Hunting Report - Tim and Marit Doucetn

I had been looking for an elephant hunt for many years, interviewing potential PHs and getting cost estimates. I had received the Auction Guide from the THCC and knew that Kobus Hannibal, owner, and head PH of Africa Thirstland Safaris, based in Windhoek Namibia had donated the elephant hunt to the THCC. After speaking with Kobus in Reno and having several friends in the chapter, we decided to go and .... I won! With my wife, Marit on board as a second hunter, planning began on our safari to Namibia: elephant, plains game, and possibly an upgrade to a lion if available time. This was my 6th African Safari. We left June 17th. Kobus met us at the airport and personally assisted us through customs and gun registration. We flew out that day on his Cessna 205, north to his "four conservancy". We arrived at noon, immediately sighted in our Rifles Inc. 458 Lott and a 300 Win mag. That afternoon we were fortunate to take three beautiful trophies, (talk about a fast start!), a Common Springbok, Gemsbok, and a huge Hartebeest. Kobus was more excited than I. We then hunted elephant for a few days in the area and decided to move to another area with known recent activity. On arrival, we quickly found tracks, followed for almost 5 hours, without success that same day. Up early the next morning and picked up fresh tracks of a herd. Caught them, but all the bulls were too small, and young. One older bull had one broken tusk. We pulled back, knowing that there were more animals somewhere in the area. We picked up other fresh tracks, including a large bull and started following. The tracks were probably the ones we saw yesterday, but could never catch them that day. Interestingly, he circled around us, and in fact crossed our tracks. We knew he was close. He soon joined a group of cows and calves. The next day, we spotted the herd at 300 yds. Shoulder to waist high brush separated us. Kobus myself, Francois, began the stalk. Marit and 3 others hung back. We approached to 35-40 yds., and could go no further. No cover, plus a calf had spotted us, looking at us continuously, but really did not know what we were. He did not raise the alarm. Kobus put up the sticks, I took the shot, my 458 Lott with a 500 gr. solid, at the frontal brain area and then a heart/lung sent him down for good. A great Namibian tusker! From there we went on to hunt other species and ended with Marit taking a Mountain Zebra, Blue Wildebeest, Gemsbok, in addition to my Black Wildebeest, Blesbok, White Blesbok, Waterbok, Warthog, and an enormous Hippo. We also then flew south for a lion hunt which took three days and was quite exciting having to shoot it as it charged! Before this hunt, both my wife and I attended the SAAM Safari course at FTW Ranch which is a hunter's shooting school geared for an African safari and covers shooting off sticks for plainsgame and in close shots at dangerous game with life-size moving targets. We highly recommend to fellow hunters as we used those tools we learned at SAAM on this safari. This was truly the hunt of a lifetime and the accommodations, hospitality and professionalism were all top notch. Thanks to the THCC for making this all possible!!!

Tim and Marit Doucet