My brother in law and I had a great time in Zimbabwe, hunting with John Sharp.



Shot the zebra at maybe 80 or 90 yards. He was looking right at me and I hit him dead center of the chest, maybe 6 inches above shooting right under him. He did not react at all to shot, simply ran off with the rest of them. While I felt good about the shot, this was the first animal I shot at and John looked at me like I whiffed him. The guys in the back of the truck didn't even know which animal I shot at. I felt pretty low for a few minutes until we found him dead as a hammer about 75 or 100 yards away.




This guy was maybe 75 yards away, quartering towards me pretty hard, (he was not quite facing me head on). I hit him on the right hand side of his chest, right where I was told to, and he buckled and ran 30 yards. A jackal ran up to him, while the dust was still floating, licked him and then went and laid under a bush about 10 yards away, waiting for something to come help him unwrap his delivery supper. Jackal didn't make it to supper.



shot this through both shoulders and it made it about 30 or 40 yards.





I wanted to shoot my rifle, rather than borrow something larger, so I had to shoot this guy in his neck or head. I was told to shoot him right under the mane if I didn't have a straight on shot at his neck. I got too excited and shot it right dead center on the neck, from the side. He turned and ran directly away from him and I shot him in the right side of the back of his head. I had my scope on 1.5 and saw the impact and him fall like a ton of bricks. I was busy patting myself on the back, when John said you might want to shoot him again. I look up and he is up and off to the races. Third shot goes right next to the first one, middle of the neck, from the side. I pause to load another shell (I failed to replace the wildebeest shot) and the fourth one caught him about an inch below his ear. Fortunately, this was the most excitement we had.

The buffalo was pleasantly uneventful.


I was shooting my 35 Whelen that Sterling Davenport built, loaded with 200 grain triple shocks over 60 grains of Reloader 15. The guys found one bullet, the wildebeest shot. This bullet did not hit any substantial bone and managed to retain about 60% of its weight.
[img]http://i746.photobucket.com/al...-8f8d-bbd144afbb97_zps61f548dd.jpg[/img]

All in all, I don't think that I could have had any more fun. I will be saving my pennies until I can get back over there and hunt buffalo or lioness with John. The Bubye Valley Conservancy is a remarkable place and I consider mice elf fortunate to have been able to spent some time there. We saw 4 of the Big 5 while hunting, no leopard.

That's great stuff!

Your zebra kill reminds me of mine on day one of my first African Safari. I knew I'd made a good hit, but he acted like nothing had happened, running off with the herd and causing me to doubt. He was piled up 80 yards away.

I guess I was a bit excited on my giraffe too, as it took multiple head shots to anchor him, although the first one put him on the ground immediately.

Thanks for sharing!

Looks like a great hunt! Congratulations. Seems that .35 Whelen of yours did very well indeed.

Tell us a little about the "uneventful" buffalo please, looks like an interesting rifle was used.

Guy

What a great experience. That is one dark old stink bull giraffe. Congrats on experiencing the Bubye and a great hunt with a great PH.

Great hunt Willow. That double looks like John's Rigby. Were you hunting leopard or you just didn't see any? Also did you see any sable? I've hunted with John twice and have booked for leopard in 2015. Cheers, jorge

Congrats on a great trip1 Nice pics. Hunting Africa is very addictive, it won't be your last trip....


maddog

Congrats on a very sucessful safari!

On my first safari I got real sick of people telling me I'd missed an easy shot, only to have a dead animal a short distance away. TSXs don't give much visual confirmation of a hit. Belting them through both shoulders usually takes care of that, switching to A-Frames takes care of it better.

Great hunt. It's amazing how everything goes right when you book with a top notch professional. I would love to hunt with John some day and have already hunted with a few greats- Buzz Charlton and Jamy Traut.

Congrats on a great hunt!

That giraffe is a beauty. Nice dark old stink bull!

Looks and sounds like you had a good hunt with a legendary PH.

Guy, that is John's Rigby, used as a prop only.

Jorge, we saw one sable while we were hunting. seeing one makes you wish you had a "1" on your license next to "Sable" rather than "nil." One of our friends was hunting leopard while we were there. We had a big thunderstorm mid way through his 14 days and it set back progress. He is planning his return trip for another shot a leopard.

As to the triple shocks, if anyone wants to trade some .35 caliber Aframes for some 200 grain TSX, I'm your guy. While I only saw two triple shocks recovered, I wasn't impressed with the weight retention. Mine lost all 4 petals and the other one I saw (from my buddy's 375) had maybe half of one petal. Granted everything died like it was expected t and many TSXs weren't recovered, so I've no real problems with the results, I just wanted a pretty copper flower like I see posted and didn't get one. I'll go back to mushrooms over flowers.

That is how TSXs work! lots of damage when the petals break off and the rest punches through and gives you two holes and NEVER any bullet failure. I was a big A Frame user and went to the TSX for that exact reason. Pretty mushrooms but the penetration just wasn't there.

Beautiful animals.

thanks for posting those great pics....you have no idea how many of us get our vicarious "Africa fix" this way.....

Congratulations on a very nice hunt.

How much for the box of 300 Savage?


Congrats on your success, good stuff

Congratulations!! That was fun to read and really makes me want to do Africa!

