Africa: A Continent of Contrasts [Hardcover]

Philip Briggs (Author), Martin Harvey (Photographer), Ariadne van Zandbergen (Photographer)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 11, 2007

Africa: Continent of Contrasts describes and depicts the natural, cultural, architectural and historical wealth of the African continent, in particular the varied wildlife, geographical landmarks, scenery, indigenous people and many noteworthy aspects of local culture and ceremonies. The book is divided into four main regions: North, West, East and Southern Africa, offering detailed information and rich visual impressions of each.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Philip Briggs is a travel writer and tour guide who specializes in East and Southern Africa. He was born in Britain and raised in South Africa; he has written many travel guides and other books on the African continent. He also has written for many naturalist magazines. Martin Harvey worked for the National Parks Board in Zimbabwe and Natal Parks Board in South Africa before eventually becoming a professional wildlife photographer. Based in South Africa, he has photographed wildlife in over 38 countries around the world, from the Arctic regions of North America to the deserts of Australia. Born and raised in Belgium, Ariadne van Zandbergen is a freelance travel photographer and tour guide specializing in Africa. Ariadne has visited some 30 African countries and her photographs have appeared in numerous books, magazines, newspapers, maps, periodicals and pamphlets.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 296 pages
• Publisher: Struik Publishers (January 11, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1770070877
• ISBN-13: 978-1770070875
• Product Dimensions: 12.5 x 9.8 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #432,739 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

African travel specialist Philip Briggs has been exploring the highways, byways and backwaters of the world's most challenging and exciting continent since 1986, when he spent several months backpacking on a shoestring from Nairobi to Cape Town. In 1991, he wrote the Bradt Guide to South Africa, the first such guidebook to be published internationally after the release of Nelson Mandela.

Over the rest of the 1990s, Philip wrote a series of pioneering Bradt Guides to destinations that were then - and in some cases still are - otherwise practically uncharted by the travel publishing industry. These included the first dedicated guidebooks to Tanzania, Uganda, Ethiopia, Malawi, Mozambique, Ghana and Rwanda (co-authored with Janice Booth), all of which are now in their 3rd, 4th, 5th or 6th edition.

Philip has visited more than two dozen African countries, and written about most of them, whether it be for guidebook publishers such as AA, APA-Insight, Berlitz, Camerapix, Dorling Kindersley, Frommers, Struik-New Holland and 30 Degrees South, or for specialist travel and wildlife magazines including Africa Birds & Birding, Africa Geographic, BBC Wildlife, Travel Africa and Wanderlust.

He still spends at least four months on the road every year, and spends his rest of the time battering away at a keyboard in the sleepy dorp of Bergville, in the uKhahlamba-Drakensberg region of South Africa. He is married to the travel photographer Ariadne Van Zandbergen and lives with three dogs and a cat. When not obssessing over some or other aspect of African history, culture, wildlife or travel, Philip's interests include music, reading and walking.