NAMIBIA: Westfalen Hunting Safaris

[lpace]

That was my favorite story so far, kinda colorful! Nice kudu! I like the ones with that horn configuration. I have been to Africa twice, kudu none.....

 

[Scott Slough]

Great hunt and report so far. Love the kudu and the kids!

 

[accipiter]

Congratulations on a great hunt! It reminds me of the great experience I had at Westfalen. Because I was there in the off-season I stayed at the other lodge (near John's main home).

I am enjoying your report and look forward to more photos of your trophies. Thanks for sharing!

 

[MMAL]

You know this dreaming about a safari, planning for a safari, packing for a safari, going on a safari, and now reporting on a safari is really crushing my productivity at work.

Sat. July 30th, 2016

Again the plan was an animal for my daughter. We headed back to Westfalen proper as I will call it. We entered the property and headed to a different section. We easily spotted a gemsbok and the stalk for my daughter began. As stated, I was not invited but after 15 minutes they were back with us unsuccessful.

We then headed to a different waterhole that you could sneak up to from behind an earth dam and into a blind they set up on top. Cresting the top we spotted a number of gemsbok, springbok, baboons and warthogs. A pretty springbok came to the far side of the hole; my daughter was excited that the horns coming together like teenagers do now with their hands to create a heart. I wasn’t gonna tell her any different, if she was happy, I was happy. She found a good rest on the blind and was able to take the time she needed. She dropped him in his tracks at about 110 yards. Her first animal ever, complete with her war paint.

Blind in the background.

It was only 9am by the time we loaded the springbok in the truck, we drove to another spot, jumped out of the vehicle and headed to another koppie to spot. Renout took the springbok not to camp but to John’s main house to be processed. I thought that was great as it maximized hunting time when needed or wanted. In addition, I was personally amazed that we didn’t have to drag, game sled, or skin any animal in the field. Every time Gideon/Renout got the truck to the animal. It must have been my kids and my amazing shooting!!!!!!!!!

Around lunch time we headed back to the blind over the waterhole to eat our lunch in a cool, shady spot. Up in the blind we saw a number of animals including a mature gemsbok. He was at the salt lick that was 250 yards away, so we waited until it came to the water. Of course it didn’t, walking slightly away, we finally got it to stop at @275, one shot from my 300 win mag and he ran @50 yards before he was piled up. On a side note, my son was filming the hunt but filmed the completely wrong gemsbok. We laughed then and we laughed again as we watch the video over dinner when right before the video stops you hear him state, “I… I… I think I was on the wrong animal!”

So again we loaded him in the vehicle, Renout again took him back to the main house to be processed and we headed back to the blind to finally start our lunch. While we were eating, not 20 minutes later at the same damn waterhole, a zebra walks up to the watering hole. We can tell he is old, as zebras are not normally in this area. The PH suggests he was probably kicked out of the herd. My son starts pleading with me to change his list and to add a zebra. He had been looking for a Hartebeest as his last animal and I let him change and take the zebra. The first shot was perfect from @120 yards and the animal took two steps and fell. Only he wasn’t finished. He got up and starting walking away. 20 yards and at least two minutes later he finally turned broadside for the finishing shot. Tough SOB as both shots from the 30-06 were good shots. Although the coat isn’t perfect, my son and I both loved the character and the marks of the old stallion. With three animals for three hunters from the same waterhole we decided to call it day by 2pm and headed back to camp.

Around 4:00pm, the whole family loaded into the two seater defender safari vehicle for a game drive and to rebait yet another two leopard sites. Nice way for the whole family to spend some fun time together.

 

[MMAL]

Sunday July 31st, 2016

We were well ahead of schedule on the wanted animals list so instead of the family going with John to Etosha National Park and I go hunting, I decided to drive them myself. An easy 1 ½ ride to the gate, all on paved roads. The park itself was great but not as great as truly wild animals. It was a much bigger Lion Country Safari down in Florida. Although it was great to see up close, huge herds of elephants, some rhinos, one lion and countless plain game, throughout the whole day I still had the feeling that I would rather be in a place with less animals but truly wild ones. Memorable for us as a family but one day is all we needed. Besides the windshield was cracked by a passing truck that threw a stone and the next morning we noticed a flat tire on the minivan. Not sure the rental car could take two days in the park.

Rhino, Elephant and Kudu in background.

