As we continue to explore the Senses of Safari, we realise how difficult it is to accurately describe the feeling of safari. The safari experience is an amalgamation of the senses; it’s the people you meet, the stories you hear, the extraordinary wildlife you see and a sense of magic that seems to continuously be in the air. This Saturday I thought I’d see what other people have been saying about Africa – and it turns out many people feel the same way – they have fallen in love with this phenomenal continent. Happy Saturday to you all, I hope you enjoy these little snippets of Africa and of course, some exquisite photography from our field team.

“There is something about safari life that makes you forget all your sorrows and feel as if you had drunk half a bottle of champagne – bubbling over with heartfelt gratitude for being alive” – Karen Blixen

“When you leave Africa, as the plane lifts, you feel that more than leaving a continent you’re leaving a state of mind. Whatever awaits you at the other end of your journey will be of a different order of existence.” -Francesca Marciano

“If I have ever seen magic, it has been in Africa” -John Hemingway

The view from Varty Camps deck

“I just wish the world was twice as big and half of it was still unexplored” – David Attenborough

“The continent is too large to describe. It is a veritable ocean, a separate planet, a varied, immensely rich cosmos. Only with the greatest simplification, for the sake of convenience, can we say ‘Africa’. In reality, except as a geographical appellation, Africa does not exist.” ― Ryszard Kapuściński

“Africa has her mysteries, and even a wise man cannot understand them. But a wise man respects them” – Miriam Makeba

“I never knew of a morning in Africa when I woke up that I was not happy” – Ernest Hemingway

“But African time was not the same as American time…As African time passed, I surmised that the pace of Western countries was insane, that the speed of modern technology accomplished nothing, and that because Africa was going its own way at its own pace for its own reasons, it was a refuge and a resting place.” -Paul Theroux

The Private Granite Suites Boma

“The only man I envy is the man who has not yet been to Africa – for he has so much to look forward to.” -Richard Mullin

“The gladdest moment in human life, methinks, is a departure into unknown lands” – Sir Richard Burton

“I hope you have an experience that alters the course of your life because, after Africa, nothing has ever been the same” – Suzanne Evans

Evenings on the Founders Camp Deck

“Why is it you can never hope to describe the emotion Africa creates? You are lifted. Out of whatever pit, unbound from whatever tie, released from whatever fear. You are lifted and you see it all from above.” -Francesca Marcian

“A person does not grow from the ground like a vine or a tree. One is not part of a plot of land. Mankind has legs so it can wander” – Roman Payne, The Wandress

“To get lost is to learn the way” – African proverb

“Nothing but breathing the air of Africa, and actually walking through it, can communicate the indescribable sensations.” – William Burchell

“People must feel that the natural world is important and valuable and beautiful and wonderful and an amazement and a pleasure” – David Attenborough

“You cannot leave Africa, ” Africa said, “It is always with you, there inside your head. Our rivers run in currents in the swirl of your thumbprints; Our drumbeats counting out your pulse; Our coastline, the silhouette of your soul” – Bridge Dore

“One of the great things about travel is that you find out how many good, kind people there are” – Edith Wharton

Immersed in the wilderness – Pioneer Camp is a favourite for families and groups of friends.

“You know you are truly alive when you’re living among lions” -Karen Blixen

“Once a year, go someplace you’ve never been before” – Dalai Lama

“To my mind, the greatest reward and luxury of travel is to be able to experience everyday things as if for the first time, to be in a position in which almost nothing is so familiar it is taken for granted” – Bill Bryson

An evening spent at Tree Camp

“Africa – You can see a sunset and believe you have witnessed the Hand of God. You watch the slope lope of a lioness and forget to breathe. You marvel at the tripod of a giraffe bent to water. In Africa, there are iridescent blues on the wings of birds that you do not see anywhere else in nature. In Africa, in the midday heart, you can see blisters in the atmosphere. When you are in Africa, you feel primordial, rocked in the cradle of the world.” – Jodi Picoult

“Africa changes you forever, like nowhere on earth. Once you have been there, you will never be the same. But how do you begin to describe the magic to someone who has never felt it? How can you explain the fascination of this vast, dusty continent, whose oldest roads are elephant paths? Could it be because Africa is the place of all our beginnings, the cradle of mankind, where our species first stood upright on the savannahs of long ago?” – Brian Jackman