Eric

Well done willow! You sure hunted with a great outfit and even though I have not met John Sharp, he has a good name down here and is certainly well known as a top notch PH.

Nice trophies and we look forward to hearing the buffalo story in great detail.

Great Post, congratulations on the fantastic hunt! I love to hear of the 35 Whelen being used anywhere, but especially in Africa.

Nice post. Congratulations on the hunt. I haven't read too many stories of people using a .35 Whelen in Africa, so extra points to you for originality.

Very nice and a great write-up.

I hope you have a 2 story foyer or great room. That giraffe mount will take up a good portion of it. Did you hear the skinners groan when they realized they were going to be skinning that beaut of a giraffe?

Glad you had a great hunt. The pics seem to prove you did.

Congrats.

My brother in law killed the buffalo on the 4th day of the hunt. We would spend the mornings following the trackers, who were tracking bulls away from water holes. This was by far the most enjoyable part of the hunt for me. Everyone comments on how amazing it is to watch the trackers work. This is kind of like shooting doves in Argentina, you hear it all the time and prepare yourself by telling yourself, "Oh, I can imagine these guys working" or "I can imagine the sky full of birds" but until you see it, you've got no idea of the magnitude of experience. Issac and Kevin (the trackers) would quietly wander around and after an hour or so, there would be a fresh pile of $h!t, then a while later, a big black buffalo standing 30 yards away in some thick brush. The one that was killed was with another bull and had laid down. Brother in law got set up on the sticks, Isacc started breaking branches, buffalo stood up and turned to look at noise and he shot. Buffalo ran 30 or 40 yards and died. His buddy stared us down while we walked around to find the dead one. John yelled at the survivor and off he went. The two or three minutes between the shot and John yelling at the other bull were the best of the trip. I was always the 5th in line, behind everyone but the game scout. During these 2 or 3 minutes, I noticed that the scout had his south african made AR (I don't know what the rifle was) slung over his shoulder and was keeping a tree between himself and me.

I don't have any room for the flat skins from these animals. I'm afraid I'll have to have seat covers for my car made so that my wife can't find a new house that has room for them. I need to take that card out of the deck. I am looking forward to getting the european mounts from everything (less the zebra). The giraffe skull has a pretty good sized chunk out of it from my second shot.

Oh, thanks to RenoH414 for sending me two factory boxes to put my reloads in. TSA did cut the lock off of my pelican case that had my ammo in it going over there. And coming back. I would suggest using a TSA approved lock on your ammo case if you're going to lock it at all. TSA also confiscated several hundred 416 bullets (just a plastic bag of projectiles) in Dallas. I called them on it and could hear a lady in the background say, "I didn't know what they were and asked so and so and he said just to take them." Southwest was able to get them back and in a cardboard box and on my plane. No harm in done, but a brief head ache and lesson on bullets versus ammunition.

David,

I am so jealous!!! I just may have to go back with you! seriously!

Willow,

Did you shoot the buffalo with the .35 Whelen as well? I thought that caliber was illegal for Cape buffalo.

That's why I went to North Fork soft points. With the same 300 grain NF bullets, I shot an Impala stem to stern (bullet under the skin of the ham) and hit a Cape buffalo in the spine/shoulder junction. DRT on the Impala. The buff fell down and didn't move a step. Both bullets, when recovered, weighed over 290 grains and you can't tell the difference between them.

Drew, it was a great time. I'll probably be back over there sometime. Some projects will have to be re-evaluated/moved around. Its going to be tough to build a new shotgun and go to Spain and to get back to the Bubye.

Indy, I did not shoot the buffalo with the 35 whelen. My brother in law shot it with a 375. Despite my disappointment with not having pretty copper flowers like I've seen posted here, all of the animals I shot with a triple shock died in very short order.

I too have shared the greatness of the Bubye with John, Isaac, Kevin and "Wing", what a lifetime memory. In fact we saw a really big leopard while driving to the Fimbiri camp but alas not on my list for that hunt! Which camp did ya'll hunt? My second rifle was the whelen's little sister the 338-06 and did an excellent job with the 210 TTSX bullets. Actually I was hunting this time of year only four short years ago. We also lost about two days to rain in our fourteen day hunt.

Thanks so much for sharing your trip with us.

We hunted out of the Samanyanga camp. There was certainly no measure of "roughing it" at this place. Now that I'm thinking about it, I'm going to see if I can arrange for my wife to have an ice bucket, can of soda and a bottle of scotch sitting out for me when I get home from the office. Scotch and soda might be as essential to a good, late afternoon shower as a bar of soap?

I've sent the 50% deposit on my taxidermy, so the next stage of the waiting beigns. That is another bonus of this hunt for me, I get two different count downs/things to anticipate, rather than one.

This is a very nice camp. When I was there they had covered tents with attached bathrooms. I really liked this set up as it felt like wild Africa with nothing but tent fabric between you and the elephants in camp. I have heared they have replaced them with chalets. How do they handle the sleeping arrangements now?

I received my trophies a few months ago and was looking at the european mount of the giraffe and thought I saw something rattling around in the back of the skull. I managed to shake it around enough to recover my second triple shock. This bullet stayed in place through the boiling, cleaning and shipping.

Cool!

I took a 35 Whelen with 225 grain trophy bonded bearclaws. It worked fantastic on everything from Klipspringer to Kudu.