My son learned to take the zoom lens of the camera and take a picture through the binoculars. The lion was up for three seconds and otherwise was camouflaged behind the bushes. I only found him watching the zebras that were weary of coming to the waterhole.

Monday August 1st, 2016

So we planned to hunt gemsbok for my daughter. Being a teenager you could see this waking up early stuff was not sitting well with her. This being her first hunt, I came to learn that she really likes hunting expect for the getting up early, staying quiet and remaining still parts. I expected that in the future hunting days, if she were successful, she was going to decide to sleep in from now on. I was right for once.

We headed to a different section of Westfalen proper and quickly spotted a mature gemsbok. My daughter was off on a stalk. I am not sure what happened as I was not invited. My son and I got comfortable in some shade but before we even fell asleep they were back.

Next the big koppie overlooking the waterhole 300+ yards away again.

The waterhole had a ton of gemsbok, warthog and springbuck around it. The stalk was planned and Gideon and my daughter headed off. It was really fun to watch from the elevated shaded position on the koppie we had. The wind must have swirled because suddenly the close gemsbok and all the warthogs were off in a flash. The rest of the animals, not sure what happened, just wandered off. The two continued into the blind set up over the hole, as Renout, my son and I scanned the vast land in search of any animals headed their way. After 10-15 minutes with animals spotted but none heading to the hole, Gideon and my daughter came back to the koppie. That was Gideon’s one and only mistake of the whole safari. As if some unheard water bell went off, not 10 minutes after getting back to the koppie the animals started piling back into the waterhole. Watching them pour in all I heard was Gideon mutter “I’m an asshole”. I could only laugh because up until then I had nothing to complain about in the first three days of hunting and by “mistakes” go this was minor.

Off they went again. And again they got spotted or winded. And again they got into the blind. Only this time they sat. 25 mins later we spotted more gemsbok and four kudu bulls coming to the water from different directions. My daughter got to see some show at the waterhole with kudu bulls and gemsbok all over the blind. Some bulls getting to within 10 yards. I wished she had the camera instead of me up on the koppie. Ultimately the mature cow they were looking to get a shot on, never presented a shot without another animal behind or in front of her. She next decided on a nice bull, and dropped it with one shot at 90 yards.

Loading the truck with the Gemsbok, Gideon surprised both my son and I by offering him a cull gemsbok for camp meat. To say he was excited was an understatement. We came to Africa with one animal each for them. But TIA. It was lunch time so we headed to our favorite blind to lunch and figure out what was next. Coming over the earth dam the waterhole was packed. A mature cow was on the salt lick at 254 and Gideon ask my son if he was comfortable at that distance. My son is up for anything when on scholarship as I like to say. It wasn’t his money if we didn’t recover the animal! So after finding a good rest on the blind edge he fired and the cow dropped. Nice shot even if I am little biased. We loaded the truck up with both gemsbok and headed to John’s house to drop off the animals and to finally have lunch under the veranda.

Again the meat processing room here was clean and professional. You can tell that John and Juliana know how to process and take care of the meat. I am sure this is part of the reason the meat in camp was excellent.

The 165 grain Hornady GMX bullets from both Gemsboks’ today. They performed well. Never recovered a ttsx from the 300 win mag,

After lunch and a siesta, we headed out to the north section of the property to hunt Hartebeest. Saw one group of cows but no bulls. Finally, at just about sunset we heard and spotted three bulls and some cows. We raced to the top of a koppie in hopes of spotting the bull. Somehow I ended up on top of a large boulder that was on top of the koppie that I don’t quite remember scaling. As last light enveloped us and the bull presented no shot I started to realize that I was on top of a boulder with no real clear way of getting down, at least getting down uninjured. I managed to slide, finger hold, toe crawl down while Gideon, part Mtn. goat, walked, skipped and jump his way down. Laughing back to the car, we headed back to camp for sundowners.

Back at camp, my older daughter and son were not the only hunting stories of the day. John had taken my wife and two younger kids out for a hunt for camp meat. It was a very nice thing for John to include the kids as they now felt like big kids on a real safari. Even though John did the shooting it didn’t stop my 7 yr old from donning war paint. My 4 yr old wanted nothing to do with it. As stated, John did not have to do that but throughout the whole safari John or Juliana constantly had something to do for the young kids and my wife who were back at camp. Although everyone going knew this was “my” safari, it certainly made it easier for me to enjoy it knowing everyone was having a great time.

