'Mana Pools was the first place where I comprehensively understood how symbolism affected one’s perception of a place that one was traveling to. Mana has the Zambezi River, fabulous wildlife, epic scenery and the option to rough it in several remote campsites north and south of the Mana flood plain. But there is a symbolic element to the Zambezi valley as well. When you traveled to Mana you definitely had the feeling that you were leaving the rest of the world behind because the last stage of the journey there entailed a steep and spectacular descent down the Zambezi escarpment into a wild, steaming-hot valley inhabited by elephant, thousands of black rhino (in the era I am talking about) and hundreds of thousands of buffalo. That descent into the valley became a very important part of the trip for me. It was symbolic! I know now that such symbolism is at the core of how we view the world. Indeed Aristotle understood this when he penned his iconic treatise The Hero’s Journey . This was his blueprint for the successful theatrical plays he had seen in Athens (circa 350 bc). That same blueprint is applied today to every film you have ever seen. The crucial element of his treatise was a circular journey in which the Hero descends into a figurative ‘Night World’ where his core beliefs are challenged with trials before he can again ascend to the ‘Day World’ above and thus complete his journey. This is true for every journey we make and I now understand why I found this descent down the escarpment into Zambezi valley such a fitting start to any trip to Mana. Mentally and figuratively it was a descent into the wilderness ‘night world’ of my mind. At the age of 13 and seated in the back of my uncle’s Safarilandia Land Cruiser, that was how I felt as I descended down the escarpment and into the Zambezi valley for the very first time!'

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