The Seychelles is the kind of destination you might imagine when someone says “go to your happy place”. These 115 islands, many of them uninhabited, rise from the Indian Ocean off the coast of East Africa. Britain and France fought over them for a long time before the country finally gaining independence in 1976.
Spend a few days and you’ll discover why they were worth fighting for. With white sands, clear blue skies and a seemingly never-ending summer, it’s easy to spend your entire time here lazing on one of the famous beaches, like Anse Lazio and Anse Source d’Argent, in your bathing suit with a book and pretending nothing else exists.
If that sounds a bit too relaxing (yep, we sometimes get a tad bored with perfection) there’s enough to keep an adventurous traveller busy. Visit the giant tortoises on Curieuse, hike to the centre of La Digue for views of the surrounding islands and ocean, or snorkel off the beautiful horseshoe beach at Port Lanauy on Mahé for an impressive underwater show.
It’s summer in Oran on Algeria’s Mediterranean coast. I’m in town for the Arab Film Festival, but on my first afternoon in the city, thanks to a contact in the local music world, I’m in the chic foyer of the Sheraton to meet Sadek Bouzinou, founder of reggae rock band Democratoz.
He’d said he’d arrive at 3.30, but time in Algeria is ‘flexible’ – 3.30 can mean 4.30, 5.30 or perhaps next Tuesday. But two minutes later, a tall, striking figure walks across the white lobby. In a landscape of businessmen, families and schmick hotel staff, it feels like I’m having a hallucination. This good-looking singer with his powerful smile appears to be wrought in technicolour.
This is what I love about travel. One minute you can be sitting in a five-star hotel with sweeping views of the Mediterranean and city, but no real sense of the local culture, and the next you’re leaping into a dump of a car with a singer, saxophonist and drummer then bumping down a dusty road to a neighbouring village for a jam session. Later I discover it’s protocol for international festival guests to check out with hotel security, but they were either having a siesta or recognised Sadek (who could miss him?), a respected and famous local figure on the music scene. Sure, the military escort from the airport was kinda cool, but the getaway with the local musos is even cooler.
We hoon along with warm air blowing in through a broken window and Sadek points to a lone tree on the arid horizon. “It’s the Democratoz tree – all alone,” he states solemnly, before his face erupts with a wide, infectious grin.
Twenty minutes later we pull up beside his four-storey house in Gdyel. After a tour of the garden planted with figs and wild roses, we head upstairs to a large terrace. I spy a perfectly tap-danceable plank of wood and, by the time I’ve dusted it off, even more musicians have materialised. To my delight, everyone’s keen to jam.
Democratoz was born when Sadek, guitarist Abderrahmane and drummer Popay began getting together to play Bob Marley covers. More musicians joined them, and the band grew from there. Its music takes the Jamaican rhythms and grooves of Marley as its starting point, but adds a local flavour, weaving in Algerian beats – local raï music and gnawa – as well as funk, dub, jazz and rock. They have performed at major festivals around Algeria, toured Morocco, Jordan and Beirut, and will head to the USA this year.
There’s a particular song, lyrical and anthem-esque, that has pricked my ears. In a video of the band performing ‘Mazel’ at a festival in the Sahara, Sadek sits on stage singing, his voice charged with emotion. Thousands of Algerians sing along and wave lighters above their heads. I ask Sadek what the song is about. “‘Mazel’ talks about Algeria,” he explains. “It’s a song that tells the history of the country and says that whatever has happened and is happening, there are people here who want to try to change things for the better.”
During the 1990s, terrorism destablised Algeria, and social and political commentary through art was a dangerous act. Those who dared often did so from the other side of the Mediterranean. Now Sadek believes artists need to “say things as they are, be daring enough to express”. Democratoz’s songs all carry a positive message or tone of irony that allows the music to be serious and accessible, authentic and bold – and danceable.
We don’t waste time and get jamming. Sadek, grinning and singing, plays a cowbell, accompanied by the saxophonist, two guitarists, three percussionists and me, tapping along. It’s percussive, driving, inspired and exhilarating in the North African heat.
