My Life with Ndoto - Teresa O'Kane

A story of love, loss, and Land Rovers. Travel from Cape Town to Northern Kenya and back with the author and her husband in a 1973 Series III Land Rover, a quintessential African overland safari vehicle that screams adventure with every bump in the road and every broken leaf spring, . Their yearlong, 48,000 kilometer journey in Ndoto (Swahili for dream) takes them through South Africa's national parks and into Mugabe's Zimbabwe. They travel over the Kalahari in Botswana, and into the deserts and dunes of Namibia. Traveling up the Great North Road from Zambia to Tanzania, they dodge potholes, people, and sometimes Police. Dangerously lost in Burundi, they manage at last, after their gear stick shears off one day and the transmission dies the next, to summit the road to post-genocide Rwanda. Uganda brought more adventure and challenges when the author has to drive up an escarpment through Queen Elizabeth National Park--in reverse. War prevents the couple from entering South Sudan, the newest country in the world and their northernmost goal of the trip. Kenya is highlighted by memories of pomegranates and a visit to Lamu, an island that feels stuck, beautifully, in time. They are driven from from the pristine beaches of Malawi by monsoon rains and insect invasions and the author is brought to her knees in Mozambique after too much Peri-Peri and civil war conflict. Along the way, Ndoto is attacked by a honey badger, described as "Strong!" (even when she was limping) by almost everyone, including bribe-seeking police and more mechanics than the author can count. Not only will you feel you are along for the ride in this funny, insightful, and touching story, O'Kane also offers practical tips for overlanding, and shares how you can live your Safari Jema, your own good journey.