I realize that there may be many who wonder how a safari could possibly enrich family spirituality or reinforce long held values and at the same time provide an advanced course in ethics, but then I suppose the word “safari” conjures up different perceptions for different people. 

To some the word may provoke images from the late 19^th or early 20^th centuries, where hundreds of native porters walked in single file carrying vital supplies to support a year long journey into the remote corners of Africa.  These images may have been gleaned from books or movies such as Out Of Africa, or the study of our nation’s very own adventurer President Theodore Roosevelt.

For others the mention of safari may inspire less romantic images and simply symbolize an outdated era of faded icons.  Perhaps a perception of odd-looking animal heads adorning walls of “Men Only” clubs.  The word may even stir mental pictures of establishments frequented by the unenlightened as they gathered to drink whiskey and performed antiquated male bonding rituals in rooms polluted with cigar smoke and boorish behavior.  

I won’t attempt to argue against these perceptions.  They might be accurate portraits of a distant past, or merely an association with the celluloid folklore of Hollywood movie making fame.  There is plenty of room in our universe for people to entertain all their perceptions of “safari”, and far be it from me to deny them.

It would be an injustice though if I didn’t take the opportunity to explain what a safari was for my family and for many of those that have journeyed before us, for they too saw the safari as something much less than an arena for machismo and understood that it was truly a voyage for the soul.  It is because of a need to share this truth as evidenced by my family’s experience that I felt compelled to write this book.

Those that have enlisted the event know that a safari brings us within proximity to reasonably glimpse the life of primitive man.  It is a way to transport oneself as far as possible from the information driven and over-regulated new age in which we live to the stark, uninhibited and impulsive ways of ever-present wildlife.  It moves us from a reality defined by the pillars of logic to a place where instinct governs survival and has done so since the dawn of time. 

A safari tests the mettle of one’s character.  It is an experience created by a wide variety of thoughts and emotions ranging from fatigue, boredom, disappointment, fear and sadness to understanding, euphoria, pride, awe, excitement and surprise – all of which are called upon randomly and at a moments notice. A safari elicits respect, appreciation and concern for wildlife and a profound awareness of our responsibility to perpetuate it for posterity.

My family and I now realize that a safari is an education of sorts.  It is a humbling experience that overwhelms one with their insignificance, as we become spectator to the mysteries of our universe, and yet on another level an innate understanding that we are a vital weave in its fabric consoles us.  In a way a safari is a religious experience – it is as simple as living a humble life of faith while at the same time it is as awesomely complex to comprehend as all that is holy. 

It would be of great satisfaction to me if my modest attempt at writing would inspire families, hunters, and observers to visit Africa and to take an interest in its future.  In my opinion it is a continent that needs to be understood in order for it to survive as it is meant to be – an archaeological testimony to the ways of time immemorial and a display of intricate patterns and interdependencies of the world’s ecology.

On a less majestic note, I also wrote the book with the intent to increase the level of awareness of the elements of sport hunting, and as a diagram of the critical relationship between the sport and the way in which it ensures the future survival of wildlife populations.  I’ve tried to highlight the need for wildlife management practices and present the economic realities of hunting and the importance of “fair chase” in a way that’s easily understood and is offered as a natural extension of the chronicle.

I have also made an attempt to display the need for conservation of resources and to promote moral and ethical decision-making by portraying the important benefits of these virtues.  Although it is not a “how to” book it does provide a path for anyone looking to take his or her family on safari – or even go it alone for that matter. 

I might never know if I have been successful in my endeavor but it will bring great satisfaction to me if even one person is moved to let go of their perception of a safari as one of the stale images I portrayed earlier and replace it with something closer to which I have detailed throughout the book.  I am eternally grateful to those who helped make my family’s safari the moving experience that it was.