Top_Heavy's World

The morning was normal, as mornings go while on safari. Milton would poke his smiling face into my room to be sure I was awake. He would make breakfast and sweet, British tea. The days supplies would be put into the truck, the fuel and daily maintenace being already taken care of. Allan, my PH, a tracker and a gun bearer and I would climb into the open topped hunting truck and we would drive the dirt roads. Tracks of all manner of animals would cover the roads from all of the nighttime activities. We would size up the animals, evaluate the tracks for age, type, size etc, and then we would drive on or get out and track the animal. During our travels this morning, we came upon one of my favorite animals, the common duiker. This tiny antelope looks a lot like a miniature whitetail deer, with short black horns. The shape, physique, etc all reminded me of the deer I hunt so often. We found this beautiful bull while driving. A short stalk and a good shot were needed to anchor him. This duiker has about 3 1/2" horns and weighed perhaps 30lbs.

We did find a herd of klipspringer with a magnificant bull in it. This bull would have gone very high in the record book with a bow. Allan beieved in the top 10 all time! I worked on this bull for hours and actually shot at him 2 times. My gear was set up for shooting big animals at less than 30 yards. 800 grain arrows drop really fast after this point and I never got inside of 50 yards. Both shots at the bull fell way short. I did go back to get my rifle, but never saw the monster bull again. With the Mathew's Drenalin I use today, this little beast would have my name behind it in the books for sure!