Then suddenly it’s dusk and time for me to head to the cinema. We’re back in the decrepit car and banging out rhythms on the dashboard while discussing life, music and when I’m going to come back for one of their concerts.
There is no doubting the beautiful island of Mauritius is known for its endless beaches, swaying palms and relaxation-inducing weather. However, there is more to this part of the world than just that. This mountainous island practically explodes from the Indian Ocean, east of Madagascar, to showcase spectacular scenery, incredible walks and unforgettable diving.
In the capital of Port Louis there’s a melding of the cultures, from Africa, India, the Middle East and parts of Asia, that have washed up here over the years. Check out the Central Market before moving on to the rest of the island. Take the two-hour walk to the Black River Peak lookout in the Black River Gorge National Park, where you look out over the whole island, then head back towards the coast. It’s all about the beach, so hire a car and find an isolated one, jump on a board or try your hand at kitesurfing at Le Morne, or check in with one of the local dive operators to hit shipwrecks and the shallow Sharks’ Trench.
If you’ve got some time on your hands, Rodrigues is the one of the nation’s furthest flung outposts, 650 kilometres from the main island. Here the residents live a simple existence among nature’s finery and welcome visitors looking for complete relaxation.
Scared of ghosts? For those who like a good haunting, the dead are very much alive in Madagascar. The Malagasy tradition, known as razana, dictates that the living serve their dead ancestors by carrying out the spirits’ bidding from beyond the grave. Some communities even exhume and rewrap their dead loved ones seven years after they’ve been buried.
Razana is tied to a deep culture of fady (taboo) that locals take deadly seriously, and are offended when tourists ignore their beliefs. Think you’re a sensitive, seasoned traveller, immune to boorish backpacker behaviour? You may not be quite as savvy as you imagine, because in some communities wearing swimming goggles is considered an affront. When travelling to a different township be sure to ask your guide about the local taboos.
If you remain of the living, you’ll discover Madagascar is a biosphere unlike any other. For travellers there’s an array of water sports, dense rainforests to trek and 90 per cent of the wildlife is unique to the island. Just be careful of those cunning lemurs – their name means ‘spirits of the dead.’
Camp rules dictate you cannot walk around unaccompanied after nightfall. Just the night before, a leopard had crept into camp and killed a bushbuck – the carcass is still there and everyone is certain the leopard will return for its prey. My guide, Onks, escorts me to my tent, then I am on my own. Lying in bed, with only an emergency air horn, I pray the canvas is a successful deterrent. The night, as it turns out, is far from peaceful – elephants trumpet, hippos grunt, baboons scream and there are plenty of other sounds I can’t recognise.
This is my first stop of three on the Okavango Delta. Each of the camps is isolated within the immense waterway and accessed by bush airline. Only from this aerial perspective can you appreciate the scale of this lush paradise in the otherwise arid Kalahari Desert.
That afternoon, I clamber into a mokoro (dugout canoe), the traditional method of transportation in the delta. Chris is the poler, expertly navigating channels hippos have trampled through the papyrus. Onks travels ahead to ensure we don’t hit a hippo speed bump.
Xigera Camp is a series of thatched huts and tents, all interconnected by raised boardwalks. But the 10 canvas castles are far from your average two-man dome. My accommodation is the size of an apartment, with separate bedroom, dressing room and bathroom, and an outdoor shower.
The dawn is freezing, but suitably rugged up, Onks and I head out on a game drive. We pass skittish impala, each face seemingly decorated with heavy-handed make-up. Onks teaches me how to gauge a giraffe’s age by the darkness of its markings. Zebras parade stiff mohawks and tattooed stripes, the pattern of each as unique as a fingerprint. We encounter a macabre scene of squabbling vultures devouring a baby elephant carcass. All that remains is the deflated skin with leg stumps attached.
