Articles written by Justin Bell
Arrival at Kilimanjaro’s Crater
As we climb, sucking in air, we are all intensely aware that this place, like the depths of the ocean or the moon, can never be our home.
Our journey to Maasailand
I hoped that my safari guests would appreciate what was to come - staying in a mobile camp in Maasailand.
The crossing
Then another huge column of wildebeest appeared over the horizon and advanced towards the river, and once again they began to mass at the river's edge.
Laughter
There was a lot of excitement in the transit area when we met, exchange of news and travel accounts, and soon afterward we were on a private air charter enjoying magnificent views of Mount Kilimanjaro out of the port windows!
Can we have some rain?
Tanzania was a dust bowl just before our safari started ...
Silence
The Namib desert..... The contrast in deep changing colours - reds and russets that turned gold if seen from a different angle. Dunes that were so iron red in some places and so light and cream-coloured in others. The contrast between the reddish colours on these dunes and the crystal ...
Rusty ruddy reds and searing space-sky blues
My family and I have just come back from a safari in Namibia. After years living next door to Ngorongoro Crater and the Serengeti we didn't expect to be overwhelmed by the wildlife, and the quantity of wildlife could not compare with those moist East African lava-rich soils. ...
A giraffe smoking a pipe?
While game driving in Etosha national park, we saw a giraffe doing some rather strange neck movements, as if it were trying to reach higher into the sky. We also noticed something white that it seemed to have in its mouth, and which made it appear that it was smoking ...
Friendship and challenge to the top of Africa
When talking to people about climbing Mount Kilimanjaro, one of the first questions I am asked is if they are fit enough. In actual fact how you are able to acclimatise is a far more important factor, and unless you have been to high altitudes often, it is not possible ...
Nine days hiking Africa’s highest mountain
Why do people climb Africa's highest mountain, the summit of which is at 19,340 feet / 5,895 metres asl (above mean sea level) and has half the available oxygen as any point at sea level? Firstly it is a journey on foot. This is significant, and is one of the ...
Cheetahs in the Serengeti
Regular readers of our blog might find that the sightings mentioned in my article "Slim, Sleek, Slender and Spotted Sprinter" of March 2008 are either very rare or exaggerated. Well the cheetah sightings with Mathieson family that we enjoyed in December 2008 / January 2009 amounted to over 19 different ...
Fly camp and village football
I was with Peter and Carol Mathieson and their four kids Katie, Daniel, Michael and Jack, from Pittsburg, Pennsylvania in the USA, and who were on safari with their family - grandma (given the honorary nickname of "bibi" - Swahili for grandma), cousins, uncles and aunts (some who live in ...
