Description
Uganda Safari provides an entertaining, wide-ranging and informative tour of the country that Winston Churchill famously described as the 'Pearl of Africa.'
Subjects tackled include history, culture, geography,
transport, wildlife, a bit of botany, some famous films,
national parks, human evolution, tea, and conservation. There's also some sex involving British royals and wild animals, though disappointingly, not on the same
page.
While the main text is suitable for readers of Grade Il and above, serious students will find the supplementary notes and diagrams informative and occasionally insightful.
An ability to read is not, however, essential to benefit from this book. Simply by placing Uganda Safari on a coffee table beside the Brodt Guide to Uganda and Yuval Harari's Sapiens, the owner will be identified as a person of taste, discernment and rare intelligence.
An all-star cast of characters appears, including Ernest Hemingway, Squash' Lemon, Pliny the Elder, Homoerectus, Teddy Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, EdwardVIll and Toodles' Furness, Idi Amin, Sir Vivian Fuchs, Princess. Elizabeth Bagaya, Henry Morton Stanley, Ptolemy, Julius Obonye, Kathryn Hepburn, Michael Keigwin MBE, and Kabaka Ronald Mutebi of Buganda.
Chapters are ordered to accompany an anti-clockwise itinerary around Uganda, Heading east from Entebbe to Jinja and the Source of the Nile, the route leads off the beaten track to visit Mount Elgon and Kidepo Valley National Park. After continuing to Murchison Falls NP, this eastern loop connects to the popular western safari circuit that includes Fort Portal and the Kibale Forest, Queen Elizabeth NP and Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, home of the mountain gorillas.
Though the book can be read sequentially whilst travelling around Uganda, its diverse contents also reward random inspection making it a serendipitous armchair read and lavatory companion before, during and after a Ugandan safari.
Andrew Roberts first Visited Uganda with a backpack in 1990. He returned three
years later to help the Forest Department set
up eco-tourism projects. He is still there, now with his wife Sarah, and daughters, Eleanor and Caitlin.
Andrew is the co-author of the Bradt Guide to Uganda and the creator of the popular Uganda Maps series.