Hunting Angola The Long Awaited Reopening Announced

[AfricaHunting.com]

Hunting Angola The Long Awaited Reopening Announced

Lots of talk at the SCI convention about the long awaited reopening of hunting in Angola. Several outfitters and professional hunters have been actively involved to make this happen for a couple of years now.

I am here to say that the ink is till wet but the deal is finally done and hunting in Angola will begin in 2010. The predicted hunting season will be from August through October.

The hunting concessions in Angola apparently will operate much like the CAMPFIRE areas in Zimbabwe with a contract for 25 years. The hunting concession is located in the Southeastern corner of Angola, very near the border of Zambia and adjacent to the Luiana National Park in Angola which borders the Caprivi Strip of Namibia (see yellow campfire area in map below). The 2.5 million hectare hunting concession area will be divided among a few hunting outfitters, one of which is Roger Whittall Safaris based in Zimbabwe. The hunting concession is sandwiched between the Cuando (Kwando) River to the East and the Luiana River to the West.

I had a nice conversation with Butch Coaton from Zimbabwe, a well known PH and the son-in-law of Roger Whittall who has been spending some time in Angola surveying the game and preparing to hunt this area. He showed me some video footage of the hunting area on his computer and it looks very promising, I saw Elephants and Buffaloes in good numbers. In some areas the main river reaches out into many streams creating a vast swampy plain that can span 5 kilometers across perfect for Sitatunga and many other species (see the extensive list of species below).

Roger Whittall has been given permission to do promotional hunts in Angola for this year, his company has been allotted the Southern most part of the concession area bordering the Luiana National Park. Roger is now back in Zimbabwe from the SCI convention. He will be heading to Angola as soon as possible so he can to get things moving, as there is a lot to do to set up camps and infrastructure as interest for hunting in Angola is high. Butch will be in Angola during February and March and will in a better position to answer all of our questions when he gets back.

Quotas are yet to be finalized for each hunting area and outfitters are already working with CITES...

For Roger Whittall Safaris prices for Angola, click here, and for a close up map of the entire hunting concession area, click here.

Anyone interested can contact them about their openings for hunting in Angola.

Roger Whittall Safaris
Roger Whittall
www.humani.cc
roger@humani.cc

Butch Coaton Big Game Hunting
Butch Coaton
www.butchcoatonsafaris.com
butchcoaton1@yahoo.com

Angola Hunting Areas

Angola Major Cities

Detailed Map of Angola
(click on thumbnail to enlarge map)


Africa

List of species offered in Angola by Roger Whittall Safaris
Aardwolf
Angolan Bush Duiker
Bat Eared Fox
Black Backed Jackal
Blue Wildebeest
Bushpig
Cape Buffalo
Common Reedbuck
Defassa Waterbuck
Giraffe
Hippopotamus
Impala
Lion
Livingston Eland
Oribi
Puku
Red Lechwe
Roan Antelope
Sable Antelope
Serval
Southern Greater Kudu
Spotted Hyena
Steenbok
Tsessebee
Warthog
Wildcat
Zambezi Sitatunga
Zebra

 

[Calhoun]

...It's great that more hunting is opening in Africa. I hope they do well! It looks like a good area for hunting and maybe if things go well more areas in Angola will free up for hunting!

 

[TOM]

What great news. The price list doesn't seem that bad either. A 10 day buffalo hunt in Angola with trophy fee would put you a bit above 10k, depending on taxes and transport costs. I bet he will fill up pretty quick with hunters wishing to hunt this area.

 

[enysse]

I don't think the pricing is bad either...it takes a lot to develop a outfitting area. It's a wild area! Could be a real quality hunt, for a person that is a experienced hunter and has patience.

Glad to see Angola back on the hunting map!!!

 

[Andries]

This will be great! The wild life is wonderfull in some places in Angola. I am living on the border, close to where the Cuito River come into the Okavango. The local population is much less than in Namibia.
I don't want to sound negative, but there are only two things that I don't like about this.
1- Landmines
2- The corruption in Angola. You have to bribe your way in and out and very rarely will your equipment leave with you.

