Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Africa Namibia Caprivi Strip Cancelation 5-day Buffalo Hunt $15K

Had a message from my friend Jan du Plessis that a friend of his in the Caprivi Strip, that Jan does some freelance DG PHing work for, has a just cancelled buffalo hunt come open. Details as I have them......

PH/Guide: Jan du Plessis
Contact Info: Email - sebra264gmail.com or via WhatsApp - +264 81 325 2372
Location - Caprivi Strip (I do not know the exact location or block)
Dates: Anytime after 14 July to 30 Nov 2023
Total Hunting Days: 5
Exportable: Yes
Total Cost: $15,000. USD all in from the time Jan picks you up in Windhoek until he takes you back to Windhoek (excluding taxidermy etc).

Includes: road transfer between Windhoek and hunting camp. It's a FULL day's drive each way, and customary camp lodging, maid/laundry food and beverages etc.

Not included: Airfare to and back from Windhoek or any lodging/food etc in Windhoek either before you're picked up or returned to Windhoek, taxidermy work other than initial prep and delivery to a Namibian taxidermist for processing/export etc.

Rough idea for an itinerary would be:

Day 1 - Arrive in Windhoek and overnight there
Day 2 - Drive to camp
Day 3 - 8 Hunt
Day 9 - Drive back to Windhoek and overnight
Day 10 - Fly home
Day 11 - Arrive Home

For those who've never gone over, most routes into Windhoek from the US will take 3 calendar days. You spend most of the first day getting to either Newark (United) or Atlanta (Delta). Both points of departure are overnight flights that land in Johannesburg generally to late in the day (end of calendar day 2) to make a connection on SA Airlink from there to Windhoek necessitating an overnight in Jberg. There is an early morning SA Airlink flt that gets you into WHD about 8am (3rd calendar day) but by the time you clear immigration, do the rifle paperwork, collect bags etc, you're looking at not leaving the airport until 9am or so and you do NOT want to be driving across the country after dark. Therefore, I would highly recommend just relaxing a bit and take a later flt to WDH and spend a day resting and exploring the city for the day. Then start the drive at daylight the next morning - Day #1 above. There are some other routes/carriers via Europe and the Middle East but those still take 3 calendar days at they involve 2 overnight flights going over and coming back and you have to be careful of the carrier as they MAY not allow firearms on board.

I have not been up in the Namibian side of the Caprivi but, I have been on the Botswana side, therefore I can not personally attest to any of the hunting area conditions or the camp/lodging facilities you'll be in. I do know several people who have taken this trip with Jan up and they said they had a great hunt and got good bulls. I've got pix they send me but, I don't have permission to publicly post them.

This is pretty much all I know about this. I will say this, for buff in Namibia, this is a damn good price. Only places to hunt them are the Waterberg Plateau Park in N. Central at $36K or the Caprivi Strip area at $35K. The Waterberg is huge but it is a high fence controlled area and the Caprivi is free range.

I'll help you sort out airline tickets and lodging in Windhoek and Jberg if you'd like but, everything else will be directly with Jan.

Thanks M3, sent an email to Jan.

Perhaps it’s just me but $15,000 for a five day buffalo hunt seems like a lot of money for that hunt. I could be wrong, but it strikes me as pretty pricey for a cancellation hunt.

Caprivi rates run there or more.

I’ve hunted buffalo twice in the Caprivi and that’s a good price for an exportable bull. The conservancies there charge the outfitters a high fee for exportable bull permits, thus a high trophy fee. It’s much cheaper to hunt a nonexportable bull, more in line with this hunt cost. Also for an eastern Caprivi hunt, it’s a lot easier to fly to Kasane Botswana and drive3-5 hours from there.

I'm in the Caprivi at the moment, second time here.

I don't think I would do a 5 day hunt in the Caprivi, but I suppose it depends on where you are hunting. First hunt took 7 days to see buffalo. This time took 4 days.

I would be cautious.

I guess it depends on which conservancy you hunt. I turned down a number of bulls on the first day and shot one the second day. Second hunt was over the first day. Both times I saw dozens of dugga boys and hundreds of buff. Having said that, I wouldn’t fly all the way to Africa for a 5 day hunt.add 3-4 days to visit Chobe National Park and do some tiger fishing.

Looks like a pretty good deal as it includes the trophy fee. As others have said, If I were flying all the way to Southern Africa I would want to spend some more in the bush, either hunting or fishing. You can probably find a way to add on some other activities if you want to.

Yep, on the area. Day after we got this one, we saw herds of 2-300.

That said, like other posts, I wouldn't fly that far for a 5 day hunt. To me, 10 isn't enough. YMMV

Had a message from Jan

The area is at the far eastern side of the strip, directly across from Kasane Botswana.

He has done a lot of freelance DG (ele & buff) PH'ing in that end of the strip. He, and the several guys I personally know who've hunted there with him, say they are "in buffalo" from day one.

He also reminded me that an "observer" is free.

Edited to Add:

Just realized where he's doing this is almost directly across from where my friend Gerhard Koch is doing DG hunts in Bots. Here's the link to my posting about it. If you hit the link to SV Safari's in that post, you can see a couple of promo videos that show the area etc.

https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbt...s-w-sv-safaris-gerhard-koch#Post18351541

Edited to Add: The area is called the Kabulabula Conservancy. You can do the name search in Goggle Earth to see where it is. Lodging is in one of their tented camps within the conservancy. If you want to add extra days for hunting or other activities (fishing etc), you'll need to contact Jan directly and sort it all out with him.

That location being the case, you could fly directly into Kasane from Joberg and cut out a lot of travel time from Windhoek and take the extra days saved and do photo safari stuff in Chobe National Park and fishing in the Zambezi River. The drive time from Kasane would be 3 hours at most and take you through Chobe NP, where you will lots of game, especially elephants You cross into Namibia at Ngoma border post over the Chobe River and often see buffalo from the river bridge. Kasane is served with multiple flight’s daily with 2 different airlines. I’ve used this route 7 times and it’s quite convenient.

While flying into/out of Kasane Botswana would cut down on road travel time, I'm not sure how the temp firearm permitting/transiting would be accomplished.

I've taken firearms into Botswana and Namibia and RSA. The primary challenge might be because one of the requirements of obtaining a temp import or even a transit permit is you have to have an "invitation" or "motivation" letter from a licensed outfitter or game farm in each country as part of your application. I did fly into Botswana once and then transited with firearms into RSA for a couple of days hunting and then back to Bots to finish the trip. I still had to have a SAPS 520 and an invitation letter from the Outfitter/PH/game farm on the RSA side when we went thru the boarder crossing check point.

I'm sure you can fly into Kasane and cross into Namibia and back out again. I'm just not sure of the documentation you'd need or how you'd get the rile permit in Bots since you'd just be transiting thru and taking physical possession of it while driving across to Namibia. Again, not saying it can't be done. I just don't have any first hand knowledge of how it would be done without someone in Bots doing the invitation/motivation letters and getting your permit approved in advance. Would be an absolute piece of cake if you were using one of Jan's rifles.

If anyone is seriously interested in going and routing thru Kasane Botswana, I suggest you contact Jan and ask how you'd go about it. He may have a Bots contact to help facilitate the process.

As far s I know, this hunt is still available. I simply could not make dates work.