This is a tale of adventure.
It is a tale of friendship, of two best friends, sharing a love of hunting.
It is also a tale of loss.
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Dr. Tom Chestney had spent 12 days hunting a Cape buffalo in Zimbabwe, a veld-covered country in southeast Africa in 2007.
"We would get up before daylight, have some coffee and we would go to the waterholes and find tracks and follow them all day," said Chestney, a retired maxillofacial surgeon from Altoona. "The vegetation was so thick, you had to crawl on your hands and knees. Scorpions were coming out of logs and crawling on you."
After nearly two weeks of searching, Chestney finally shot a 2,000-pound bull. Wounded, the animal charged away into the high elephant grass, and with his guide's advice to "let the bullet do its work," they settled back and waited.
After an hour and a half, they started to track it. In a clearing, as Chestney waited, his guide walked on, looking for some sign of the bull. Chestney heard something in the high grass and called out to the guide. He quickly held up his hand to quiet Chestney, but it was too late.
"(The Cape buffalo) did a death charge," Chestney said. "He was 19 steps away, and I didn't even know he was there. It was amazing. He came firing out of the weeds."
The bull was charging right at Chestney.
"My P.H. (professional hunter) shot him in the face to change his direction as he was charging," he said.
Chestney then delivered the kill shot and, with it, bagged one of the African "Big Five": a leopard, a lion, an elephant, a rhino and a Cape buffalo.
The bull's head now hangs among the trophies in Chestney's Altoona home.
"(Hunting in Zimbabwe) was the most exciting thing in my life, next to having my kids," Chestney said. "It was completely different than anything I had ever done.
"Bosco agreed with me."
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The African hunting trips were the idea of Dr. Richard Bosco.
Chestney, who is 63, met Bosco when both were students at the University of Pittsburgh School of Dental Medicine. They were roommates, and as both shared a love of hunting, they became fast friends. After school, they both served in the United States Navy, and they were residents together at St. Francis Hospital in Pittsburgh. After residency, Bosco practiced in Butler, and Chestney, who grew up in Bellemead, came home to practice. The two friends, however, never lost touch.
"He and I went everywhere on trips, hunting," Chestney said. "We hunted in South Dakota, Colorado, Canada. He wanted to go to New Zealand for red stag hunting. He wanted to go to Alaska."
And Bosco was first to venture onto the Dark Continent.
"He went one year, and I didn't even know he had gone," Chestney said. "When he came home, he called me and wanted to go back. I didn't even have to think about it."
The friends traveled to the country of South Africa in 2006.
"We hunted all different kinds of plains game," Chestney said, "waterbuck, kudu, eland, wildebeest, blesbok, warthogs, springbok. We hunted sable antelope, which is the most beautiful animal on earth. It's just breathtaking."
Chestney returned home, thinking he'd just had a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Bosco had a different idea.
"I thought I'd be one-and-done," Chestney said. "Bosco wouldn't quit. He wanted to go again, and he wanted to go to Zimbabwe.
"If you like to hunt and don't want to worry, go to South Africa. Zimbabwe, that's a totally different story."
Hunting in Zimbabwe was the most thrilling hunting Chestney has ever done.
"In South Africa, you stayed in huts surrounded by a metal fence. There was no chance of anything getting in," he said. "In Zimbabwe, your camp was just thrown together in the middle of a forest. When you went to bed, you stayed in your hut.
"There is literally nothing to protect you there. You hear the hyenas howling all night, and you swear they are right beside you. It's a level playing field (in Zimbabwe). They can kill you as much as you can kill them. You are on the food chain over there."
The friends bagged many kinds of game during their safari, and Bosco shot a nuisance lion that was terrorizing a village.
After they returned home, as buddies tend to do, Bosco didn't miss an opportunity to stir things up.
"When we came off the plane, Bosco told my wife that everything I shot tried to kill me," Chestney said. "That made her a little nervous."
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The leopard had just killed a kudu when Chestney got his shot.
"My professional hunter, Dirk Fioure, whispered to shoot, and from 80 yards away, that leopard heard him," Chestney said. "That was unbelievable."
They had spent three days hunting for the big cat, and when Chestney fired, the wounded leopard jumped off its prey and ran.
"That leopard was just a blur when I shot it," he said. "It was off that kudu, and until I could chamber the next bullet, it was gone."
The hunting party tracked the leopard for an hour and a half - in the dark.
"If these animals are injured, they will stalk you," Chestney said. "That dangerous game can get you. One of the worst things is a wounded leopard, and you're tracking him.
"We had one tracker on the ground, in front of the Land Rover. I was on the back of the Land Rover, covering his back. Our safeties were off."
They found the dangerous cat in the deep elephant grass.
"I saw his eyes and shot him," he said. "The scream he let go when I shot him was bloodcurdling."
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"I thought (the trip to Africa) was the chance of a lifetime," said Cynthia Chestney, Dr. Chestney's wife. "When I met Tom, I knew he was an avid hunter, so I was thrilled, especially since he was going with his best friend."
Chestney's family - consisting of Cynthia, 57, and daughters Meredith, 29, of Pittsburgh, and Maggie, 25, of Charlottesville, Va. - is very supportive of Chestney's hunting, so much so that Maggie has taken up the sport, too.
"It's very relaxing for Tom, given what his profession was," Cynthia said, adding physicians are always on call.
"But I couldn't get away from my beeper," Chestney replied.
Cynthia even enjoys the trophies that fill their house.
"At first, I felt like I was living in 'Jumanji,'" she laughed. "They are beautiful, absolutely gorgeous. The leopard is my favorite."
The mounts tell a story of a lifetime spent hunting, in many locations with many friends, including Rod Baumgartner, Dr. Timothy Ehgartner, Dr. Richard Pfeffer, Michael Ehgartner and Dr. Donald Miller and Chestney's brothers Jim and Joe, as well as his father, Donald.
But, in spite of the numerous trophies residing in three rooms of his home, Chestney humbly stressed that there are others in Altoona with more mounts from more places.
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Bosco made it back to Africa one more time, without Chestney.
Bosco was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor in 2009, so he decided to make one more trip. Chestney opted out.
"His son was going along," said Chestney, who himself is now battling prostate cancer, taking treatments in Altoona under the care of Dr. Ted Belis and Dr. Jack Schocker. "He knew he was dying when he made that trip. I thought he should spend that time with his son. They killed a lion and an elephant and darted a rhino. I thought that just he and his son should go."
After the trip, Bosco died.
"My hunting buddy is gone," Chestney said. "He was the impetus behind it all. I lost my best friend."
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Chestney will return to the woods next month, hunting for whitetail deer, which he said is still exciting despite his experience with dangerous game. He is planning on traveling to Montana for elk season, and he is looking forward to hunting turkey, one of his favorite pursuits. He will continue to travel and hunt with his brothers, with Maggie and with his friends.
"Some of the best memories of my life," Chestney said, "have been hunting."
Mirror staff writer Cory Dobrowolsky can be reached at 946-7428.
