Devil’s in the Details

Chapter 1

General Dwight D. Eisenhower once commented, “The plan is nothing. Planning is everything.”

As the Supreme Commander responsible for the overall plan and planning of Operation OVERLORD – the Allied invasion of Nazi Europe in WWII – he both appreciated and understood the criticality of planning as the precursor for success. His words are no less true today, regardless of the endeavor.

Each year millions of sportsmen spend billions of dollars to hunt at home and abroad. And each year some of those same sportsmen return from an experience they’d sooner forget. I’ll wager that, in most cases, the difference between a wonderful experience and a fiasco lay in good planning or lack thereof.The devil’s in the details, as they say, and the more complex and distant the goal, the more planning is necessary to achieve success. At the end of the day, only results count!

Part I – Prelude to an Adventure – addresses the planning involved for an enjoyable and successful safari experience. I emphasize the word ‘experience’ because a successful African safari – from the KiSwahili meaning “journey” – is about a great deal more than squeezing the trigger. Success, however it’s measured, can never be guaranteed. But a good plan, combined with detailed and realistic planning will likely lead to a safari worthy of Africa, sport hunting, and the sportsman or sportswoman.

Planning involves six essential elements which answer the questions: What, Where, When, How, Who, and Why. I began withwhy because it set the stage for the other five questions.

Why Africa? After all, there’s no shortage of big game in North America, it’s much closer and, one would think, easier and cheaper to obtain … right? Well, not exactly.

If the sportsman’s hunting interests are limited to putting venison on the table, where sex is irrelevant and good public land is readily available for hunting, then, yes, it’s cheaper and easier to hunt near home. But as with most things in life, you get what you pay for, or earn in the case of fair chase hunting.

The relative ease and expense changes when the sportsman’s interests involve more than just food. The meat tastes pretty much the same, whether it’s from an SCI record bull elk or 5-year old cow, but the underlying motivation in taking either is quite different and the downstream importance to conservation in general, and sport hunting in particular, is huge.

Hunting in North America for trophy whitetail or mule deer, elk, goats and sheep ranges from $6-35K for one animal. For that pric