'Africa has a tendency to go on and on and on. For many people traveling between destinations in the parts of Africa that might be considered wild - this means a journey in a light aircraft and staring out the window down at flat bush country side sliding inexorably past. This is an occupation for some that is almost as boring as watching comatose lions sleeping under a tree at midday. Which is where the expression ‘as interesting as watching paint dry’ comes from! After take off, as the aircraft climbs higher (and these kinds of flights always take place between 10 a.m .and 3 p.m.), an amazing thing happens -the hinterland is exposed in all its bushy, monotonous glory. The beautiful scenery of the tourist areas, where the wildlife has congregated around the last remaining water sources, are left behind and become diminutive and insignificant when the whole expanse of what lies beyond is revealed. I do not find these hinterlands of bushy hell boring at all as I know exactly what is going on down there in the endless flatlands that stretches away to infinity. I ‘know‘ because I have both an imagination and a little bit of experience. I know exactly that bush down there would be a terrible place to be stranded. There would be very little useful shade and absolutely no water anywhere. Bronzed bottle-shaped baobabs would be sitting there so huge and yet so useless to you, patiently waiting for the rainy season. There would undoubtedly be midges and flies to irritate you the moment you stopped moving. There would be lots of acacia trees and scrub. Very aesthetic to look at - but actually acacias are just thorn factories, ready to pull off your skin, or puncture the tires of your Landcruiser. The heat would be unbearable and everything would be painted in colours limited to eleven and a half shades of grey. But that’s what makes the bush so magnificent! It is hostile, downright unpleasant and absolutely uncomfortable. It serves to provide a contrast to the rarer, beautiful tracts that one is inevitably traveling towards. Of course all of the above is only true for the middle part of the day. In the evening it’s another story altogether and this painting cheetah at Tarangire in Tanzania is an example of how the evening light transforms even the most monotonous of scenery.'

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