Customer Reviews

African Safari Journal

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I think this journal is innovative and very useful. Not only does it provide a myriad of information about the main safari destinations in Eastern, Central & Southern Africa, but it also has blank pages for journal entries, a safari itinerary, film log, shopping list & addresses. It has a great packing list, metric & temperature conversions, rainfall/temperature charts in various African cities and a southern hemisphere constellation map - all of which I use to gather separately before going on safari. Along with general travel information, it contains basic maps of the main safari countries and national reserves in Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, DROC, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Bostwana, Namibia & South Africa. I also like the mammal guide, mammal checklist and phrase guides. I bought one for myself as I am going back to East Africa this year and another as a gift for a friend who is going to Southern Africa next month.

My wife and I went on our first safari to Northern Tanzania National Parks with a very experienced leader (over 100 safaries). He recommended this book and that we keep a journal--something I have not done in 35 years. HE WAS RIGHT! We carried this book with us on every game drive and refered to it often. At camp we entered journal entries. These proved very valuable after our return to organize and present video and photos. This book has almost everything you want to look up. In addition the packing checklists were 100% right on for our experience.

If you take only one book on safari, I strongly recommend this one. If you can take more, I recommend Estes's Safari Companion and a good field guide with color pictures like the Audubon.

On our trip to Kenya & Tanzania, we brought 3 books:
1. Lonely Planet East Africa
2. National Audubon Society Field Guide to African Wildlife
3. and the African Safari Journal.

A fourth book - The Safari Companion: A Guide to Watching African Mammals Including Hoofed Mammals, Carnivores, and Primates - was left at home as we wanted to limit the size of our luggage. I found this book fascinating as it discusses behavior as well as provide basic information about the animals. We just couldn't justify the extra weight.

Lonely Planet East Africa is essential in that it gives information not only about safaris, but also about the various countries and cities that we visited. We could not have functioned without this travel guide.

The National Audubon Guide was good in that we referred to it during and after the game drives to read about the animals that we found. The paper quality was very nice and the photos were the best out of our small collection.

The safari journal was used purely as a journal, that is, we could have probably bought a notepad to do the same job. That's not to say that it isn't useful. It's just that the information contained therein was covered in detail by the other books and we never had a need to refer to the journal. However, if you are traveling ultra-light and you only had room for one safari book, this might be the best solution as it is a rudimentary travel guide, basic animal reference, and journal all in one.

I just got back from Africa where I climbed Kilamanjaro and went on a safari. This book is an awesome way to organize ahead of time. On my trip I used the journal to organize my thoughts on the trip and to keep track of my film and what I had on each roll. If you are going on a safari in Africa this is a must. Take my word for it. I took 24 rolls of film on my trip and was able to keep track of all my info with this book. Enough said.

I just recently went on a 2 week safari in Kenya. I bought multiple books prior to my trip and this was the only one I truly used. It is paperback and lightweight and has all the information you could possibly need on a safari in Africa. I used the Swahili translation page, the journal pages and maps of the national parks we visited. Most importantly I was able to look up any mammal or bird or tree we saw very quickly and find just the right amount of information.
I only wish the bird pages were in color as it was hard to identify birds looking at black and white pictures in the book.
But, other than that, I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is going on a safari in Africa.

I wish I would have discovered this book before my safari. It would have been the perfect way to organize all of my notes. (I have notes in various books, on little scraps of paper and in my journal.) This book allows you to have everything in one place! If you are going on safari, you must not leave without this book!

Took 6 hrs of video and 5,000 digicam images. Time passes so fast and remembering what I shot, when, where and what the guide or ranger said of particular interest was always going to stay in my mind .... not.

This little book was well laid out and easy to use. So I used it. At end of day I would jot notes, and boy have I forgotten so much detail!

With a 30lb luggage restriction on one flight, this still went with me, and it was a good decision.

This guide book was a gift to me as I prepared for my first safari. I debated whether to bring it because of the extreme weight limit on luggage. However, it was as essential as my camera and binoculars.

This is an extremely comprehensive journal that helps prepare for the trip as well as a favorite companion on safari. I could make journal entries, mark the location of our camps on the included maps, record animal sightings, refer to the various language pages and keep track of short airline flights to out of the way dirt airstrips. Even the guides used the animal reference section on occasion.

The section Getting Ready...is invaluable and matches the information sent by our tour company. This guide was obviously prepared by a VERY knowledgeable traveler.

Several of our travel group have purchased this guide AFTER returning home so they can record the details of travel to this remarkable continent.

This guide covers many areas in Africa so that it is appropriate for all safari locations.

I would award it more than five stars, if possible.

An absolute must if you're planning a photo safari to any of the African game parks and reserves. It supplements the guide's own information plus serves to a chronicle and accurately annotate of all of the photos that you've captured.

I recommend this small paperback for every safari traveler! Tour organizers should include this with the plane tickets. I used the maps of the parks before my trip to South Africa and Botswana.The packing lists were helpful.While there I enjoyed checking off the list of animals and plants in the back of the book. Also fun was that the guides talked by radio to each other about the location of animals in the Tswana language. We soon broke the code by using the language guide included in the book.It is a must-have. I learned about it on Amazon.... So glad I brought it along.It is very well thought out.