In the Shadow of Kilimanjaro: On Foot Across East Africa by Rick Ridgeway

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In the Shadow of Kilimanjaro: On Foot Across East Africa by Africa Travel Books

In the Shadow of Kilimanjaro: On Foot Across East Africa by Rick Ridgeway
Price: $8.96

Features

Paperback: 304 pages

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC; New Ed edition April 17, 2000

ISBN-10: 0747545243

ISBN-13: 978-0747545248

Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5 x 0.8 inches

Shipping Weight: 7 ounces

Reader Reviews
The story is of a trek, entirely on foot, from the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro, east along the great watercourses that rise on the mountain and empty into the Indian Ocean. Most of the trek is through the Tsavo game parks in southeastern Kenya. Despite some sloppy editing, the book succeeds very well on two fronts. First in giving the reader a very palpable sense of being on foot and in danger in the equatorial African wilds, where humans are prey as often as predator. The other, unexpected area of success of this book is as an introduction to the personalities (Richard Leakey, for instance) and issues involved in East African conservationism., as well as a sympathetic description of the plight of the indigenous peoples living on the periphery of the game parks whose cultures were utterly destroyed by a well-intentioned attempt to save the wildlife. Big topics, all, and all are well presented. The author wrestles with the conflicts that arise from the fact of human population growth and the inchoate desire to preserve. He comes back over and over to the ironic story of the game warden who hires as hunting guides the poachers he himself captured. he hints that humanity may, haltingly, be developing a more sophisticated approach to these problems, at least intellectually among a few ... but still the Somalis poach elephant with automatic weapons, and still the Indonesian forests burn. The question remains: will a satisfactory balance be struck as a result of the extremes engaged in liberal democratic debate, of the Greens rioting at WTO conferences and clear-cutters flattening the Amazon rain forest? However, the book is primarily about an adventure walk through Africa; it is an easy read and the material is both gripping and topical (1997). Comment | Permalink | (Report this)

In the Shadow of Kilimanjaro: On Foot Across East Africa
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Price: $8.96
Updated on 8-23-2008.