Brendan's Adventures

“Are we going to be able to cross that?” “I don’t think so,” I reply to a group of guests from Jollyboys Backpackers. “The geometry of it doesn’t work.” The bus driver asks us to step out of the vehicle and then proceeds to slam the vehicle into the walls over a deep ditch grooved into the [...]

Heavy mist dusts the air across the old colonial bridge downwind from the famed Victoria Falls.  Joining Zambia to Zimbabwe, the bridge is more than just a border, it’s the scene of screams.  At the midpoint of the bridge, a ledge hangs vicarious from the lip and the enthusiastic shuffle their bound feet to the [...]

The guide is quick to let everyone know that the elephants that are bowing in front of us were all rescued.  They’ve come to here in Zambia from Zimbabwe after being saved from poachers or people hoping to turn them into pets.  But as I look across at the row of beautiful elephants saddled by riders [...]

I’m handed a stick and the guide demonstrates to me how to use the 3-foot long twig to keep a lion at bay with it.  I laugh as he scratches the ground and tells me that the tapping stick will distract the golden cats from the idea jumping me and turning me into a ball [...]

A couple days ago I stood in front of a mirror in Lubumbashi, DRC staring at the person I’d dissolved to.  The stresses of Kinshasa, the wear of a recent fight with malaria, and the fact that I had simply not been eating properly had all lead to the demise of my physical health.  I [...]

With my backpack leaning vicariously on my now broken luggage rack, I let the town of Lubumbashi, DRC fade away in my now broken rear view mirror. Today feels like a milestone.  It feels poetic.  It feels as if I’m turning the page in a story to find a new chapter begin. Over the past [...]

I drag my bags from the cozy guesthouse bed in Mbanza-Ngungu, DRC where I spent 2 days in complete peace recovering from malaria and toss it on the back of my scooter which is held together by little more than duct tape and love.  I have a couple hours of driving left until I reach [...]

This is a continuation of the story from yesterday.  Read this article first… ————————- Pastel blue walls surround me as does a combined congregation of people in white shirts, random children and an authority figure of some sort.  My arm is taped to a t-shirt and the bed.  I look at my hand and it [...]

My arrival in Brazzaville was meant to be one of joy; the closing of a chapter if you will.  In many ways it is.  I arrived at the beautiful and friendly confines of the overlander paradise known as Hipocampe.  I am reunited with Jeroen and Sonja, the overlanding couple from Holland I’ve dubbed Double Dutch.  There is [...]

Thanks to an issue shipping Anne Murray on the train to Franceville, I fell behind.  I fell way behind.  Now normally, being a little bit late in travel isn’t exactly a bad thing, it means you’re having too much fun to move on.  However, when I applied for my visa for Congo in Yaoundé, Cameroon I hadn’t [...]

It’s been a while since I posted a video of the week.  Actually, it’s been a while in general since I posted a video to my youtube travel channel.  The truth is that traveling through Central Africa has meant that there hasn’t been a whole lot of great uploading opportunities.  The internet is decent in [...]

Overlanders talk about the road from the Gabonese border into the Congo as the worst road in Africa.  So I obviously wasn’t too keen on the fact that my day wasn’t going all too well to start.  I certainly wasn’t keen on finding myself where I am now, laying down on my side, Ann Murray laying on top of me, sand [...]

Lope quickly became a distant memory.  I took the train to Franceville and hoped to add regain some positive energy after my bad experience in Lope National Park.  But, as much as I wanted to shake the bad vibes from my system, I had to leave a piece of me behind. There was a fuel [...]

Although it probably shouldn’t be a surprise, the one thing I have been asked more about travel in Africa than anything is the cost.  Well, the truth is there is no set price or budget.  Every country changes, every city is different, and of course each person has their own standard of living that they [...]