We stop just metres from a solitary bull elephant and my heart starts racing. He flares his ears, curls his trunk and rocks his head in a warning to back off. I’m nervous, but Onks judges his behaviour and calmly waits. The elephant eventually walks over to a palm tree and repeatedly head-butts the trunk. Palm nuts rain down and he deftly uses his trunk to shovel the tiny rewards into his mouth.
Back in camp, I help myself to the open bar while Petunia squelches up beside the pool. He’s the resident hippo and is clearly not at all disturbed by over-excited tourists, ignoring me while hoovering up swamp grass, his huge jaws chomping nonstop like a Hungry Hippo playing piece.
Before my next flight, we have to clear the dirt runway of hazards. This sophisticated process consists of Onks scaring off animals by running with his arms waving comically. Today’s ride is a 12-seater Cessna Caravan and it’s a mere five-minute skip to Kwetsani Camp. Straight from the runway I’m off with Kwetsani manager Dan, along passages in the grass just wide enough for our tinny to pass through.
As if on cue, a herd of elephants is gathering at the water’s edge. The family of five could easily be missed, with only the tallest adults showing above the reeds. Dan cuts the engine and we float quietly as the footsteps approach. The matriarch wades across first and emerges with a distinct waterline dividing her body like Top Deck chocolate. A tiny baby slips right under, all but its periscope-like trunk disappearing into the water.
Where Xigera has a rustic Robinson Crusoe vibe, Kwetsani is styled like a fancy African hotel. An elegant restaurant and lounge adjoins a massive deck overlooking a vast dry plain. My tent is a dream treehouse with an interior equal to any luxury suite. Bi-fold doors open to uninterrupted views, so I can spy wildlife without leaving bed.
Meshack is my guide and we are on a leopard-spotting mission. A short boat ride takes us to Hunda Island, a haven for animals during flood season. Within 10 minutes Meshack locates a leopard and cub. The bub is a frisky kitten desperate to play, attacking its mum’s legs to little effect. It’s mesmerising to observe the mother’s beauty and intimidating presence from just a few metres away. We hit the jackpot with another female leopard lounging nearby on a rock. She dozes like a passenger on a plane, her head slowly sinking forward, then snapping back up.
My final stop is Savuti Camp, located north of the delta in the Linyanti region. From the air the scenery changes dramatically as floodplains seep into barren landscape. It’s a contrasting dusty transfer to reach Savuti’s open huts and decks layered above the Savuti Channel. The waterway is an animal magnet and the ‘bush television’ plays a constant wildlife documentary. Twelve elephants appear seeking a drink, then two hippos emerge from the reeds and sink into the river. A pair of giraffes meanders past to complete the scene.
Goodman, the guide here, has organised sundowners at the hippo bar. He sets up drinks on the bonnet of the jeep beside a pool teaming with the wallowing creatures. Just beady eyes, flared nostrils and teddy-bear ears breech the surface. The animals disappear then resurface, flushing nostrils like a snorkel, in a different spot. The big boys tussle for dominance, yawning their jaws wide to reveal weapon-sized tusks. Catapulting their bodies out of the water they knock their mouths together – it’s like an awkward first attempt at pashing.
I’m not long in bed that night when chaos breaks out. Trees snap like toothpicks and something is brushing my tent. There’s a massive silhouette at my door and two white tusks gleaming in the moonlight. My nonchalant guest lets off a sloppy fart that wafts through my tent. I lie back very, very slowly and consider futile escape plans. Instead I lie awake for hours as the elephant herd happily feeds. In the morning Goodman laughs at my tale and says a thirsty elephant once skewered its tusks through a tent while the guest was showering.
As I reluctantly farewell my hippo neighbours and close the tent, I nearly collide with a feisty male elephant blocking my boardwalk. His splayed ears and rearing trunk bar my passage, so I lower my bag and wait. Ten minutes pass and the stand-off continues. This is surely a sign I’m not meant to leave this surreal Eden. Isn’t it?
Huge steps have been taken to preserve the outstanding natural resources of this equatorial African nation. Rainforest covers about 80 per cent of its land mass, and, in 2002, former president Omar Bongo Ondimba set aside about 10 per cent of the entire country to national parks.
