When everything goes right and a shot opportunity presents itself, it’s best to have the utmost confidence in your equipment. Bows featuring heavy draw weights coupled with heavy arrows and stout two-blade broadheads are a must when facing thick skinned dangerous game.

Taking up the trail, we followed light blood 65 yards to Dale's first buffalo. Back slapping and handshakes were in order. After photo sessions, we began caping and boning out the meat.

The islands are owned by the Tiwi people and controlled by the Tiwi Land Council. Part of the deal that Les and Bill worked out to allow bowhunting included salvaging the meat and transporting it to the locals. Several times during the butchering process, we were alerted to approaching herds of buffalo by the cracking of brush. We took refuge next to climbable trees as they filtered past. One group contained a bull whose travel route was over the top of Bill and me. At seven yards, I filmed as Bill leveled the big bore rifle at its head and grunted, "Oy." The bull gave him a dumb look and I thought he was going to do something stupid. The bull finally shook his head and turned. When he caught our wind, he thundered off, causing a stampede. We finally completed our task, shouldered our packs and trudged three miles back to the truck.

Hard Luck Times
The next couple of days I decided to demonstrate to Bill and Dale just how unlucky I can be. I blew countless stalks for various reasons. At one point, Bill and I had been snaking on our bellies in 16-inch tall grass for an hour. We were 10 yards from a big bull just waiting for him to turn. The tropical sun was frying us when the wind decided to change 180 degrees. After the bull blew out of sight, Bill rolled on his back, looked at me and exclaimed, "You deserve better than that, mate." I just shrugged my shoulders and replied, "Hey, at least I'm having a lot of fun."

The next day, we went back to the Honey Hole. We cut through the rain forest to an open, boggy, grass-covered area. Bill spotted a monster bull and we high tailed it to cut him off. The soft ground made for quiet going, but the huge bull was nowhere to be found.

Later on, we were working down the creek when Bill signaled he heard something. Dale and I looked at each other and laughed. Bill doesn't hear well and couldn't hear us whisper when we saw something. He insisted that we tap him with our longbows to get his attention and we had been prodding him all week. We worked slowly in the direction Bill pointed. After a while, Dale and I heard the sound too.

Splashing and sucking noises made their way to our ears. We closed in quickly with a favorable wind. We came to the edge of a 20-foot diameter hole filled with liquid red mud and two bulls. They were entirely coated with red slop as they rolled on their backs and pounded their heads into the bank. We held up just inside the cover 10 yards from the buffalo. One of the buffs was bigger and he came up the bank and stopped broadside. I was just going to shoot when he looked our way and stared blinking his mud covered eyes. How in the heck that bull saw us I'll never know. The other bull broke the tension by horning his buddy in the rump. The bigger bull lurched forward out of sight and the second bull took his place. It was time for me to kill a buffalo. When the bulls front leg went forward, I drove a broadhead through his heart. The bull bolted across the stream and tipped over on a muddy flat on the other side. He wasn't the biggest buff on the island, but I couldn't have cared less.

Bill's wife, Linda, had been stuck in camp all week preparing delicious meals for us. Bill had promised her a picnic lunch on the beach and Dale some fishing, so we took off for Tinganoo Bay early the next day.