Africa Beckons (Part 8)

Get me a gun

(1979) Undeterred by this most disappointing outcome – namely having our land lease request turned down by His Excellency, The Minister of Lands - I was determined to enjoy my brief sojourn in the capital, city life being a refreshing contrast – for a while at least – to the coastal heat and myriad raucous sounds of the African bush.

My next stop was at Kenya Bunduki (Bunduki being Swahili for gun), established in 1929 and a city firearms dealer that Alex and I had already frequented several times. I rang the bell, and one of the two elderly African attendants emerged to unlock and swing back the heavy door of prison-style bars that secured the entrance.

On our earlier visits, Alex and I had rather fancied a pair of Ruger .357 Magnum revolvers that they had on display in a glass cabinet, and each time we had been there, the two long-suffering elderly attendants had patiently indulged us as we removed the revolvers from their boxes and waxed paper coverings, felt the heft of them in our hands, flipped the cylinders open and closed, caressed and admired them lovingly and then reluctantly returned them to the ever-smiling attendants for safe-keeping; we had neither the funds nor the necessary firearms license to purchase them.

The last time Alex and I were there, I had turned around at the door before leaving, addressing the older of the two gentlemen. “Mzee,” I had said, using the customary term of respect with which one would address an older man, “Remember that you are keeping these two guns for us, until we return with the license, and we buy them!” He nodded resignedly, replying, “Ndio. Mpaka mara ingine, Bwana…” - “Yes. Until next time”. I remember that I had stepped out into the sunlight and sniffed my hand where the manufacturer’s heavy application of lubricant had left a welcome smear. I was excited at the prospect of us acquiring these two handguns and at least having something to repel the dangerous game in the delta.

But on this particular visit to Kenya Bunduki today, I wanted to see what heavy rifles they might have for sale. When I was growing up in England, my father was one of very few in the British Isles who had a coveted firearms license, which enabled him to purchase and own a variety of different firearms. While at Edinburgh University, I had owned a Franchi shotgun, and I also used firearms extensively when I lived in Australia and worked on outback ranches there. So, I had already been around firearms to a certain extent.

I grew up in our sizeable family home set on three acres on Wentworth Estate in Surrey, some thirty miles south-east of London. Early on during the time the IRA was terrorizing London and Southeast England (1973 to 1994) with random bombings designed to maximize civilian casualties, we had two masked men come to the front door of our home one evening with a sawn-off shotgun. The doorbell rang and my mother answered the door. But my father was right behind her, and once he saw the two masked men, he brushed past my mother and pushed the two men down the front steps, sustaining a head injury from a shotgun barrel in the process. The two men panicked and fled, getting into their car and speeding off down our gravel driveway. Before exiting the open driveway gate, they threw the sawn-off shotgun out the car window and into the bushes.

The police later retrieved the shotgun and found it was not loaded, although my father, a very brave man, could not have known that. The detectives who came down from London and the local police both suggested that the would-be intruders might have been IRA and that they were probably after my father’s gun collection. So, after some deliberation on the matter, my father decided to disband his gun collection, only keeping a brace of double-barreled sporting shotguns, the receivers of which had beautifully engraved silver inlays.

Here at Kenya Bunduki, I could not find a suitable heavy rifle that they actually had in stock. What I was really after was a .460 Weatherby Magnum, a heavy rifle with a bullet the size of a small cigar that would be the best defense against any dangerous animal in Africa, however large or mean. While calibers of .300 Winchester Magnum, .338 or .375 H&H Magnum are powerful and versatile enough to handle a variety of game found out on the African plains, they are insufficient for large and dangerous big game. In Africa, most professional hunters prefer higher calibers with greater stopping power; calibers that start with a ‘4’, such as .404 Jeffery, .416 Rigby, .416 Remington, .458 Winchester Magnum, .458 Lott, .460 Weatherby Magnum, .470 Nitro Express or even .500 Jeffrey.

Expressing my gratitude for their patience with me, - after all, they knew I still did not have the necessary firearms license - I said goodbye to the two elderly attendants and exited the premises of Kenya Bunduki, making my way over to the government’s Kenya Firearms Bureau. In those days, firearms of any kind were hard to come by, and Alex and I had been told on several occasions that there was no chance of us getting a license to buy a rifle, suggesting that perhaps two powerful handguns might be the next best thing.

So why did we need firearms? At our Tana River Delta Camp on the coast, the wildlife was unused to human presence, meaning that encounters with the local big game – notably, elephant, Cape buffalo and lion – were unpredictable at best. Now, a shot from a .357 Magnum revolver striking flesh would do nothing but irritate an elephant, and it would just make a charging Cape buffalo or a charging lion even more determined to come on. But the sound of a warning shot might just turn such a charging beast.

