But that's the thing...you don't need to win the lotto. While the total price for a hunt in Africa can look pretty daunting, there are ways to ease the impact on your bank account.
1) Book the hunt a couple of years ahead. You will usually have to pay some percentage of the daily rate in order to hold your hunt date. If that's $500/day for a 10 day plains game hunt in RSA, you'll have to drop $2500 right away. Set aside money the next year to pay for the remaining daily rates. Then, usually a few months before the hunt, you will pay the rest of the daily rates. Once you've gone and come back you will receive a bill from the outfitter to cover the trophy fees. Depending on what you take that will be anywhere from a couple grand to 5 or 6K, but you will have spread out the payments over a span of a couple of years which makes it much more manageable.
2) Work closely with your taxidermist to defer the cost until all is finished. If they have the freezer space and are willing, you can spread out your taxidermy over a couple of years. I did that when I went to Zimbabwe. I had my impala, warthog skull, and cape buffalo done right away but left the full-mount civet for a year. Again, spreading the costs out.
3) Use airline points to cover your flights. I did this when I went to Zimbabwe and it ended up only costing me a few hundred bucks to cover the taxes and fees. This was using the CIBC Aventura Visa, but the RBC Avion or BMO World Elite would work just as well.
So to break it down:
Year 1: 50% of daily rate paid
Year 2: set aside remainder of daily rate. Book flights with points and pay fees with cash (or points, if you want)
Year 3: Hunt, pay the balance of the trophy fees
Year 4: Pay for shipping and Taxidermy
When you do it this way, a $15K plains game hunt in Namibia becomes much more affordable. Similarly, a $30K cape buffalo hunt in Zimbabwe becomes much easier to swallow, though it is more of a stretch.
