take up the track, I will say this, there was decent blood in the tracks. We trailed this thing for at least 3/4 of a mile or more. We see it a couple of times, I take a couple of 300 yard shots just trying to slow it down, but no luck. Finally its wounds are starting to show its in thick brush maybe 100 yards away I get a Texas heart shot. I hit a little to the right, he goes 50 yards and turns broadside. I get settled for a shot and Jaco goes this is our last bullet make it count. I settle the crosshairs on the right front shoulder and squeeze the trigger, the bull trots 20 yards and drops over. Finally a sigh of relief. Not the way I was wanting this to go down, but Kudu down. I definitely have mixed emotions.

I have to give credit to Jaco, before we went to the last waterhole, I told him lets forget the bow and grab the gun. He said "give it this last blind". I thank him for that.

It was a great day and great evening

Aaron went hunting with Quentin and they got an Eland

Thursday find Aaron and I hunting with Jaco. This is our first time hunting together in Botswana even though this is our second trip together here.
We are hunting the property North of Ghanzi. We aren't on the Property very long when we look over and see some Gemsbok, we stop and get the binoculars out and see that 2 of the Gemsbok have run off, but the 3rd one is standing there. It is definitely unique to say the least. Jaco says to bad you guys want trophies, that would be a good non typical. My brother goes " I will shoot that".

So the hunt begins. we bail off the truck and go maybe a couple hundred yards. I'm behind my brother with the camera. There he is standing broadside, Jaco sets up the stick and Aaron puts the rifle up takes aim and shoots. The Gemsbok which is 150-200 yards away, buckles from the shot, pivots around on its front half. Looks like a great shot. We watch the Gemsbok carry its right front shoulder as it goes away. We get to where the bull was standing and are having trouble finding blood. The trackers get on the track and start trailing it( watching the Bushman trackers work is amazing, its like magic!). We run out of blood and start finding bone from the shoulder, we bumped this bull a couple of times, lost the tracks in rocks, manage to stay on the trail. We have been on his trail for at least an hour and half. Finally we see the bull and he is hurting, he is standing in a thicket (which there is no lack of in Botswana) and Aaron is able to get a finishing shot. I was able to get this all on film. This Gemsbok is a cool looking animal. Aaron can finally breath, he was definitely getting worried. We get his animal loaded. Aaron says he is officially done hunting, its all me.

Aaron told me he was a little concerned for me with how long it took to get his animal, because we were kind of hunting for me today. I told him jokingly " don't worry, I'll make my quick"! HAHA!

We drive maybe 15-20 minutes come around the corner and there is standing 8-10 Wildebeest bulls. The truck stops the bulls start milling around, looking like they are about to run. Jaco says grab the gun and shoot the one standing broadside. The bull is standing maybe 100 yard and I put the scope on his right front shoulder low and squeeze the trigger. The bull humps, runs 30 yards and starts spinning circle, goes down! Its a beautiful bull!

We jump back into the truck and head out to find a Impala ram. We go to a couple of waterholes that are known to have Impala around. We don't go far and as we round a corner there is a ram that appears to be good, but goes out of sight. I grab the gun and get ready just in case he heads back towards the ewes. I hear Jaco say there he is and take him. I put the scope on his shoulder and squeeze. The ram springs up and runs, definitely hit hard. We go to where the ram was last seen and there he is 50 yards away. The biggest ram I seen all week of hunting.

It was 27 minutes from shooting my Wildebeest to my Impala ram. When I joked about making it quick, who knew.

This hunt was an amazing time with my family! I wish my dad didn't get sick, we still don't know what he got. He is ok now, so that is good. The guy made it Africa and killed a 58'' Kudu which is amazing.
Hope you all enjoy!
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Congratulations, what an oryx !
 
I agree they are the best. I am sure there are many outfits that do a great job, but I just find it difficult to go with anyone else. There prices are really reasonable as well, specifically there cull prices. As you can see above I shot a couple of culls and appreciate the ability to do so and the cost effectiveness of it as well.
 
I need to go back. I flubbed a stalk on a huge Eland and I really want to get after the Kudu in rut. It’s a unique place for sure.
 
Congrats, great hunt

That non typical Oryx is fantastic !
 

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