The riverine plain behind our safari camp was dotted with a network of high and dense bushes, the prudent course of action being to give them a wide berth when walking across the area. This was because the biggest threat came from solitary old Cape buffalo bulls that liked to lie in the cooling mud on the shaded side of these bushes. Having left the normalcy of herd life, these itinerant old bulls in Africa are notoriously mean and ill-tempered, and they can be aggressive even if unprovoked. A mature bull stands about 5’6” at the shoulder, weighs up to 2,000 pounds and has sharp curved horns that can span anywhere from three to five feet from tip to tip. At the base of those horns is a thick “boss”, a dense skullcap of horn that will deflect almost any bullet.

When you consider the span of the horns and the length of a buff’s neck, you figure his horns can sweep about nine feet, from side-to-side. So, even if you could outrun him (you can’t) and even if you could suddenly change direction like a gazelle (you can’t), he would snag you on his horns before trampling you into the dirt until you were unrecognizable as a human. Lions know this, so they keep well away from those wicked horns. Even so, a buff’s neck muscles are so strong that if he does manage to snag the King of Beasts, he can flip a 450-pound male lion high up into the air!

Alex and I had each had a separate encounter with just such an ornery old Cape buffalo bull when we first set up the delta camp. In my case, I was casually strolling across the plain one late afternoon with the aim of photographing the camp from a distance. It was only later in my career as a professional safari guide that I learned to ‘keep my head on a swivel’ as I walked. But on this particular day, I was consumed with the thought of how I was going to take the photo, not noticing that I was straying rather close to a large and dense thicket. As I passed the thicket on the far side, a huge old Cape buffalo bull burst from its hiding place with a loud snort, where it had been lying in the shade, enjoying the cooling sensation of the thick mud, before it was rudely surprised by me.

This kind of incident can go one of two ways; either the bull stampedes off into the distance, or it angrily turns on the interloper and begins an onslaught with its deadly horns. Luckily for me – and for Alex, when it happened to him the following week – the bulls in each case just snorted loudly and made off at full speed.

Today, as I stood outside the Kenya Firearms Bureau, appointment slip in hand, I reminded myself that obtaining a firearms license was the one impediment standing between us and those two prized Ruger revolvers. When you enter the double doors of the Kenya Firearms Bureau, the dimly lit interior reveals a long counter stretching away into the even darker recesses of a huge room, with an official sitting at a desk at the front, completing paperwork in triplicate. I announced to this individual that I had an appointment with Bwana Dougie Walker, the Senior Superintendent of Police, and he scurried off to fetch him. Looking around the huge room, which was really more like a grand hall, I noticed several stuffed heads of African wildlife, high up on the walls.

Soon, Dougie Walker appeared, a tall Scotsman with a head of blond curls. “What can I do you for?” he asked in a friendly fashion, and I stated my case. “My business partner and I operate a safari camp in a remote part of the Tana River Delta, where we and our clients have occasional encounters with large and dangerous game. Consequently, I would like to apply for a firearms license so that my partner and I – we are both familiar and experienced with firearms - can each buy a powerful revolver, such as a .375 Magnum. Better still,” I continued, “would be two heavy rifles.” As an afterthought, I added, “For example, there are several nasty old Cape buffalo bulls that live in the vicinity of our delta camp.”

He had been looking at me inquisitively while I spoke, but the mention of Cape buffaloes seemed to peak his interest. “You don’t need firearms,” he countered, “because surely you know what to do if you are faced with a charging buffalo, don’t you?” I started to mumble a reply, but this was evidently a rhetorical question, since he continued without waiting for me to finish. “Well, this is what you do,” he went on, rather enjoying himself and expressing himself with great hand gestures “you stand your ground as the bull charges you. Stand very still until you can see the whites of his eyes, then you bend down, grab a handful of shit and throw it right in his eyes!” I did not see where this was going, or realize he might be having fun at my expense. He waited, expectantly, and I asked, “But what if there isn’t any shit?” “Don’t worry,” says Dougie Walker with a smile, “there will be! Application denied.” And with that, he turned on his heel and strode back into the gloomy interior of the hall.

In retrospect, that decision was probably a good thing at the time. Alex could be incredibly rude, bloody-minded, stubborn, pig-headed and infuriating at times. Why Sally had not smothered him in his sleep, I would never know. But I feel sure Alex would have driven me to the absolute brink one day, at which point, I would have shot him – unless Sally shot him first - and then fed him to the huge crocodiles languishing in the Tana River. (to be continued)