Shadows Across the Sahara: Travels with Camels from Lake Chad to Tripoli

by John Neville Hare

Riding Pasha, his beloved white camel, John Hare set out from the shrinking shores of Lake Chad with 25 camels, 4 Tuaregs, a Chinese professor, a white Kenyan rancher and a young Englishman. His to reach Tripoli, following an ancient camel route, notorious in the days of slavery as a road of extreme hardship and death and last crossed in its entirety by Hanns Vischer in 1906. Today the ancient slaving route is strewn, not, as formerly, with the bones of deal slaves, but with over one thousand carcasses of dead camels. The expedition took three and a half months to cover 1462 miles and along the way met every kind of village market stall-holders, incredulous border officials and owners of travelling camel salt caravans. They encountered descendants of people who had met and entertained Hanns Vischer and introduced the Tuaregs to the powers of acupuncture and the ancient art of Tai Chi. However, the true heroes of this journey were John Hare's camels - resolute and uncomplaining in both hot and freezing conditions and sometimes in the face of icy winds. Two of the camels died of exhaustion, but the rest eventually reached journey's end.

288 pages, Hardcover

First published June 6, 2003

About the author

John Neville Hare OBE FRGS, explorer, conservationist and author was, in 1957, the very last recruit into Her Majesty‚ Overseas Administrative Service in Northern Nigeria.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Ha...

Reviews

[Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

John Hare relates the story of his incredible expedition from Nigeria to Libya undertaken to raise awareness about the conservation of the endangered wild Bactrian camel. Written with much affection for the region and the camels. Needed better maps. Found it difficult to follow the journey on the minuscule drawing in the book.