The best known of those is Loango with its surfing hippos and elephants grazing by crashing waves. Humpback whales splash off the shore on their migration (mid-July to mid-September).
Pirogue (canoe) trips up the Ivindo River take travellers into a land of heavy forest and waterfalls. In the trees above, you’ll catch glimpses of monkeys and African grey parrots, while hippos are resident in the water. Ivindo National Park is also home to Langoué Bai, a forest clearing discovered by Mike Fay in 2000, where there’s a research centre to track the animals – elephants and gorillas among them – lured by the rich food in the area.
There are large populations of gorillas and chimpanzees in the Lopé National Park, but for wildlife lovers this is also where you can find the world’s largest gathering of primates – about 1350 mandrills hang out together here in the dry season from July to August. Hornbills and forest kingfishers can also be spotted in the trees.
Libreville (named thus for the freed slaves who built it), stretched along the northwest coastline, is the country’s only city. Gabon is flush with money from oil, and this town is neat, trim and tidy, unlike almost all of the rest of Africa. For a true taste of the continent, head to Mont-Bouët market or to L’Odika, a popular restaurant in the Quartier Louis that serves French-African fusion dishes.
Before we get started, let us tell you this: Republic of the Congo shouldn’t be confused with the place across the river called the Democratic Republic of Congo, which is mired in violence and poverty and was the setting for Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. It’s true that both are jungle-clad environments, but it’s only in the former travellers can journey safely to the best of what these domains offer. In fact, some of the forests in the Republic of Congo are almost intact and, with the value in protecting them from harm acknowledged, places like Parc National Nouablé-Ndoki and Parc National d’Odzala are some of the best eco-friendly destinations in Africa.
You’ve got to be on the intrepid side to venture here, but chances are you’ll be heading to either one of these parks to view the lowland gorilla populations. Also on the wildlife list are forest elephants, crocodiles, dwarf buffalos, leopards and lots of different birds.
The country’s coastline is the starting point for Parc National Conkouati-Douli, where you can do river tours and forest walks. The population of chimpanzees has been threatened in most parts of the country, but here there’s a rehabilitation sanctuary for youngsters orphaned by poaching, as well as wild families living in the thick jungle.
Close encounters of the thick-skinned kind are frequent on this 163-kilometre paddle down the mighty Zambezi. It’s not uncommon to manoeuvre around partially submerged hippos, glide past elephants bathing in the shallows or observe crocodiles sunning themselves on the banks during this six-day aquatic adventure with River Horse Safaris.
There’s no other tour that takes visitors into this part of Zambia, traversing the entire floodplains of the Lower Zambezi and journeying through isolated Mupata Gorge before ending where the Zambezi meets the Luangwa River. Each day, the camp is packed up before dawn, everyone climbs into twin canoes and the journey begins before the heat kicks in. Wildlife abounds here, where humans are few and the landscape is vivid and unexpected. Vast walls of volcanic rock rise from the water in the Great Rift Valley, and estuaries running off the main river feel as though they’re completely unexplored.
At night, tents are set up on the sandy banks of the river and everyone helps out by preparing dinner or cleaning up. There’s also the chance to go on game drives and walks, looking out for animals that make their home further away from the river’s edge. With a maximum of 12 guests on any given adventure, this is an intimate way to observe the vast African wilderness.
There’s definitely an advantage to appearing as though you’re an animal while trying to get up close to another. At the Ant Collection, the horses used for riding safaris graze and wander the bush with the wildlife you’re hoping to see – including rhinos, giraffes and zebras – so none of them feel threatened by the presence of ponies.
Ant’s has about 90 horses (most of them thoroughbreds or Arab-Boerperd crosses), so there’s one to suit any level of rider, including those who’ve never saddled up before. Two guides accompany each safari through the private game reserve: one to canter along ridges and sandy tracks with the experienced equestrians, the other to hang back with the novices.
