SOUTH AFRICA: BOWHUNT: Farther/Daughter Bowhunt In Limpopo

[Slaton]

Oh where to start? I’m sitting in the Johannesburg airport thinking about the last 10 days. I guess I will start with the fact that I’m not a very good writer and my grammar and punctuation is probably worst. Please bear with me and ask any questions that have not been covered. I’ll try to get the whole story in but might take several parts. I’ll start with the basics and will fill in details later.

When: July 4th-July16th
Where: Limpopo province
Why: To hunt and sling arrows in the dark continent
Who:My wife, Daughter an I
How: With our bows and arrows

We left Atlanta on Delta on the evening of July 4th and landed in Johannesburg on the evening of July 5th. We stayed in City Lodge overnight before connecting to Polokwane the next morning. Gracy Travel handled all of or travel and they are worth every penny Hannah there has been or person and is awesome. The 5th was our anniversary and she had contacted City lodge and had flower and Castle Lite waiting in our room. We are not wine drinkers. The next morning Michael met us in the lobby and escorted us through all the checkin and security. We where from the lodge to the gate in 27 minutes without any problems.

We land in Polokwane to be picked up by our PH’s. Divan picked us up and about an hour ride we where the lodge just outside of Louis Trichardt. We will be hunting for the next 6 days with Wild Game Safaris operated by Ryno Smit and our Ph’s will be Divan and Reinhardt. Sara and I will be hunting. We quickly unpacked and got our bows out for a few shots and then we where off to the blinds for an afternoon sit.

I’ll break down some of our equipment we chose for the hunt. Sara is my 16 year old daughter and is shooting a Bowtech Solusion Sd set at 60lbs, a 23.5” draw length with 410 grain arrows. I’m shooting my old trusty Bowtech Allegiances at 70lbs with a 440 grain arrow. We chose a variety of broadheads for the trip to include Iron Will, QAD Exodus, Slick Trick, Magnus Stingers and black hornets, Grim Reaper Hades.

The first afternoon sit and we had action right off the bat at my blind. The eland where on the feed and water as soon as the truck pulled off. In less than 10 minutes we had a nice warthog come in to 20 yards and I get a shot but it looks little low but right in line with the leg. Just a couple of minutes pass and a larger warthog is in the feed bucked at 25 yards. I pull back and make what feels like a good shot but looks to be a little high. I can’t believe it. I’ve wanted to hunt Africa for 30 years and in the first 15 minutes I’ve been there made 2 questionable shots. Sara and Reinhardt are in a different blind not far away and seeing plenty of action but no shots are presented on animals on Sara’s list. We get out to track my pigs but the ground is very sandy almost like being on a Gulf of Mexico beach. And the blood is just sucked up by the sand. The trackers follow blood and spoor for awhile but it is getting dark and the blood is dryed up. We leave for the evening with Sara not shooting any arrows and me not finding the 2 pigs I shot. Not the way I would have guessed the first day would have gone. But there is more to the pig story that happens days later.

The next morning we head to a different area. Sara goes to 1 blind and me to another not to far away. The action was slower than the evening before when we first get there but as the day warms the water hole gets busier. We have seen monkeys, warthogs, ostriches, kudu cows, and some male impalas but nothing mature comes into our side of the water. A little before noon 2 good impala rams come in to drink at 17 yards and I make a good shot and he is getting low to the ground when he goes out of sight. We hope out of the blind and find him about 80 yards from the blind. My first African animal on the ground.

 

[Slaton]

The picture will not upload here in the airport. I will continue the story when we get home and have better service.

 

[Firebird]

Interested to read more of your adventures and see the pictures. Especially hoping you were able to recover the first couple warthogs. Hope it’s a safe/uneventful trip home

 

[Slaton]

We are back in Atlanta waiting on our ride so I will see if some of the pictures will up load.

