With Dreams of a Vanishing Africa, Craig Harrison takes us back to a time and a continent nearly unimaginable today. His intensely personal accounting of his journeys reminds us that there once was a time when young adventurers could hitchhike and travel in Africa on a shoestring budget with little worry about being robbed, or worse. He relates his interactions with local peoples and fellow travelers – some good, some not so good, but never bad enough to cause him to abandon his quest. Of course, the main feature of the book is the magnificent parks through which he travelled and the spectacular wildlife that only Africa can offer. Very little that has happened throughout Africa in the years after Harrison’s wanderings has been good for wildlife. Back then there were few critically endangered species in Africa. Rhinos flourished, elephants were common everywhere, and mountain gorillas became friends with Diane Fossey. The Addax, now Africa’s most endangered animal, wandered the Sahara from Algeria to Sudan. Now their population in the wild is less than 500, and their future is not particularly bright. This book serves as a benchmark and documents an Africa that will likely never be seen again. It is a captivating and fascinating story that is difficult to put down once you start reading it, and it will stand for a very long time as documentation of a unique period in Africa’s history.

William T. Everett, President and Founder of the Endangered Species Recovery Council, La Jolla, California