Don't Look Behind You: A safari guide's encounters with ravenous lions, stampeding elephants and lovesick rhinos

by Peter Allison

Paperback, 2009

Call number

916.82710466

Publication

Guilford, CT : Lyons Press, 2009.

Pages

241

Description

Incredible true tales from a world-renowned safari guide and celebrated author Romantic notions aside, being a safari guide isn't always particularly enjoyable or glamorous. Quite often it is beset with challenges, like having to spend a night in a thorn tree with marauding hyenas below. But safari guide Peter Allison lives for such moments. Here, the author of the widely praised Whatever You Do, Don't Run details his time spent in safari camps not only in Botswana but also in South Africa, Mozambique, and Namibia--places he loves, despite how much it feels like they might just be trying to kill him. In Don't Look Behind You, Allison recounts adventures few would live to tell. Like the time he and a group of bored guides launched a makeshift raft into a foaming, flooded river teeming with hippos and crocodiles. Or the afternoon he heard monkeys telling him that a leopard was walking around the camp, and then realized the leopard was in his tent, with him in it. In addition to relating his encounters with animals, Allison shares the stories of those tourists who have long been pushing him toward early retirement. Normally respectful of all his fellow creatures no matter how many feet they have, Allison fantasizes about leaving one in particular behind on the Skeleton Coast, a place that receives less than half an inch of rain a year, and is patrolled by lions and hyenas. Join Peter Allison for another riveting, rollicking, behind-the-scenes dose of everyone's dream experience--going on safari--and come through amazed but, thankfully, without a scratch.… (more)

Language

Original language

English

ISBN

1599214695 / 9781599214696

User reviews

LibraryThing member frisbeesage
Peter Allison's second collection of stories about his time in Africa as a safari guide is a rare look at this intriguing lifestyle. What most people dream of doing for a week or two on vacation, Peter Allison lives. As you might expect, living with lions, leopards, elephants, and hippos, in
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addition to tourists, Allison has more than his share of adventures to relate. He does so with humor and love for his adopted country, always able to poke fun of himself and his rookie mistakes as a safari guide. Through it all his love for Africa and its amazing wildlife shine through. His books make me really, really want to visit Africa!
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LibraryThing member tonyadusold
This is a very fast and easy read. It's a collection of stories that will make you laugh out loud. Highly recommend.
LibraryThing member dannN
As a South African, having been to the Okavanga Delta, Etosha in Namibia and various game parks, I can appreciate Peter Allison's love of wild animals. His self-effacing style of writing makes for a very humorous read whilst the reality of a safari guide's life underlies the story. Some jobs are
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not as glamorous as they might seem! An enjoyable, light read.
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LibraryThing member Jthierer
Very funny set of stories, but I wish there had been more of a through line connecting the stories into a larger whole.
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