A Visit with the Village Chief….

The owner of Zambeze Delta Safaris is Mark Haldane….

He is an amazing and extremely generous man who is concerned for the welfare of all the people around him and NOT just for the hunters that visit and inhabit his camp.

Over the years he has put many projects into place and today we visited several of those.

The first stop of the day was to speak to the village chief. Chief Thozo (pronounced Tozo) is 51 years old and arrived at our meeting spot in full regalia.

The chief first wanted to speak in Portuguese, but Mark convinced him that English would be better. However, there were several intervals where they reverted to Portuguese to more easily get the point across to the chief.

Before we go on, you need to understand a bit of Mozambique history. There was a civil war in country from 1977 to 1992….FIFTEEN long years. During this time much of the wildlife was wiped out as they were killed to feed the warring armies.

The chief started by talking about the changes that have taken place since the end of the civil war to now. Since 1992, the animals have slowly come back, with much credit going to Mark and to Zambeze Delta Safaris!!

The chief explained that this is good for the villagers because professional hunters have followed the increased game and now the government gives 20% of the concession and licenses fees that these hunters pay, directly to the village.

Also, the meat from the “sustainably hunted” animals is distributed back to the local community. In a normal season there are 50-52 tons of game meat given directly to the villagers.

During the war years, there was little food but now malnutrition has almost vanished. ZDS has encouraged agricultural plots and other ways that the villagers can sustain themselves.

When asked what the chief wants for the future, he said that he likes how things are going and wants things to keep going up and up for the 1200 people living in his village.

When asked if there was anything that he wanted to say to us, he said, “I want to tell how good collaboration with Mark and that I like the job that he do here. He transport when we have people sick, he build a school and a clinic, he build my house…..

He do so many jobs . I like very well the job of this man!!”

It was encouraging to hear his broken English words and to know that we are getting to be a part of this upward trend.

As we were returning to the camp, we passed a group of women heading home from a day of working in the rice fields. They sweetly stopped and showed us their wares…..

They are so stately as they walk slowly toward home…..

Watching their contentment makes me extremely thankful for the many blessings that I have in my life.

Hungry stomachs no more…..

Today I am talking about taking the meat from the buffalo that Michael had hunted and providing it to the villagers. If you want the WHOLE story start HERE…..

After our victorious lunch, we headed to the local village for the meat distribution.

On our other excursions from the camp, we have worked our way further into the bush but this afternoon we were heading toward civilization. I started to see various huts and shacks…..

And then we started seeing children……

*A TINY little boy with a BIG stick!!!!*

I felt a bit like the Queen as I sat on the elevated seat in the back of the jeep, waving and smiling to every child that I saw.

Word had gotten out that a meat delivery was imminent, and the crowds were already forming when we arrived. It started out mostly as children….

….and we enjoyed watching a heated game of dodgeball. Believe me, these little girls could THROW that ball!!!

And what is it about little boys and tires……

The village representative….

….came to us and shook our hands (one firm shake) to tell us thank you for providing the sustaining meat.

And I know that this photo may look gross to us…..

….but to these villagers, it’s “what’s for dinner”.

The village representative had to sign saying that he had received the meat………

……and then he and his son took the lead in organizing and handing out the meat. They know who received meat from the previous buffalo and ensure that it is shared between all of the villagers.

While we were waiting for the villagers to arrive, we did some videos that will be used in an upcoming Ted-X talk that Michael will be presenting in September……

The women soon arrived and the doling out of the meat took place…..

They then picked up their pans of meat, put them on their heads…..

And returned to their homes…..

The meat will be smoke-dried over a fire and eaten later. Julian told me that they will boil the dried meat first to get rid of any mold or other toxic substances that have formed during the storage time, and then cook the “cleansed” meat.

It was a humbling experience to visit the village and even more to see their excitement and gratitude for two white people who were supplying food that will give nutrition to their children and strength to themselves and their families.

Please enjoy this video montage, but be warned that there are two scenes where the raw buffalo meat is shown. If you think of it as walking down the butcher aisle of your local grocer, you should be okay!!!

Cape Buffalo here we come…

If you haven’t been following along on this journey, please start with this post and move forward……

SO……on Wednesday morning, we did it all again!! Today we took the BV even further onto the flood plain and within an hour of driving, the trackers had spotted the buffs. While they figured out which way to go, I enjoyed the scenery….especially the white-barked “Fever Tree”.

The are was also populated with many Palm-type trees…..

I managed to get one shot of the fruit as we rolled past…..

When I was off of the truck and taking photos, Julian commented that he heard a leopard call (called a “saw”) and suspected that there was one in the brush just ahead of us!!!……YIKES

It was interesting to see the tracks that the BV left on the soft ground…..

Julian and Dolish would look for the highest point so that they could see further over the plain. Julian used the BV cab as his ladder……

…..while Dolish preferred a HUGE termite hill…..

The trackers would also listen for the buffalo. When they heard Oxpeckers (a bird that sits on the buffalo), it caused them to turn and go in a different direction!

We walked/slogged on their path for about an hour and then came upon the herd. Now it was a waiting game!! Julian had to find a bull that was appropriate for a “community meat buffalo”. It couldn’t be a huge trophy but also shouldn’t be a young bull. Once he had found the proper one, he now had to make sure that Michael knew which one he was looking at!!

