Part I of the story of two safaris twenty years apart at the same camp with fathers as a professional hunter and client, then their sons as a professional hunter and client. Many things remained the same, many things changed, and many coincidences link the two trips.
As a kid I was glued to the TV when “Wild Kingdom” came on, as well as “Tarzan” movies. There were no African hunting shows on TV back then, only the occasional Discovery Channel programs about African wildlife in national parks.
In 1997, I was a thirty-year-old Sheriff’s detective dreaming at the Dallas Safari Club show. I went home from that DSC show with masses of brochures and magazines. One guy took extra time to make me believe I could afford to make an African hunt on a cop’s salary. Tommy Morrison of Sporting International made a good sales pitch. Now I just had to convince my wife how “affordable” a quick ten-day safari would be. It worked with one stipulation. Once I got back, she did not want to hear “Africa” again. Deal!
A ten-day plains-game hunt turned into a twelve-day buffalo/plains game hunt. I counted down the days for 18 months. I sold nearly all my guns, a four-wheeler, and anything else I could, and worked as many off-duty hours as possible, working security details for extra cash. My wife, my parents and all my friends didn’t understand all this, and thought this Louisiana duck-hunter had lost his mind. Next thing I knew had I left my wife, five-year-old daughter and one-year-old son and was off on the longest flight of my life with my first-ever passport, my new Win. Mod. 70 .375 H&H and a bunch of disposable Kodak cameras, off to meet some guy named Mark “Ellos” Ellement to whom I had never spoken or seen a picture of, and who would be my professional hunter. All I knew about what I was doing was from the Capstick and Ruark books I’d read, as well as some Zimbabwean history and political books. Those days in 1998 were before WhatsApp and email! I don’t think Matapula Hunters (which Ellos owned half of ) even had a website back then. Mr Morrison told me that Mark Ellement usually only did elephant hunts for repeat customers, but had a window in his schedule, and had taken my hunt because I was a young first-timer.
After a sleepless night in Johannesburg, I was on a plane to Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. I was SO nervous and began questioning my own sanity. I was no world-traveler and totally out of my comfort zone. Once I got my bag and gun and made my way to the final exit, I was thinking “now what?”
Outside was this lanky guy with leathery skin, wearing short shorts, who walked towards me, removed his cap and extended his hand. “You must be Conrad,” he said. I wondered who he was. I was half expecting to see Tarzan or someone in khakis and a terai hat. “Yes, that’s me, how did you know?”
“I’m Mark Ellement,” he said, “and I’m here to pick up