Over dinner we discussed the next day hunt. Eland was not on my list of animals wanted only because at Westfalen it was advertised that they were only available under the high-fenced property John has access to. John and Gideon advised that a property that was part of the conservancy had free ranging eland currently and asked if I wanted a chance at them. Most certainly I said. Although AH was awesome at preparing me for what to expect on a safari, I did not read much about how many times your “list” will change. TIA.

Later in the evening I asked John why he didn’t advertise the eland as free range, I would definitely have had it on my list. He stated quite easily that we don’t have free ranging eland all the time so I don’t feel comfortable offering it on the website. It goes to the character of Westfalen, John, Juliana, Gideon and Jerome (booking agent) that as I look back at emails and notes of conversations leading up to the hunt, not one thing was promised or suggested that didn’t come true. If anything the end product that was delivered by Westfalen was better than advertised, not the other way around.

 

[cpr0312]

Great pics and trophies! Wonderful family memories made! Love the pics of the elephant and rhino together, really cool!

 

[MMAL]

Tuesday August 2nd, 2016

My older daughter had decided that sleep is more important, as expected. My son and I drove due west this time for about 30 minutes along rocky and rutted farm roads. Once again the landscape changed. To date, I have been on four different parts of Westfalen’s hunting property/concession and each one was a different terrain. The differences were stark in contrast. Ultimately we ended up at another farmer’s home. Only once I got home and consulted Google maps did I realize we were a full 9 miles as the crow flies from our camp and the entire trip we were on property we could hunt. In addition, since we started and throughout the whole week we did not see another hunter. It is nice to be the only party in camp and for a full safari not see any other hunters. Not something I am used to, and pretty impressive, at least to me.

We pulled up to the home and there next to the gate is their pet zebra! LMAO, TIA. My son petted the animal but had to stop because it kept trying to bite him. We picked up an additional farmhand and set of eyes and we were off to a waterhole to look for tracks.

While looking for the initial set of tracks, I was able to do something I did not even know I wanted to do. With Gideon and the two trackers following multiple sets of tracks, I was told to hop in the driver’s seat, head down the road to the dry river bed, follow it for a couple of kilometers and circle over to the next farm road, they would meet me there. For someone used to directions that usually include road signs, street names and some type of number, I initial thought these directions were a little vague, but nevertheless my son and I were off. I have a 30-year-old defender 110 in the states, I am not sure why this was never on my bucket list. But once I got behind the wheel and realized I was driving a defender, through a dry riverbed, in Africa, on safari! I put it on my bucket list and then check it off!

Corner of C35 and D2667 in Namibia where we were hunting Eland

Somehow we made it to the general vicinity of where Gideon was talking about, and shortly after shutting off the engine and comforting my son with “we will be alright, we have the food and water”, Gideon and the trackers showed up. We were off, following one of the sets of tracks. Renout was on the hood giving hand signals to Gideon on where to go. Being my first safari, I thought it great to see Renout’s ability to follow the tracks at a higher speed and their ability to communicate with no words. We followed the tracks both in the truck and on foot for the next two hours. We finally caught up to the eland only to find out that they were immature bulls and not what we were looking for.

Back to the water hole to pick up more tracks. This would be the second of multiple times we did this. The track following continued for most of the day through a quick lunch and into the afternoon.

Quick note; during the 10 minute lunch was the only time I encountered a flying insect. We had lunch by a shade tree in between two big boulders that sheltered the wind. The no-see-um’s or gnats were bad but again this was the only insect we encountered the whole safari. That was a big bonus for the whole family. Namibia in the winter, no biting INSECTS!

Back to the hunt, as we were tracking we even made plans to head back to the waterhole at last light to drag a tree branch around so that at first light the next day we could more easily pick up new tracks. But at @3 we finally caught up with a group of eland that included a nice bull. The problem was that the wind was heading west and downwind was a group of 8 giraffes. No way to get close without the giraffes spotting or smelling us. We waited. By 4pm the giraffes were heading further west and we decided to give the 700 yard stalk a shot. We quickly made our way to about 350 yards and as I stated before the terrain on this area was different. This was flat sparse bushveld. We came up from the shallow creek bed and on hands and knees started to close the distance.

