Alive In Africa: My Journeys On Foot In The Sahara, Rift Valley, And Rain Forest

"Africa was a natural choice for me. A continent of great extremes, it contained the world's largest desert, vast untouched rain forests, hunter-gatherers who lived nearly uninfluenced by the outside world, and exotic wild animals left over from the Pleistocene found nowhere else on earth. Human life began in Africa, and only in Africa was it possible to sense what life was like for the first people, living on foot among lions, elephants, and other dangerous creatures.
In the Sahara I was beaten into submission by the wind and sun. Nights brought an end to the suffering, and in the crystalline depths of the dark universe it seemed possible to reach out and touch God. It was the hidden evil in my guide's agenda that tested me to the limit, in an escalating battle of two indomitable wills.
The tropical rain forest was an immense sea of sweltering vegetation, a riotous explosion in which life was constantly being created, mutated, and destroyed. In the deep silence of the forest, giant trees and tannic streams seemed alive with spirits, as if time had been rolled back ten thousand years.
Walking with only a spear across the grasslands of East Africa's Great Rift Valley quickened my wits and refined my adrenaline; life became an intense game of Russian roulette in the bush." -- from the Prologue

"Authentic adventures in a continent of great extremes" "Alive in Africa" chronicles author and photographer William F. Wheeler's exceptional journeys on foot through a continent of great extremes--from the Sahara desert to the grasslands of the Great Rift Valley, to the Congo rainforest. Illustrated with his stunning images, this elegantly written book takes us back to a bygone age when explorers traveled without GPS or satellite phones. A must for aficionados of fine travel writing from the likes of Bill Bryson and Paul Theroux, as well as anyone with a passion for Africa's natural beauty and the isolated peoples that live at its heart, "Alive in Africa" fully captures the author's enlightened awe for the worlds and people he encounters. In the vast wilderness, Wheeler felt closer than ever to being truly "alive," And that, he discovered, was what he was searching for all along.