When you’ve had enough time atop your mount, head back to Ant’s Hill lodge, built on the edge of a cliff, with a pool and deck overlooking Waterberg National Park. Meals, including high tea before the afternoon ride, are a highlight, and each of the rooms and cottages is decked out with African fabrics, daybeds and touches of luxury. After dark you can enjoy a wine tasting, head out on a night drive or learn about the stars.
Some places are better than others to find out you’re not one for camping. For me, it was at a rudimentary outpost on the first night of a five-day trek to the summit of Kilimanjaro. Climbing Africa’s tallest peak was one of the myriad clichés on the bucket list this man drew up on reaching middle age – the others included acquiring a pushbike, using the phrase ‘craft beer’ in public and, um, writing a bucket list.
I had been seconded to provide media coverage of the trek being undertaken by Canteen, a charity that helps teens battling cancer and their families. As such, all our gear had been provided by various companies whose usual clientele consisted of ruddy-faced types who counted orienteering among their hobbies and could MacGyver rudimentary instruments out of twigs, gum and wallaby spit. It went without saying, at least to me, that everyone knew you didn’t roll your sleeping bag into its tiny sausage-shaped cover come daybreak. You punched it in like James Packer greeting a lifelong pal.
Having thus delayed my colleagues – many of whom did little to disguise the concerned glances they swapped – we embarked up the trail where further embarrassments awaited.
Bear in mind this trek was middle-class adventure lite. Our heavy backpacks were carried by relentlessly cheerful porters, while we were encumbered by mere daypacks. Tents were erected before we arrived at camp and hot food awaited.
At day’s end beneath a sky of velvet sapphire, surrounded by a bunch of teenagers who were dragging their chemo-ravaged bodies to inspiring heights, it became clear that I am a staggeringly shallow traveller. While others spoke of fate’s cruelty and the simple pleasures of a hot cup of tea on a chilly African night, all I was thinking was, “I could seriously go a day spa.” As glib, vapid and vacuous as I know it is, my thoughts were less about mortality than massage.
Call me crazy, but stumbling out of both the earshot of my cohorts and my tent in the pitch black of the pre-dawn to pee against a rock didn’t make me feel more alive. The howling winds that buffeted my tent did nothing to connect me with the elemental oneness of nature and, in fact, was more akin to being caught in the lungs of an asthmatic giant. Oh, and did I mention the airborne funk that emanates from a group of climbers who hadn’t seen a shower in a week? Eau de parfum it ain’t.
I even tried to play it off against the fact I am Jewish – “after 40 years in the desert, we’re done with roughing it” – but it sounded as hollow then as it does now.
Was I that much of a sybarite that I would rather have anodyne creature comforts over an experience that was literally grounded in primeval mysticism? Apparently, yes, I would.
Long story short: we reached the summit on a sun-burnished dawn where it felt like the world was laid out before us. I would have preferred an Egyptian cotton bathrobe.
Any suspicions I was not among my people were underlined when we returned to high camp. Which one would think was the perfect locale for Donna Summer, drag queens and glitter jokes. It was not. It was so not.
Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t swap the experience for all the ylang-ylang and seaweed wraps in the world, but there’s no way there’s going to be a repeat on the Matterhorn or Everest.
The clothing has been donated to types who view polar fleece as a fashionista does cashmere, the sleeping bag was dispatched to Vinnies and my wife uses the padded ground sheet as a yoga mat.
I’m not saying I will never worship at the alter of the Great Outdoors again. Far from it. I just want the experience to be followed by a turndown service and perhaps a pillow menu.
And don’t get me started on the whole ‘glamping’ business. Like anything where two separate entities are mashed together – Kimye, ‘mumtrepreneur’, fusion food – both suffer as a result.
By all means, bake your campfire damper, lie on lumps in the ground until sunrise and get your ‘Kumbaya’ on. But if you’re paying the same amount for a safari-style tent with a mosquito net as you are for a room with comped wi-fi and a spa bath, the hoteliers saw you and your quinoa-powered nouveau hippie mores coming a mile off.
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