Now in every picture I looked at, seeing it in person and walking on it for at least part of the last four days, bushveld looks and feels sandy. Let me tell you something, it is not sandy. It’s like sandpaper and for a person whose knees and shins had found every thorn bush in Africa up this point, this was not pleasant. The good news is we only had to do it for 50 yards. The bad news is from then on we had to drop to our stomach and belly crawl.

When we got to about 300 yards, we realized we were in “trouble”. As we were heading east toward the eland, to our right and south a bunch of springbok were heading right toward us at about 250 yards. If we could see them, you know they could spot us, although that hadn’t yet. To add to this, behind us, downwind we noticed the giraffes heading back toward us. Although far enough away where we only saw the tops of the head, it was only a matter of time before they caught our wind.

There was not much we could do but stay low and push on, belly crawling toward the bull. At 274, the springbok were closer and the giraffe were out of sight but had to be closer than we needed. A bipod would have been nice but we improvised with a set of binoculars, a log and a neckerchief. The bull, quartering slightly toward me was hit hard by the 300-win mag. The bull turned and ran off. We waited the African standard of at least 5 seconds and then went right after him. Boy am I glad we did. As we stood up, springbok looked at us as if we were aliens and the giraffes were already running away from the sound of the shot.

Gideon started at a fast walk and after the first 100 yards of tracking steadily started increasing his speed. By 400 yards into the tracking we were at a jogging rate of tracking. I had yet to see blood or for that matter the eland but when we slowed down as the bushveld changed to rocky thicker vegetation and elevated terrain, I saw from blood on the rocks that the eland was hit and bleeding well. I felt confident but soon we were back at the jogging rate of tracking. The huge footprints of the eland made it fairly easy to track but now daylight was becoming an issue. The first shot was taken at what I assume to be around 4:30 and sunset was @5:20. We had been running after this eland now close to 40 minutes and we saw the sun starting to set behind the horizon. Gideon looked at me and stated that we would find the bull if not tonight then tomorrow but by tomorrow the meat will be bad. He didn’t have to say anymore. No one wanted a 1500 pound animal to go to waste. Didn’t think I had it in me to increase our speed but we did. 10 minutes later we came over a crest to two koppies about 100 yards apart, the eland tracks went right through the middle of them and the sun had set to our right. Gideon turned and asked for my gun, if he saw him on the left koppie he was going to finish him. I gave him my gun reluctantly but with the knowledge that the meat was more important than my pride. As he crested the left koppie I walked the tracks through the center. As I watched Gideon scan the country side from the top, I looked right and was absolutely amazed to see Renout on the top of the right koppie. How the hell did he get in front of us, to show up here? I could not fathom how starting out at least 700 yards behind us at the shot, did he track/anticipate where the animal was going/get in front of us. To this day I am still amazed as there was no radio communication between the two of them.

As the shock wore off I realized he is trying to get Gideon’s attention. Throwing a little caution to the wind I turn to Gideon and whistled just loud enough to make him look my way. I point to Renout who is now motioning for both us to him. I start sprinting to the koppie and start climbing to the top. By the time I get to the top of the three story koppie, Gideon has descended the one he is on, ran the 100 yards over and scaled this one. Definitely part Mtn. Goat. He hands me my gun and I bear down on the group of eland. I find mine, Gideon confirms and I finish him with a solid shot at about 150. Two steps and he is down.

I slowly walk over to put my hands on this gigantic animal. I don’t mind the pain in my calf or the fact that I could drink about three gallons of water at the moment, he is awesome both in horn size and what we just accomplished. With the horns in my hands I look over to Gideon who is laying down on the job, what a slacker! We are both tired but I thank him for a great job and like that, the moment was over. I hear and see Renout on the front of the truck guiding it and my son through the brush to us. How the hell did he get here that fast now with the truck? I literally climb down the koppie after the shot, walked 150 yards, reflect about the hunt a little and thanked Gideon and the damn truck is coming.

You can see where my quartering toward first shot was low and probable missed the vitals but caused the good blood trail.

RENOUT! Pronounced re-NOUT!


