Well the Africa hunt is planned, the plane reservations made (Thanks to Valerie Paul at ATD - Adventure Travel Desk and it’s time to start getting ready. Here is our itinerary for the May flight to South Africa.

Seattle-Washington DC 735A 320P

Washington DC-Johannesburg 540P 445P

Johannesburg-Mpumalanga 1130A 1220P

It’s a long flight from DC to Johannesburg but it will be well worth it. I’ll bring some books and DVD‘s to watch. Maybe all the HAWG Quests episodes I missed!

As I mentioned in my last blog my main target is a Kudu and after listening to how tough African game is from guys who have hunted this area it was time to go rifle shopping. Besides what better excuse to add a new rifle to the collection then for an African plains game hunt.

After looking at all the choices I decided to go with a Browning X-bolt Composite Stalker in 338 Win Mag.

It’s a hard hitting rifle and weighs in at only 7.3 pounds. It has a 26in barrel and should be pleasant to carry around all day. It will have a little recoil but I figure, no pain no gain!

Now this bad boy needed optics so after talking to Tim Lesser the Marketing Communications Specialist at Leupold & Stevens I settled on a VX-3, 3.5-10x50mm with an illuminated Duplex as my scope.

When it was time to choose ammo I contacted Tim Brandt at Federal Premium/ATK and he highly recommended theFederal 225-grain Barnes Triple Shock loads in .338 Win Mag. He stated that the Barnes Triple Shock loads have an excellent track record for hunting on the Dark Continent.

So the rifle is here and it’s time to get it over to our Snake River Hunting Club gunsmith Don Davis to have the scope mounted and the rifle bore sighted. Then off to the rifle range for sighting in and lots of practice.

Check back often for the latest on my safari preparations.

Capt John