Epilogue: First of all, a quick shout-out of thanks to everyone who shared advice, opinions & photos on this particular topic. I learned a lot! One of the things that that was readily apparent to me early on in this thread was that it would be really hard for me to make a bad or a wrong choice. Every cartridge being mentioned was more than adequate for my current goals since North America & plains game was what my hunting buddy was suggesting. I appreciate that everyone was willing to play "what if" and share some knowledge.
Because affordable, left-handed options that I like rarely appear, my gut instinct told me that fate & circumstance would probably play a part in my final choice. Most likely, the item that popped up first that I could successfully acquire would be the winner of this selection process. On page 6 of this thread a month ago, I missed out on a Ruger #1 in .404 Jeffery. The latest rifle to slip through my fingers was a left-handed Dakota 76 in .375 H&H:
I think most readers would probably agree that this is a nice-looking rifle that would suit my purposes. I also think that most readers (including myself) would also guess that there was a snowball's chance in hell that I was going to win this auction. With the extra Kahles scope and the boxes of ammo, I laughed at the $3k~5k pre-auction estimate but decided to play along & go as high as $5,500. But they blew past me so fast I didn't get to savor that fleeting moment when I was on top that lasted a blink of an eye before I got relegated to the list of losers. I like nice things but having to pay almost $8k to stay in the game was a bit too Gucci for me.
I was house sitting for friends who were on a road trip to Austin & hanging out with their pet menagerie so I decided to console myself by going outside & sitting in a bow stand for a couple of hours. I didn't see any deer this evening but it was nice being out in the woods. When I came back inside, a LH Winchester Model 70 Safari Express magically appears. Boom! Mine now! Like hunting for elusive game, left-hand rifle acquisitions are all about patience, perseverance & sometimes (like this purchase) speed & luck. I have to do my research (e.g. this thread) ahead of time and grab things with confidence when they appear because they often don't last long.
It's funny how fate & circumstance sometimes works out since earlier this week a batch of about a dozen LH Ruger 375 Guide Guns appeared on GunBroker at attractive prices. As soon as they appeared, they started disappearing just as fast:
Since my friend who keeps talking about going to Africa lives in the Seattle area, I often thought that visiting another hunting buddy in Alaska to go hunting up there might actually be a more probable scenario geographically and that this particular rifle would be an interesting model to use in that environment especially at that price. But I held off on purchasing one while waiting to see how things panned out with the unobtainable Dakota 76 which fortunately resulted in the much-admired Winchester 70 falling into my lap instead. Not a bad outcome.
If I was placing a bet when I started this thread 2.5 months ago, then the .375 H&H was always a prohibitive favorite: It was findable in LH models, it was affordable, it was a nostalgic classic, ammunition is ubiquitous, it was highly-recommended by people whose opinion I value and it was an all-around smart choice for my intended needs & purpose. What was totally unexpected was I would get infected by
Riflecrank,
CZ550,...,
et al's enthusiasm (that borders on fanaticism
) for the .458 Win Mag. You guys have officially piqued my interest. As someone who likes too much empirical data and overthinking things, the 181-page (and growing) .458 Win Mag thread in this forum has been a lot of fun to wade through as I read every post. That's a bunch of information to try to absorb. Anyway, the stainless Ruger M77 MkII with a laminate stock that I posted a picture of in my previous post above should arrive at my FFL tomorrow. When it does, I'll jump over to the .458 Win Mag thread and see if I can coerce those guys into helping me cobble together something similar to
Sir Ron's
Alderella pictured below since this second new rifle is the same model except with the bolt on the "correct" side. Back in September, I would have said that the 404 Jeffery, 400/450 or 416 Rigby/Ruger/RemMag would have been the more likely selection. The .458 WM might not have made the top 5. Hopefully this Ruger will be another fun learning experience.
If I ever manage to break away from the southeast in my upcoming retirement years, then the final result of this thread and my current selection of larger calibers to choose from currently looks like this:
30-06 - Sako 85 Hunter LH
9.3x74r - Ruger No. 1S
375 H&H - Winchester 1885 Safari Octagon
375 H&H - Winchester M70 Safari Express LH
405 Win - Winchester 1885 Traditional Hunter (iron sights)
458 WM - Ruger M77 MkII LH
If I'm unsuccessful at taking an animal on either continent with that selection, I don't think I'll be able to blame my tools. The purpose of starting this thread was to put one more bolt action rifle into the safe. Surprise, surprise...it turned into two.