You can plan the logistics, memorise your itineraries, and scroll through every lodge feed. Zafaris will do the hard yards for you when it comes to creating perfection on paper... Meticulously, obsessively, with every detail considered... But here’s the catch: the African wilderness does not read itineraries or doomscroll and while we can control all of the human stuff, if you think a safari is anywhere near what you see on National Geographic and the good old BBC, think again. Africa will roll her eyes at your preconceptions and mutter "what-eva" in true Diva-like fashion. She's that down. 

So forget the safari you think you want and be prepared for the one you didn't know you needed... A mostly unscripted expedition into the real meaning of wild where one minute nothing seems to happen and the next you're in the middle of something so life-changing and profound your jaw hits the ground with an audible "thunk" and stays there for the rest of the journey.

Yes. Africa is gobsmacking. And it's often the small stuff that smacks it the hardest! You notice things you did not know you would notice, things you didn't even know existed... A dung beetle walking backwards pushing its ball of pooh will be more riveting than the sleeping lion you were staring at two minutes ago. A frog call, completely unfamiliar, might make you pause and wonder how you ever lived without it. The sound of a hyena calling as darkness descends will be gooseflesh-inducing and thrilling all at once.

This is the safari that sticks. Not the staged highlights, not the photographs you can post with twee hashtags. It is the almost-moments, the missteps, the things the camera cannot capture. The stuff those wildlife documentary makers left on the cutting room floor... Elephants farting as they walk; dwarf mongooses sunning themselves in the early morning sun, all fluffed up and cute beyond measure; two lizards having a word with one another about territorial boundaries; small birds harassing the living crap out of large, mean-looking ones in mid flight... 

Africa works in subtlety, in unpredictability, in patience. It will unsettle you, charm you, and occasionally make you wonder why you ever thought you'd get to grips with it in such a short space of time. This is why people go on safari year after year - one is never, ever enough.

A safari is not about chasing perfect moments, and the less you do 

the more the bush rewards you. The magic is in the smells, the sounds, the little details you never thought you would care about. Rain on dry earth, light shifting across a magnificent landscape, the way a herd of impala freezes for no reason at all. Africa does not pose. It whispers, it teases, it shows you the things you never knew to look for. Each and every time.

You can rinse and repeat as much as you want but no two days will ever dish up the same meal. And even if the ingredients are similar, the presentation and taste will always be new and exciting. And, like American politics, just when you think you've got the hang of things something will happen to give you a true whisky tango foxtrot moment. 

In fact, this is probably Africa's superpower - the refusal to be predictable. Every safari is different because Africa refuses repetition. You can return to the same place a dozen times and have 12 completely unique experiences. The seasons rewrite the landscape and very little can be predicted other than the seasons shifting. Even the air has moods. And somewhere in the space between what you expected and what actually happens, you find yourself paying attention in a way that makes everything else feel flat. You realise how little control you ever really had and how liberating that is. 

So come with an open mind and leave the preconceptions at home. Be ready to be caught off guard, ready to be charmed, and ready to laugh at yourself when the bush does exactly what it wants and not what someone said it would do in a guidebook once. 

Africa is nothing like you expect it to be, and that is exactly why you should come and visit it. It's sometimes messy, absolutely unpredictable and completely magnificent. And if you let yourself, it will quietly, slyly, irreversibly change the way you see the world.

Text: Sharon Gilbert-Rivett