After we loaded up the impala we were back into the blind. We are a little lunch and watched some more animals come in. Not much later we have some wildebeest come in. The herd is 15-20 with a nice bull and several really old females in the group. We had talked with Ryno about culling some things before the hunt and he gave use a list and special pricing. So once the old female turned slightly quartering away at 23 yards I send an ironwill tipped arrow her way. The arrow hit forward in the shoulder and penetrated about half a shaft. The whole herd runs off in a cloud of dust and about 30 seconds we see behind the waterhole another cloud of dust and in a few minutes we find her laying dead about 80 yards from the blind.

I will continue the story later.

 

[Slaton]

It’s still our first full day of hunting and I’ve got
2 animals on the ground. Sara is in another blind not to far away and we get the call that she had shot a wildebeest as well. Since it her first African animal we ride over to help in the recovery. Once we find the arrow it is broken with no signs of a hit, and there is a gouge in the metal trough. It’s a clean miss. Im going to take 100% of the blame for the miss. I had built new arrows for her and had not indexed the nock for proper clearance and she got fletching contact sending the broadhead off course. They get back in there blind and we head back to ours.

About an hour before dark we have 2 more good impala males coming into the water. There is something about an impala that gets my heart racing. I’m not sure if it reminds me of the whitetails I hunt all the time but they have gotten into my blood and it will become a theme for the hunt. One of the mature males turns broadside at 25 yards. I put the pin on the middle of the shoulder and break a clean shot. The impala drops at the shot and hits high. We get out of the blind and follow blood for a few hundred yards but it’s getting dark and with buffalo in the area we back out for safety.

While we are looking for my impala Sara gets a 20 yard shot on a blesbok. They do the same thing and follow blood until dark and back out. The next morning we head to another farm and they head to look for Sara’s blesbok. After looking at the video it looks like Sara’s shot is almost perfect just maybe a fuzz low. They find it almost immediately the next morning very close to where they stopped the night before. Unfortunately it was jackal and hyena food.

The spot is her fletching

Day 2 to be continued later.

 

[WyoBull]

Wonderful trip report and congratulations! Thanks for sharing!

 

[Slaton]

Day 2 found us on the farm we had hunted the first night. I’m in the blind Sara hunted the first night and she is in the one I had shot the warthogs.

Once the tracker leaves in the truck it doesn’t take long and the animals start coming in. We are seeing tons of different animals, elands, warthogs, gemsbok, wildebeest, and finally kudu. The kudu was the one animal I really wanted a trophy of. We had seen a smaller bull and a few cows come through but the bull we are looking for has a third horn in the middle of his head. After about an hour in the blind he showed up but with all the activity he keeps skirting around the feed and water hole. It takes about 30 minutes of him circling the blind before he comes into shooting range. He finally turns slightly quartering away at 22 yards and I bury a slick trick mag in the center of the shoulder and stops in off side shoulder and as he is running out of site his rear end is getting closer to the ground. Once we are on the track it takes just a minute and less than 75 yards we find the bull I had traveled across the ocean for. I don’t no how many inches he is but I’m more than happy with it.

 

[Slaton]

Meanwhile at Sara’s blind she is seeing a pile of animals to. There is a couple of eland that are in the cull list including a big old female with a mismatched set of horns. And while we are on the way to recover my kudu the old eland shows up in front of Sara’s blind at 24 yards. Sara makes a perfect shot and the eland is piled up inside a hundred yards. She has buried an iron will tipped Easton axis up to the fletching with an exit hole.

After a pictures, hugs and high 5’s we are back into our blinds. I see plenty of animals the rest of the day but I’m riding on the high of the kudu and Sara killing an old mature eland and not seeing anything I want to shoot until about time to get out of the blind and a big male warthog comes in but never offers a shot but the radio goes off and Sara has shot 2. We hop out and go to try to help them to find them. The first one goes about 100 yards and is finished. The second track is lost in the sand and blood dried up as the sun is setting. The morning of day 3 the tracker go out and find it while we hunt together in the same blind I killed my kudu.