There were two possible bad outcomes….the first is that Michael shot the wrong buffalo and second was that he would wound it rather than making an outright kill.

The trackers took a seat while this process was going on and I joined them on the ground as it was much easier than sitting on my knees!!

We heard the distant sound of a helicopter and all of us prayed that it wasn’t coming our way because it would definitely scare the buffalo away!! Fortunately, it stayed closer to the camp, so we didn’t need to worry.

After an interminable time, Michael was able to take the shot. Buffalo are hardy, thick-skinned animals and are not easy to take down. When the buff didn’t go down immediately, Michael worried that he had made a bad shot, but Julian told him to just wait a bit and see what happened. The buff ran a few yards and then fell.

Now we had to wait until the other buffalo wandered away!! I expected them to all flee once the gun sounded but they just kept on grazing around us, apparently unconcerned with their fallen comrade.

By now we were all standing up and I was surprised to see a bull about 50 yards away…..just looking at us. Needless to say, we did not make ANY visible movement and after a few minutes, he simply wandered away.

When we got to the now-deceased buffalo, they worked hard to push the 1500-pound animal onto his chest so that we could do some photography…

If you want to see the photo, please click HERE.

Francisco was dispatched to bring the BV and we enjoyed looking around the plain……

….although there wasn’t much to see!!

The next part of the day wasn’t pretty but was necessary for us to transport the buffalo back to camp. We watched as the trackers skinned and quartered the big guy.

They stopped often to sharpen their knives and I was intrigued with the sharpener…..

It was so simple in design but was extremely effective!!!

Julian and I enjoyed a laugh while we were waiting….

….and the vultures wondered why it was taking so long!!

They attacked the leftovers as soon as we pulled away….

Francisco had worked hard this morning and took a well-deserved nap as we headed back to the road…..

The ride back to camp was victorious and lunch was eaten with a light heart, knowing that we had conquered the “dangerous game” and, more importantly, that a village was going to be fed!!

Come back tomorrow for the meat delivery….it was a blast!!!

Continuing the search….

Before you read this post, please read part one……

When I left you, I was following in the wake of the guide, hunter and trackers…..

I had to work hard to keep up with them, but I would still find time to stop and take a quick photo of a flower, spider web or something else that caught my eye.

Now we reached the part that I had been dreading the most….slogging thru the wetlands!! My first steps were tentative, and I found that I was trying to pull my pant legs up so that they wouldn’t get wet. I quickly realized that was a futile action and just started concentrating on walking and, most importantly, staying upright!!!

After that first water crossing, I was more comfortable with the process. It was fun, however, to listen to the squelching of the 5 people in front of me!!

At this point, I had no idea where these mythical buffalo were. I would just do whatever the trackers did…..if they walked, I walked….

If they stopped, I halted……

When they squatted down, I followed suit….

I don’t know what would have happened if they had broken out into a run….I assume that I would have RUN too!!

Julian explained that we had to move behind the herd, making sure that the wind was blowing into our faces rather than past us and on to the buffs. When they would hear or smell us, they would turn and face us meaning that it was impossible to move closer.

During this entire escapade, I never SAW a single buff. I heard them snorting several times but never laid eyes on them. Julian promised me that I WOULD see them next time!!

Unfortunately, the wind was swirling, and we ended up spooking them several times. After the third such event, Julian said that they were too spooked and that we should come back tomorrow!!

It felt good to take off the camera harness and relax a bit in the sun before we started the trip back to camp…..

Come back tomorrow for more……

Cape Buffalo – part 1

Before I tell today’s story…..this post talks about big game hunting!! Before you click off of the post, please check this one out first……

On Tuesday morning, we headed out to the Zambeze Delta flood plain for Cape Buffalo. Michael is planning to shoot one of these animals and give the meat to the local villagers. In the hunting world, this is called a “community buffalo”….no trophy is taken home and the joy comes in stalking the animal and providing meat for a village.

The buffalo reside on the flood plain and it takes a while to drive there so we had to make an EARLY start….5:00am for breakfast and a 5:30 start.

We were both nervous about the morning….Michael was concerned with the thought of hunting a dangerous animal and I was concerned about whether or not I could keep up with the trackers in the swamp-like conditions.

We were wearing high-top tennis shoes for walking in the swamp and we both sported our clean, new shoes before we left.

They were NOT this clean when we got back.

It was freezing on the back of the truck, but I put my hat on to keep my head warm and pulled my jacket up over my ears.

NOTE TO SELF…..when we come back next month, I am bringing a quick dry towel for my hair and a knit cap!!!

It took about 45 minutes to get to the drop-off point and here we picked up the BV, an All-terrain vehicle that will take us safely thru the swamp.

Getting in was interesting……

….but it was fun to stand in the back and view the scenery from up high.

As we drove, there were herds of Water Buck……

…..Hartebeest……

….and one large herd of Zebra….SO much fun to see.

My favorite was a flock of Saddle-Back Storks……

I am thinking that my Africa quilt may have something to do with the magnificent bird!!!

The guide and trackers were always searching for herds of the large black beasts….

…..OR looking closely at the ground for their tracks……

At one point, they could see that the buffalo had headed in one direction, so we headed that way as well. After we wandered around for about an hour, they decided that the beasts had returned to the path that we were originally on!!

The BV was an amazing machine, often moving through water that was 6 feet deep!! After one of our forays into the water, Michael found this cute little frog sitting on his sleeve…..