From the World Heritage inscription: The Island of Gorée testifies to an unprecedented human experience in the history of humanity. Indeed, for the universal conscience, this “memory island” is the symbol of the slave trade with its cortege of suffering, tears, and death. The painful memories of the Atlantic slave trade are crystallized in this …
Aksum is the most significant pilgrimage site in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, and one of the largest tourist attractions in the country. Aksum is important for several reasons: It was the seat of the Axumite Empire, which reached its peak in the first millennium. The Axumite Civilization was one of the largest and most important …
Click to view As you know, earlier this year I sailed from Cape Town to Morocco with G Adventures on the M/S Expedition. I’ve just published my photo essay from the trip and it is one of my best ever. Click to View my West Africa Photo Essay
Latitude: 21° 05.20′ N Longitude: 17° 51.30′ W As the cruise is winding down, I thought it was worth it to take a moment to talk about the passengers on the ship. Prior to boarding the ship in Cape Town, I suspected that the other passengers would be well traveled people. West Africa isn’t the …
Latitude: 8° 14.4182’ N Longitude: 13° 09.7768’ W For the first time on the trip, we woke up in the same place we were the day before: Freetown, Sierra Leone. We were supposed to be in Guinea-Bissau today, but for reasons only known to them, they would not let us land. So, to compensate for …
During my most recent visit to South Africa, I was able to do something I had always wanted to do: swim with great white sharks. Yes, I’m talking about Jaws. Carcharodon carcharias. Ferocious man-eater of the deep. The world’s most efficient killing machines. Whitey. Chewy. The Warden. The Landlord. The man in the grey suit. …
Usually, I write about the history, the mystery, and the grandeur of a place like the pyramids. For over 4,000 years, the pyramids have been one of the best-known structures on Earth. We’ve probably all seen TV shows, read books, or perhaps written a fourth-grade report on them, so there is nothing I can really …
From the World Heritage inscription: These fortified trading posts, founded between 1482 and 1786, and spanning a distance of approximately 500 km along the coast of Ghana between Keta in the east and Beyin in the west, were links in the trading routes established by the Portuguese in many areas of the world during their …
From the World Heritage inscription: The Mosi-oa-Tunya/Victoria Falls is the world’s greatest sheet of falling water and significant worldwide for its exceptional geological and geomorphological features and active land formation processes with outstanding beauty attributed to the falls i.e. the spray, mist and rainbows. This transboundary property extends over 6860 ha and comprises 3779 ha …