 

[ILDRHNTR]

Congrats on such a good start. Sure is great the whole family was able to go and enjoy together. What a way to spend an anniversary. Happy belated anniversary! Can’t wait for more of the story. Sure hope there’s better news on the warthogs later.

 

[buck wild]

Great trip. Fabulous Kudu !!!

 

[gram2117]

Beautiful trophies.

 

[Slaton]

We have been back home since Tuesday but part of me will always be in Africa. Sara is out of school for the summer and is working with me. I’m an electrical contractor and while we are on job sites with tool belts on our minds are trying to think how we can get back to Africa. She is a pretty cool 16 year old girl. Any way back to the story. So we were on day 3.

So the morning of day 3 found Sara, me and her PH in the blind where I shot the kudu on day 2. My PH had a bad tooth and spent the morning at the dentist. That morning was like all the other morning with plenty of animals coming to the water hole and feed but nothing that excited us to pull the bows back. We did see another good kudu bull. About 11 we had a herd of wildebeest coming but they hung up and bedded down just outside of bow range. So no arrows where flung and my PH had got his tooth fixed and medicated up so we too a few pics with Sara’s warthog from the evening before that the trackers had found that morning. The Sara and Reinhardt went back to the blind they doubled up on warthogs the night before and me and Divan where back in the Kudu blind.

A few hours go by and we are seeing quite a few animals. Then some gemsbok start to work there way into the water. We watch the milling around with the eland and warthogs but it’s hard to get a shot off with the amount of game around the blind. We had picked out two old females and a mature male out of the herd of about 15-20 but they would never get a good angle or when they did there would be something behind them. We had been watching them for 20-30 minutes waiting for a perfect opportunity and during that time we had a good impala come in to drink. Those impalas do something to me and get my heart pounding more than any other animal, but a mature gemsbok was on my list and a euro mount for home decor is something we need. With all the animals around it’s almost chaotic trying to wait for the perfect shot. The impala finally breaks to our left and we notice that he has a 6-8” flap of skin hanging off of his right hind quarter. The decision is quickly made as soon as he’s clear we are going to forgo the gemsbok and put an arrow in him. He’s drinking at 14 yards when the warthogs clear from behind him and I let out a perfectly placed arrow and he is down in about 30 yards.

Entrance hole of an Iron Will Wide and notice the hind quarter

Anothe picture of the injured hind quarter

Meanwhile at Sara’s blind she is releasing a perfect arrow on a gemsbok that is on the cull list. It’s an old female that has been gored or something but it has a knot of intestines hanging out on its belly. Looks almost like a hernia. We have switched her arrows from iron wills to QAD exodus broadheads and it passes through the gemsbok like butter and the find it about 60 yards from where she shot it.

This is a screenshot from the video. The dark spot in the crease of the shoulder is her arrow and you can also see the knot of intestines at the edge of her limb tip.

That’s all the animals of day 3 and I’ll continue to story tomorrow. Thanks for reading along so far to my bad writing skills!!!

 

[Altitude sickness]

Those memories you made will be some of the best you both have for the rest of your life.

 

[cpr0312]

Congrats and thanks for sharing!

 

[PARA45]

Congratulations to both of you on a wonderful safari and thank you for taking us along. Thank you for raising your daughter to be such a great hunter.

 

[Slaton]

Well day 4 found us headed to a couple of new places about 45 minutes west of the lodge. Divan and I set up in an elevated blind over a water hole looking down a long opening. We see impala, wildebeest, eland, warthogs, vervet monkeys, duiker, and probably a few more. But they were all super skittish and by lunch we leave this blind and head to another one.

The new blind is by a waterhole under with some trees mixed in. It was I would have imagined a blind would be when headed to Africa. Once settled in we start seeing animals pretty quick. The lookout windows are tinted and we have a monkey looking at his reflection about 3 feet away. It was pretty cool to see. We can see a giraffe in the distance with eland and a duiker out of bow range when a herd of impala females come into the water. Well as I said before the impalas do something to me. One heads to the left and quartering away with nothing behind her at 20 yards I can’t help myself and I send a Magnus Black Hornet on its way. The arrow hits perfect and we watch her crash in the Savanah grass about 50 yards away.

