The Pleasures & Perils of An African Safari
Skip the Monster Lens. Also the Safari Jacket.
by Richard Conniff
For people lucky enough to afford it, an African safari is the trip of a lifetime. I first experienced it in 1997, on a safari in the original Swahili sense of the word—a no-frills journey into the wilderness. I was headed to a research camp for a story, and my directions were to drive north out of Maun, Botswana, into the Okavango Delta, and turn left after two hours. In the wooded stand where the research camp operated, I pitched my tent on the ground and went to sleep listening to a leopard making a sound like a handsaw cutting through bone. It was a strange twist on a baby’s white noise machine, but I slept soundly.
My work as a writer about wildlife has also given me the chance to observe wildlife at various high-end game lodges in a half-dozen African countries over the quarter century since then. And there is an awful lot to be said for expert guides, comfort, and even luxury. At Chitabe, one such lodge in the Okavango Delta, I slept in a lavish tent with a bathroom better than the one at home, all on a raised platform. Elephants, at eye level with the platform, browsed the trees a few feet away. I woke up on my last morning to a sound like puppies rough-housing. Bones cushioned by skin and fur thumped repeatedly on the deck in front of my tent. I peeked out and found a couple of genets, cat-like carnivores with huge eyes and plush ring-tails, playing there. It was magical. Or rather, it was entirely natural.
These lodges have unfortunately also given me the chance to see people spend massive amounts of money getting the experience of a lifetime wrong. So I’ve come away with a few suggestions, jotted down during slow interludes between game drives:
1. You do not want to be one of those people who show up dressed like John Wayne in “Hatari.” But it happens all the time at expensive lodges. Soft men and women who have spent their lives sitting at desks spinning money arrive in unblemished safari jackets and bush hats. It’s like showing up at a dude ranch in a new cowboy hat and chaps. A safari jacket might have made sense back when you needed infinite pockets to stash film canisters. But, hello, digital photography? Instead of the safari jacket, bring something comfortable that will keep you warm on a 6 a.m. game drive. Bear in mind that July is winter in southern Africa, with nighttime lows down to 40 degrees (or, as they would say, 4° C). But it can go up to 70 by day. Even in East Africa, on the equator, it can be 50 (or 11° C) at dawn. Wear layers for when it heats up later.
2. Leave the stupid camera home. Or at least leave it in the bag half the time when you go out on a game drive. There is a peculiar quirk of the human mind that leads us to forget the things we photograph, possibly because we never fully experience them in the first place. Avoid that by just looking and thinking about what’s going on in front of you.
On safari, men in particular often suffer from a National Geographic photographer fantasy, arriving with telephoto lenses like bazookas. They can barely lift the things, much less take great pictures with them. A game drive vehicle shared with other tourists is a particularly unfortunate place to indulge this fantasy. The National Geographic photographers I have traveled with often spent days shooting the same thing in different light conditions. It’s one reason they could be awkward travel companions (but that’s another story). For you, snapping your 132nd shot of that elephant while your fellow tourists sigh is a good way to end up alone at dinner. Spend that telephoto lens money on decent binoculars instead.
3. If you must take photographs, please don’t make your guide look at them later that day. Strange as it may sound, safari guests do this all the time. They download their cameras and then bring their iPads to the campfire, on the theory that everyone will want to see mediocre photographs of what they have just spent the day seeing in the flesh. This is particularly cruel to guides, who are paid to be nice to you. That lion you are so proud of having photographed may well be the 10,000th lion sighting of that guide’s career. If he raves about your work, that’s called “acting.” Bear it in mind at tip time.
4. Instead of bringing photographs to the campfire, bring a song, a poem, or a story, to entertain your fellow guests. I once heard someone do a dramatic recitation at the campfire of “The Man from Snowy River,” by the Aussie bush poet Banjo Paterson. It was thrilling. If that seems too nervy, do a brief reading of a passage you love about nature, wildlife, or the country you are visiting. At the very least, be an interested conversation partner. Ask good questions (“Why do you think there are so many different antelope species here?”) and listen to the answers. Should you find yourself at any point talking about your wine collection, please stop immediately.
5. Do not grumble when passing game drive vehicles pause so the drivers can chitchat. This is their social network, and they are swapping information about where to find that lion you are so desperate to see. Be patient: The information they trade may get you where you want to go faster. It is of course also possible that they are seeking momentary relief from the company of excessively entitled tourists.
6. The game drive is not just about seeing lions, leopards, rhinos, cape buffaloes, and elephants, the so-called “Big Five.” In any case, when you see your lions, they will almost certainly be asleep. It’s what they do 15 to 20 hours a day. It can be far more interesting to pay attention to the saddle-billed storks, lilac-breasted rollers, or meerkats you may be lucky enough to spot en route to where you think you should be going.
7. Even for people who abhor hunting, some remnant of hunting psychology lurks within us all. Some of my best experiences in the field happened when I was hunting for something specific, a leopard on a kill, or an ostrich at the nest. This entailed occasional frustration and disappointment along the way. But for me, having the objective also made for a bigger payoff when we actually succeeded. Just be careful not to let a single-minded focus on your mission distract you from all the other common and uncommon wildlife along the way.
To minimize the frustration, consult with your guide to make your hunt practical for the species, the location, and the number of days you have available. African wild dogs in the Serengeti? Five days minimum, plus the right guide, and no guarantees. (But, hey, look at those cool little hyraxes on that kopje over there!) If your guide gets you to your objective in due time, tip well.
8. Sometimes it’s good to just sit and watch. It gets you off the washboard roads, and the rattling of your safari vehicle furiously shaking itself to pieces. (Drivers jokingly call this “the African massage.”) A good guide can almost always take you to some place where you can enjoy the quiet and just see what turns up. One time, my guide parked in front of a dense and not particularly promising stand of phragmites, a tall marsh grass, shortly before sunset. I didn’t ask why. A little later, as if a dam had burst, a river in the sky came swooping down out of nowhere. It was a murmuration of small, sparrow-like birds desperately seeking their nighttime roost. They were desperate because hawks were also waiting for this moment. The hawks dove headfirst into the river and a burst of fleeing birds exploded out the opposite side. But most of the birds got through, to perch on the phragmites in such numbers that the grass gradually bowed halfway to the ground under their weight. Later, I remembered to breathe. “Quelea,” the guide explained. A passerine, or perching, bird.
9. Safari lodges go to extraordinary lengths to keep antsy tourists pampered. But there is a special moment at some lodges I have visited, when you may get to walk back to your tent alone after dinner, in the dark, possibly under the influence of alcohol. The lodge staff will gladly send someone to accompany you. They may even insist on it. While it is unlikely that you will encounter any difficulty along the way, there could be lions. There could be hippos, which panic easily and trample with abandon. This is the moment when you realize that you are not the master of the universe, but merely one more item of potential prey, even just one incidental bit of collateral damage. Treasure that insight and carry it with you always.
It is by itself almost worth the trip.