The Shadow of Kilimanjaro

A trek in the company of the great predators. Tim Cahill once wrote that "there was a time for all of us when we wanted to be Rick Ridgeway." Explorer, adventurer, entrepreneur, Ridgeway takes readers on an incredible journey. On foot for a month, from the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro, through the plains of Tsavo, to the sea, he offers a rare ground's-eye view of east Africa as it is today and how it once was before the incursion of European civilization. Ridgeway takes a hard look at the possible future facing this once-pristine landscape, its magnificent animals, and its indigenous inhabitants. Accompanied by memorable characters, such as Danny and Bongo Woodley, sons of the legary Tsavo warden Bill Woodley; renowned elephant biologist Joyce Poole; and the descants of the Waliangulu--the "People of the Long Bow"--the last great hunters of the region, Ridgeway encounters lions, rhinos, and elephants in this wonderful adventure on the trail, and through interviews with luminaries such as Richard Leakey, comes face-to-face with the legacy of colonialism, in both cultural and ecological terms, here in the cradle of life.