Entrance and exit wounds

Sara and Reinhardt have a productive day with animals in front of them all day but nothing they wanted to shoot. All in all it was a good day but the least productive of the whole trip. That was the only day we hunted those spots.

 

[Slaton]

Day 5 found us all back at the place we hunted on our first full day. Sara is in the blind where I shot the impalas and wildebeest and I’m in the blind where she shot her blesbok.

The night before we had stayed at the lodge bar pretty late and my wife and I may or may not have enjoyed to many Castle lites and Divan was enjoying his brandy and coke. We where all a little slow that morning but had shared music that we loved and became lifelong friends, because no good story starts with we where having a glass of milk and then…. Anyway we were kicked back in the blind enjoying a beautiful African morning. Divan was kicked back checking his eyelids for holes and me just watching over the water. We had some eland come in first with a young bull in the group that is going to be a fabulous trophy in the next few years, a herd of wildebeest with 3 good males, a young kudu bull, a kudu cow and calf come in. Nothing yet that I wanted to shoot. They were feeding around when Divan’s eyelids had passed the test and it wasn’t long after until another good Impala was coming to the water. The blind we where in needed 1 more shooting window on the left that was preventing me from getting a shot at the impala.

We watched him feed for about 15 minutes and then he was joined by 8-10 females. Then a couple of waterbuck females and some ostriches. After about 30 minutes he broke to the right and got in front of the shooting window at the water hole. The impala was at 23 yards perfectly broadside when I sent a Grim Reaper hades pro on its way. If you haven’t picked up on the theme yet, I love shooting impalas. They have my heart pounding every time I see them. I think I made a perfect shot but the arrow doesn’t have much blood on it when we pick it up and when we take up the trail I’m not seeing any blood and the tracker Patrick says something about stomach and shows me a wet spot in the sand then says we probably won’t find it. But Patrick isn’t very good at lying and then smiles real big and points at Bismarck , Divans Jack Russell, sitting on top of my impala about 10 yards away. The impala only went about 40 yards.

Sara and Reinhardt see plenty of animals and almost get a shot at a wildebeest but never get a clear shot then have a herd of Cape buffalo come in to eat. But that was the end of the excitement for them that morning and we all head back to the lodge early that day.

The lodge sits on piece of ground that they very rarely hunt and when they do it’s only with bows. There is a Nyala bull that is frequently right behind the lodge. He is a bully and is always fighting with the other bulls. One of his horns is slightly twisted from and injury when he was younger. There is not blinds on the property so Sara and Reinhardt are using trees for cover when the bull comes into the feed and water. Sara makes an absolutely perfect shot with a QAD Exodus and the bull is dead 21 yards from where she shot it and in less than 20 seconds. The video is pretty awesome. The best part is mom was there with us to make the recovery.

That evening we go to a farm just up the road for a ride and a look around. The whole family is in the back of the cruiser along with Reinhardt and Bismarck with Divan and Ryno in the cab. The are just enjoying or evening and all the views, the macadamia trees are in bloom and the smell is wonderful. Just a beautiful evening and enjoying it with friends and family. We did put our bows in the rack just incase something pops up. Along the ride we see duikers, blesbok, zebras, a good kudu bull, 4 giraffes, impalas, and some ostrich. As the sun is getting lower in the sky and the temperature is dropping we come across 3 male blesbok. The Georgia redneck in me comes out and I shoot the biggest one off the back of the cruiser at 30 yards. It is down within sight and that brings an end to day 5 and the realization that or safari is almost over and I feel a little sadness setting in but I’m also as happy as I can be because I’m finally fulfilling a 30 year old dream.

 

[Smitty]

Thank you for your report! I enjoyed it. It's wonderful you were able to bring your wife and daughter.