Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Africa When you think "Africa"..

what do you hear or see, in memory ?



After a too-short 10 day photo-safari in Tansania Parks, I hear zebras

I even sometimes hear them in my sleep.

A fish Eagle scream from a clear blue sky, Baboons raising a ruckus from somewhere across the Pan in front of camp at sunset, Eland Filets sizzling on the Braii, a kudu bull slipping through the jess…..

Chapter 2 coming in 2026

beggers at the bus stations selling wood carvings and maniac drivers.

Work

The night sounds, the smell of the morning air, the birds, the views, there is just so much. I “dine on” my Africa trips every day.

If you have not gone and it’s something you desire to do, get it done.

Impala barking

The sound of doves.

First trip to Namibia was the transition of the day sounds to the night sounds, and all the thorns.

Second trip to Zambia was the sounds and sights of the hippos along the Kafue.

Think about those trips all the time.

From social perspective, it was how fortunate we are here in the US to have everything we have.

My trips are seared in my memory. The sounds I hear are the doves and guineas at sunrise and the zebras at dusk. It is truly infectious. On the plane in Windhoek leaving on this last trip, my 23 year old son looks up at me and says, "Dad, I miss Africa!" We hadn't even left the gate yet!

Doves, Ha Di Dah birds, Biltong, Rusk with strong coffee, Portugese Chicken, smells, feeling of "otherworldliness."

national geographic....as my friend used to say... "look at those bullets" in reference to tribal photos of the ladies

Yep--and Africa has a bunch of different doves, far more than either North or South America.

Have also hunted them, and in fact my last safari was entirely for birds--and took four species of doves, along with bigger birds up to guineas. The various African doves taste great, just like most African big game!

i think someday

Those freaking "go away" birds, A dark dark Namibian night.....not a light to be seen anywhere except the sky.

Namibia has some great, unpolluted sky!

But just thought of another memorable night in Africa, my first in a tent camp. It was in Botswana's Okavango Delat around 20 years ago, and every hour or two during the night elephants started breaking branches while feeding, some almost over my tent--and yes, their footprints wwere within 10-20 feet of the tent in the morning. But never heard them walking.....

A lot of it for me is the sounds and smells ... cape turtle doves with their quiet, incessantly friendly cooing, the ominous sound of a leopard sawing across the river, the crack-whoosh and trumpet of an elephant pushing ancient trees over to nibble few bites from the tender tops. A lion announcing to everything in the neighbourhood with its loud guttural - grunty territorial call that its his turf. And Zebras. What a superbly wild, ridiculously silly sound.
The smoke from a mopane wood fire, the healthy barnyard smell of a herd of cape buffalo just beyond visual range in the jesse, the dry, dirty but refreshing smell of grass seeds, squished locusts and dust cooking against the front grill of the bakkie.
And the wonderful aroma of fresh eland blackstraps prepared on the braii, with the memory of the hunt to savour as you take the first bite.

For me it is the memory of a feeling. While I was there, it felt like I had “gone home”. No other way to describe it really.

I miss Africa. Mostly in Tanzania for a year all up. Working. Tented camps, guest houses etc. great place and they people were generally great too.

Lived in Tanzania for two years. Kilimanjaro is to this day the tallest mountain I've seen and it will be in my memory forever. The food, the smells, the fun drives in Land Cruisers and the scary rides in public buses. It's the most chaotic place in the world but I loved my time there.

The bovine barnyard smell when closing in on Buffalo.