Wild life
Retracing the steps of slaves in Benin
Ouidah, Benin On a free afternoon in Benin, I decide to walk the slave route in Ouidah, the port from…
The politics of glasses
Africa Orientale Italiana ‘Where did you get those glasses?’ a stylish Italian gentleman asked me, gesturing at the acetate L.G.R.…
What the Delameres did for Kenya
Kenya’s Rift Valley The story of Kenya’s Europeans such as the 5th Baron Delamere, who died recently, is one of…
Life lessons from a 2,000-year-old plant
Iona, Angola East of the gulps of cormorants along the Skeleton Coast by the Ilha da Baia dos Tigres, Atlantic…
My hopes for Africa
Lake Malawi As we speed southwards along the potholed road near Lake Malawi’s shores, I tell my colleague Helen that…
The joy of getting lost in the Congo
Republic of Congo I’m sending this to you from the rainforest in Congo, surrounded by vast trees and jungle noises…
Nairobi’s streets are fizzing with violence – and I’m glad to be home
Nairobi, Kenya Parliament and City Hall were burning under great columns of smoke and clouds of tear gas hung over…
My father vs the killer lion
Laikipia, Kenya This month, in broad daylight on our Kenyan farm, a lioness mauled one of my bull calves. Before…
My battle with the dreaded ‘black cotton’
Laikipia, Kenya By the time I set off from the farm before dawn we’d had 22in of rain in the…
Am I having a heart attack?
Nairobi Some of our medical practitioners in Kenya advertise their services on street corners. ‘Bad omens, lost lovers, broken marriage,…
Hassan still has no dhow to captain
Kenya Hassan was our skipper. He’d take us in his dhow out on the Indian Ocean for trips along the…
A farewell to alcohol
Laikipia Some are saved by Jesus and they are sober. For others, drunkenness is as natural as love-making, roasted meat…
The beauty of Boran cattle
The Farm, Laikipia Outside the nightjars were calling and a zebra brayed in the valley. The constellations were still bright…
Progress is coming to our remote corner of Kenya
Laikipia The principal of the local polytechnic was waiting for me in the kitchen. Frequently in the kitchen there is…
We survived the worst drought in a generation
The Farm, Laikipia I realised the worst drought of this generation was at last over this morning when two Samburu…
How Moscow can pervert the course of Africa’s future
On the lengthy train ride to Kyiv I read my Plokhy as we trundled through seas of mud, passing villages…
My conversations with Wilfred Thesiger
When Wilfred Thesiger arrived in the port of Al Mukalla after his foot crossing of the Empty Quarter desert with…
The man who makes money where no one else dares to go
Rwanda The mineshaft is dark, the air humid and starved of oxygen. I follow Marcus Edwards-Jones out of the muddy…
