DLSJR
AH fanatic
- Joined
- Apr 6, 2019
- Messages
- 688
- Reaction score
- 3,328
- Media
- 27
- Hunted
- Zimbabwe, Botswana, Zambia, South Africa, Tanzania
Now that I’ve been back from Tanzania long enough to be over the jet lag I thought I’d share a report on my just concluded hunt with Alan Vincent on his new Selous concession, MA1/Madaba.
In a word, it was Fantastic! I liked hunting Mlele 2 years ago, but I like Madaba a lot more. Madaba has a lot of game and a broad diversity, while Mlele lacked many of the species we enjoyed seeing and hunting the last couple weeks.
I booked this hunt with Alan as soon as he told me he was bidding on a new area in the Selous. My hunt would be for 16-days with a 21-day license to allow certain species that cannot be hunted on a shorter license, like leopard. I brought my son, Danny, along as a ‘Companion Hunter’, meaning he had his own 10-day license and could take animals from my quota. His interest was primarily to hunt one or two of my 3 buffalo and get to tag along while I hunted other stuff like leopard, hippo and crocodile.
Also joining us was a very close friend of 45 years, Jim, who was hunting Africa for the first time at 79 years old. Jim was also on a 10-day license, focusing on a buffalo and hippo with Peter Waddelow as his PH. I jumped back and forth to spend some time as an observer enjoying Jim’s first African hunt and also give Danny some one on one time hunting with Alan since he has literally known Alan his entire life. I figured they’d have a great time together without me and they did. But I did spend most days hunting with my son, highlighted by a great buffalo day where we took 2 Dugga Boys from a group of 3 bulls. The animals I was interested in hunting included buffalo, leopard, dry land hippo, crocodile, and just a few plains game, primarily eland. I was fortunate to take everything I really wanted with the exception of eland.
We flew Emirates from San Francisco to Dar. As expected, everything went smoothly and we met up with Gladywin Spero (Alan’s logistics manager in DAR) who ushered us through Tanzania’s arrival process very efficiently. Off to Sea Cliff for the night before our charter out to Madaba the following day. Our mid-day flight with Safari Airlink on a Cessna Caravan was smooth and I definitely enjoyed the short 1-hour flight compared to the 2 1/2+ hour flight out to Mlele.
On arrival, it was a nice reunion with Alan’s team of our driver, Lema, as well as Nyoni & Robert, our trackers. They’re a great group of guys who hunt hard and have fun while doing so. I brought each of them a new pair of Converse All Star ‘Chuck Taylor’ high tops, along with plenty of new socks and these were a big hit. They all wear Chuck Taylors daily and theirs were pretty worn, so new shoes were appreciated. We also had a lot of fun with my attempts at Swahili, courtesy of Google Translate. While I had the basics down pretty good, they started longer conversations that left me in the dust, much to their amusement.
In a word, it was Fantastic! I liked hunting Mlele 2 years ago, but I like Madaba a lot more. Madaba has a lot of game and a broad diversity, while Mlele lacked many of the species we enjoyed seeing and hunting the last couple weeks.
I booked this hunt with Alan as soon as he told me he was bidding on a new area in the Selous. My hunt would be for 16-days with a 21-day license to allow certain species that cannot be hunted on a shorter license, like leopard. I brought my son, Danny, along as a ‘Companion Hunter’, meaning he had his own 10-day license and could take animals from my quota. His interest was primarily to hunt one or two of my 3 buffalo and get to tag along while I hunted other stuff like leopard, hippo and crocodile.
Also joining us was a very close friend of 45 years, Jim, who was hunting Africa for the first time at 79 years old. Jim was also on a 10-day license, focusing on a buffalo and hippo with Peter Waddelow as his PH. I jumped back and forth to spend some time as an observer enjoying Jim’s first African hunt and also give Danny some one on one time hunting with Alan since he has literally known Alan his entire life. I figured they’d have a great time together without me and they did. But I did spend most days hunting with my son, highlighted by a great buffalo day where we took 2 Dugga Boys from a group of 3 bulls. The animals I was interested in hunting included buffalo, leopard, dry land hippo, crocodile, and just a few plains game, primarily eland. I was fortunate to take everything I really wanted with the exception of eland.
We flew Emirates from San Francisco to Dar. As expected, everything went smoothly and we met up with Gladywin Spero (Alan’s logistics manager in DAR) who ushered us through Tanzania’s arrival process very efficiently. Off to Sea Cliff for the night before our charter out to Madaba the following day. Our mid-day flight with Safari Airlink on a Cessna Caravan was smooth and I definitely enjoyed the short 1-hour flight compared to the 2 1/2+ hour flight out to Mlele.
On arrival, it was a nice reunion with Alan’s team of our driver, Lema, as well as Nyoni & Robert, our trackers. They’re a great group of guys who hunt hard and have fun while doing so. I brought each of them a new pair of Converse All Star ‘Chuck Taylor’ high tops, along with plenty of new socks and these were a big hit. They all wear Chuck Taylors daily and theirs were pretty worn, so new shoes were appreciated. We also had a lot of fun with my attempts at Swahili, courtesy of Google Translate. While I had the basics down pretty good, they started longer conversations that left me in the dust, much to their amusement.