 

[AfricaHunting.com]

Andries, Those are some very good and valid points! Don't know anything about the land mine situation but this is definitely a matter that we can ask Butch about. As far as the equipment is concerned, it might be better to just borrow a rifle from the outfitter and not bring anything non essential...

 

[BETO]

I know very well Angola, have no business there in the construction and sale of equipment, there are excellent places to hunt with good amount of some magnificent animals, hunting happens regularly in the provinces, the illegal trade in ivory has killed many young animals is not difficult to see hundreds of ivory trade in Luanda, piles of leopard skins, skulls of all kinds of antelopes sold as crafts!

The region where this hunting area is very isolated and without any infrastructure, the high incidence of malaria and tsetse fly, get in Angola is not easy, visas are complicated and are worth very little time, airport Luanda is much like hell, immigration can take up to 5 hours depending on how many planes are coming, bring a weapon in Angola is easy, the harder it will be out!

Corruption is something unique, or here in Brazil you see something so absurd, the traffic of cities is a chaos makes Sao Paulo opinion of Disneyland, the price of hotels, food and drink is something unbelievable for American standards, in addition to quality bad.

There are around 80 million landmines in Angola, separatist guerrillas in the north and armed militias in the south.

The adventure will be the best!

I recommend to friends who are in the area to hire a plane full time, there is a hospital with conditions to meet in Angola, I have some Brazilian friends who work as doctors in Luanda, Benguela and Huige and when I get scared with them with the stories of deaths from hospital infections.

Only take water bottles and bottles dry before placing in the mouth, water ice may have cholera.

Despite all that Angola offers, I'll hunt there!

BETO

tradutor;

Eu conheço muito bem angola, tenho negócios lá na área de construção e venda de equipamentos, existem excelentes lugares de caça com boa quantidade de animais alguns magníficos, a caça acontece regularmente nas províncias do interior, o comercio de marfim clandestino tem matado muitos animais jovens, não é difícil ver centenas de marfins em feiras de Luanda, pilhas de peles de leopardo, crânios de todo tipo de antílopes vendidos como artesanato!

A região onde se encontra essa área de caça é bem isolada e sem nenhuma infra-estrutura, a grande incidência de malaria e TSE-TSE, entrar em angola não é fácil, os vistos são complicados e valem por muito pouco tempo, o aeroporto de Luanda é bem parecido com o inferno, a imigração pode demorar até 5horas dependendo da quantidade de aviões que estão chegando, entrar com uma arma em angola é fácil, o difícil vai ser sair!

A corrupção é algo único, nem aqui no Brazil se vê algo tão absurdo, o transito das cidades é um caos faz São Paulo parecer a Disneylândia, o preço dos hotéis, comidas e bebidas é algo inacreditável para os padrões americanos, alem da qualidade ser péssima.

Existem por volta de 80 milhões de minas terrestres em angola, guerrilheiros separatistas ao norte e milícias armadas ao sul.

A aventura será das melhores!

Recomendo aos amigos que forem nessa área a contratação de um avião em tempo integral, não existe um hospital com condições de atender em angola,tenho alguns amigos brasileiros que trabalham como médicos em Luanda, Huige e Benguela e quando falo com eles me assusto com as historias de mortes por infecção hospitalar.

Só tomem água em garrafas e sequem as garrafas antes de colocar na boca, a água do gelo pode ter cólera.

Apesar de tudo que angola oferece, eu vou caçar lá!

 

[AfricaHunting.com]

Beto, Thanks for this insight on Angola and all of the recommendations. Keep us posted!

 

[AfricaHunting.com]

Efforts to Open Hunting in Angola Have Been Abandoned

After all it seems that Angola is not quite ready to be open for hunting. I met again with Butch Coaton from Zimbabwe who was looking at re-opening a hunting area in Angola. After working on this for a couple of years and spending many months there surveying the game and the area while being in talks with government officials, Butch began to realize that the process was a waste of his time and effort as no real progress was being made, just lots of empty promises. The decision was made to abandon pursuing trying to re-open hunting in Angola for now. The other company that had also been working towards reopening hunting in Angola has also stopped all efforts at this time as well.