Pictures, loading and we head to the farmers again. Conversancy agreements dictate that the farm the animal is taken on gets the meat and a portion of the trophy fee I assume. We get to their butchering room after dark. A honk on the way in and 5 minutes later there are 10 farm workers starting to butcher this humongous animal. Everything is kept except the legs below the knees. Even the stomach is cleaned out and hung to age. I didn’t know until that night that if you wrap the liver in the colon when cooking it, it keeps it from drying out. Not gonna try that tomorrow but if I am ever on Jeopardy that might be useful knowledge to me. Renout capes the beast, we get a cut off a portion of the back strap and we are off, back to camp. I was told later that because of the drought, the farm we were on had to sell most of their cattle. Made me feel even better that we were able to get the meat.

We arrived back around 8:15 pm to a huge congratulation from the family, John, Juliana and their son who stopped by. A wonderful dinner, some great wine, a lot of exaggeration on how far we ran and then off to bed, I was exhausted. Although it was at least ten miles when we were telling the story over dinner, Gideon estimated we trailed that animal for at least 5K. Between the animals all around us as we stalked him, the run to catch up and the happy faces of both the farmer and his staff when we delivered the meat, it will be a hunt I will not soon forget.


While we were hunting eland, my wife and other kids visited the local Himba village to delivery one of the four bags of donations we brought with us. My kids considered it one of the highlights of the trip.

Their classroom.


This village was 20 km east of Kamanjab, Namibia. The picture of my daughter only is from their one and only classroom. As you can tell they are a traditional village that has no electricity or any form of modern convenience. They unfortunately have killed all the free ranging animals on their large concession (@10,000 acres) of land for food. They have a heard of goats but these are seen as a source of social economic status. Ie The chief has the most goats. Thus they rarely use them as food. They rely on the meat from safari outfitters for some of their food and they sell carved animal bone jewelry to obtain some money. They then walk 20 KM each way to the closest town to obtain other necessities. A cultural ritual is that at the age of 13 they knock out the lower front four teeth using some primitive manner. This is supposedly to help them speak their language which consists of a lot of “th” sounds. They do not bath, EVER! They rub themselves and hair with the red clay and smoke themselves over a fire to “clean”.

 

[jasyblood]

Great story and great eland bull!! Congratulations!

 

[cpr0312]

Nice eland!

 

[lpace]

I'm a school teacher and sometimes feel picked on because of the lack of some of the conveniences we take for granted. I should print the picture of that classroom and hang it up in mine as a reminder that however 'bad' we perceive our lot in life to be, it could be a hell of a lot worse!

Great stories! Nice eland!

 

[MMAL]

Yeah Ipace, I have now started calling them 1st world problems. As I mention or will mention, I am hoping the kids realize how "good" they/we have it here in the states.

Eland Bull measured 37 1/2 x 37 with 11 bases, I was very happy.

 

[enysse]

Very nice eland, very heavy!

 

[lpace]

Yeah Ipace, I have now started calling them 1st world problems. As I mention or will mention, I am hoping the kids realize how "good" they/we have it here in the states.

Eland Bull measured 37 1/2 x 37 with 11 bases, I was very happy.

My students are known to moan/complain like a bunch of massed cats over some pretty trivial stuff. At least trivial relative to the reality of how some people are required to live. Funny thing, many of the people that live in what we would consider horrific conditions smile a hell of a lot more than we do (particularly in the African culture). Go figure.

There is nothing quite like a big ol' eland bull! Big time magic right there. I don't even know what the measurements on the eland I got this summer are! From the look of things, not quite as big as yours. I might have a taxidermy document around here somewhere that says..... Mine didn't have as much of a mop on his forehead as I would like, but he was blue half way back his body and had one hell of a dewlap. I was, and remain, completely awe struck with these amazing animals!

I know I'm selfish, but please keep your stories going. It helps keep me connected with Africa. I'm utterly, totally and completely obsessed!

 

[MMAL]

Nice bull. My eland had no mop of hair but I don't care. It is all in the hunt. I could see how these might be like hunting a farm barn or like hunting an ant. I would hunt these all day long, and I did, but what I mean is I would hunt these always, if I knew it was going to be as difficult as it was.

 

[sestoppelman]

Getting an eland bull can be very difficult, I know these things! Have struck out several times, trying again next summer. Your bull is outstanding! Your kids will never forget this trip and they wont know how much they learned for some time. It looks like a happy family that knows how and when to smile! Congrats!

 

[gillettehunter]

Nice Eland. Congrats on a great hunt and a good trophy. Thanks for taking the time to share your story. Bruce

 

[Scott Slough]

Eland are VERY high on my return hit list .... mop ... no mop ... blue ... brown ... SCI gold ... no SCI ... any eland would be a trophy. I saw two who were big enough, just not old enough on my first safari ... will work hard for one on the next.

