TANZANIA: Cape Buffalo Hunt With Ultimate Tanzania Safaris

[gillettehunter]

Very nice. I just got back from Tanzania 2 weeks ago. Great place to hunt. Please write up a full hunt report. We’d all love to read it.
Bruce

 

[Cecil Hammonds]

Did you see a lot of buffalo? Any elephant?

Congrats !

We saw quite a few elephant. One was about 20 yards from us in some thick cover while we were wading in the river. That was an experience. Saw a heard of buff and a dagga boy ran in front of us, but it was still very thick grass as it was early in the season.

 

[Cecil Hammonds]

Very nice. I just got back from Tanzania 2 weeks ago. Great place to hunt. Please write up a full hunt report. We’d all love to read it.
Bruce

will do thanks

 

[Ridgewalker]

15 years of smart buffalo!

I will write up a more detailed report if anyone is interested in hearing more.

Looking forward to it!

 

[Uncle Sauce]

Congrats! Beautiful bull!

 

[Cecil Hammonds]

will do thanks

Sorry for the delay in getting this out, but here goes. . As far as more about my hunt goes, well going back to the beginning, we booked the hunt in January 2019 at the Dallas Safari Club show with the intention of hunting in 2020. Of course, Covid caused us to push back to this year, although they did manage to pull off a couple of hunts last year. I met Charl Von Rooyen of Infinito Safaris at the DSC show after being recommended by some of his previous clients that I had met. We traveled to Dar Es Salaam through Doha, Qatar on Qatar Airways, which was a 2- day trip. Upon arriving in Dar, we were met by the outfitter's rep at the airport and spent the night at the Sea Cliff hotel, which is apparently the place to stay in Dar. The next morning, I went back to the airport for a quick 1.5-hour flight to the small town of Songea. Here I was met by a young man from South Africa who was apprenticing with the PH this season. It was a 6-hour drive back to camp. The camp was in the Nalika Wildlife Management Area which adjoins the southern boundary of the Selous game reserve. The camp is on the bank of the Mbarangandu river, and it is 72 kms from the nearest road. The staff had to build the entire camp from scratch prior to my arrival as the previous camp was washed away in a flood. There are no people or agriculture permitted in the Wildlife Management Area; it was truly wild Africa. I was the first client of the season, and we began hunting on opening day, July 1st. The outfitter told me the hunting would be tough due to the dense vegetation that had yet to be burned off, but those were the dates I could make work. We started out on Day One and cut fresh tracks immediately, but my PH, Koos De Wet, thought they were a couple hours too old and they had lions after them as well so we kept looking. The morning passed with much of the same until near noon, we climbed up a hill that had a great view of the river valley below. The terrain was a series of low ridgelines with densely vegetated valleys leading to the river. Koos spotted an old Dagga Boy lying in the wet sand to cool off about a mile and a half away. We decided to put a stalk on him and set off toward the river. We had to go through a lot of deep sand in the river bed and 6-foot-high grass before we were able to get into position about 40 yards from the old bull. I had a clear broadside shot at his vitals. It was crucial that I anchor him pretty much in place because he was only about 20 yards from really thick bush country and more importantly crossing the boundary into the Selous. The first shot put him down, but I put three more into him after he got back on his feet. He took a few steps and went down for good. The 400 grain Swift A Frames from my 416 Remington did the job well. We finally got him back to camp around 4 pm. That evening sitting by the fire we could hear lions across the river from camp. We hunted hard the next 5 days for Bushbuck and Waterbuck. One the first day, we were walking in the river with thick bush on both sides when we heard a loud grunt in the bush right by us. We stopped and peered into the thick darkness, and there was an elephant staring at us not 20 yards away! Finally on the 5th day, just before dark on the far side of a river bed, I took a nice Waterbuck at almost 300 yards. He dropped straight to the ground with a hit from the .416. We had to drag him through 300 yards of soft sand and across a river to get him to where we could load him on the truck, but that just made it all the sweeter prize. I had never eaten Waterbuck, and I was surprised how tender and tasty it was. After that, we took it easy and actually went fishing in small waterholes and caught a lot of catfish. The trackers were very happy and excited to get to go fishing. They cut reeds and made cane poles. All in all, the whole safari was top notch. I was very impressed by the professionalism of everyone I dealt with. I would absolutely hunt with them again and would recommend to others as well. This was an incredible experience, and I don't know that I will ever have another hunt that will compare to it.

 

[PARA45]

Outstanding! Congrats on a successful safari. Do you have any more pictures you could share with us?

 

[Cecil Hammonds]

Outstanding! Congrats on a successful safari. Do you have any more pictures you could share with us?

Thanks, I will see what I can come up with for you.

 

[Ravensview]

Sounds like a fantastic hunt, congratulations

 

[Trogon]

Congrats on a what had to be a great hunt in what sounded like a fantastic area to be! Would also like to see more photos, if you can share them.

 

[375 Ruger Fan]

That for the report on the excellent hunt. A Day 1 buffalo is quite an achievement.

 

[Wheels]

Great looking old bull. Congratulations.

 

[mark-hunter]

Fantastic old bull! Congrats for the hunt!

 

[Cecil Hammonds]

More pics

 

[PARA45]

Beautiful pictures, keep them coming.

 

[Graham Hunter]

Just so I am clear you were hunting with Charles and not Pieter. Where is Pieter's camp from Charles?