kscowboy,
Interesting that you hunted Binga in 2008. I hunted it in September of 2008 with Rory Muil of Russ Broom Safaris as my PH. I killed a bull elephant, a cape buffalo, a hippo, and a 14' croc.
The place was swarming with natives who had moved in from the cities due to Mugabe's economic policies. The schools were closed because the teachers just wandered off after not getting paid. In one place US Aid had constructed a fence to keep elephants out, but all the wire had been stolen. We found and destroyed 35 wire snares.
There was almost no game in fact smaller than buffalo, though there seemed to be a lot of elephants. We used part of my buff for leopard bait but a native stole it the first night. Whole areas of Binga were denuded--almost desertified--by the natives and their goats.
I considered this a good hunt, as my objective was to get elephant and buff. I have heard, however, that no one hunts there now due to the increased population.
Indy, we must have just missed each other. We hunted with Gavin in Russ' area. My father hunted with Gavin in the same area in 2002. If Rory told you the story of being detained for the stolen government ivory, my dad was there for that incident in 2002. Gavin tossed him I don't know how many thousand in cash just in case they came back for him. Gavin hired the local witch doctor and one of the camp staff immediately recovered the ivory and confessed.
The area is still great for hippo and croc, as it's right on Lake Kariba. 2008 was when the hyper-inflation was occurring and Zim even had a billion dollar bill that once it was printed, wouldn't buy a loaf of bread. Corn, fish, tobacco, and bush meat was currency. It was a straight-up bartering system, so no wonder they were poaching.
The elephant were there but they were getting poached daily. I'd be curious to see what the elephant population is there now. There were buffalo and we were on them every day but as I said, if you bumped them, you never saw them again. The wind had a tendency to shift when we were there. It sure didn't help that the leaves sounded like walking on cornflakes.
The group from Boston after us got a buff that went over 42". They finally had a good, steady wind and made it happen. We got up on the herd we'd been stalking for multiple days on our final day to only find that he was soft.
What did you think of the Mopane Bees? I don't smoke but I ripped a couple of cigs just to keep them away. I sure wish I had some Avon Skin So Soft that trip!
There are far better areas that have much more game. We hunted Dande North in 2011 and that was definitely a much better area.