 

[MMAL]

Wed. August 3rd, 2016

Hartebeest was the plan. My son, daughter (maybe this hunting thing is for her) and I headed out after breakfast to Westfalen proper. The morning was slow to say the least. Three cows but no bull hartebeest. A lot of koppie climbing and glassing. We did see a group of four kudu bulls with one of them bigger than the kudu I had in the salt. I was about to change the list again but noticed he had broken off the top few inches of his left side.

Back to camp for lunch and a new plan. My wife joined me on the afternoon hunt leaving the older kids to watch the younger kids. I am glad she did. We headed south by southwest into a new part of the conservancy and one of the most remote and pretty mountainous farms I have ever seen. Deep valleys and beautiful dry river beds.

The farmer’s home was surrounded by a 10 inch loose pointy topped rock “fence” to keep the free ranging elephants from destroying his house.

Elephant Fence with dog in background.

Up on top of a mountain, not a koppie we spotted zebra, gemsbok and the wanted hartebeest. The gemsbok and hartebeest were all feeding in semi-open area of the valley floor. Gideon and I made our way down the mountain to the valley floor with the intention of stalking up to a natural berm within 90 yards of the animals. We started along the stalk only to have a previously unseen young kudu bull start walking toward us. We dropped to our knees and remained still. I couldn’t believe it when that kudu came to within 25 yards of us and finally spotted us. I’m not sure that kudu has ever seen a human because he stood there for 3 minutes trying to figure out what the heck he was looking at. He finally decided he didn’t like us and ran off, only to go 30 yards to our right and stop again.

My wife took a picture from the side of the mountain. Unfortunately it does not show us as we were just off the frame to the left, @30 yards away.

Another three minutes of what the heck are these two things. Well the sun had set and time was of the essence so Gideon stands up and waves his hat. Again, I’m not sure this kudu has ever seen a human because he stood there for another 20 seconds before turning and running away. Unfortunately he started to bark like kudu do. Never heard that before but being a whitetail hunter I thought the jig was up. When a whitetail blows at you, you might as well shoot it or head home, and I wasn’t shooting this young kudu.

The gemsbok hightailed it out of the area once the kudu started barking but the hartebeest, not sure what was going on, started slowly leaving the area. We swung around and were heading to where we thought the hartebeest were going. Another semi-open area leading to a draw between two smaller mountains/hills, opposite our position. As we were double timing it to swing around the hartebeest, looking to our left, would you believe that dumb kudu came running back across our right side at 30 yards. What the hell is going on, I said to myself. As the kudu finally cleared us for the third time, we again looked to our left and there were our hartebeest, looking at us and saying What the hell is going on over there? The big bull was almost pointed straight away from us looking over his right shoulder. The sticks were up and I slide a 30-06 bullet behind the last rib that lodged in his far shoulder from about 80 yards away. He ran 20 yards and fell out of sight. How crazy is that.

Stop looking at the Hartebeest and notice my left knee, sandpaper not sandy, I tell you.

As were driving back to camp with last light, I tried to explain to my wife that this is one of the reasons I enjoy hunting so much. There is absolutely no reason for someone to go to this beautiful spot on earth. There were a lot of animals but not by photo/zoo safari standards. You could not get as close to them as you would in Etosha or somewhere else and who would travel the 45 minutes it would take from the paved road to get back here. But we had a private safari vehicle driving us to parts unknown, where we saw no one, and to a part of the world very few people have ever seen or would take the time to travel to. I considered it very special and I think my wife might be finally getting it. Or she might be filing divorce papers as we speak. Not sure.

A picture my wife took prior to the final shot.

 

[MMAL]

Getting an eland bull can be very difficult, I know these things! Have struck out several times, trying again next summer. Your bull is outstanding! Your kids will never forget this trip and they wont know how much they learned for some time. It looks like a happy family that knows how and when to smile! Congrats!

Very kind of you to say, thank you.

 

[Ridgewalker]

Wonderful your whole family went! I almost begged for my nephew or one of my grandsons or son-in-law to go on an Alaska black bear hunt with me...all expenses paid...not interested! I just don't understand young people today that don't want to have an adventure in the wild.

You're definitely doing a great job of introducing your kids to the outdoors!