Rae Safaris

Rae Safaris Tailor made, personally guided African adventure.

In the grand blue expanse of the endless Pacific...there are volcanic landmasses born entirely out of the ocean floor......
27/05/2026

In the grand blue expanse of the endless Pacific...there are volcanic landmasses born entirely out of the ocean floor...and not from any known continental lineage we know or speak of.

Over an infinite stretch of cosmic time and thanks to the random movement of ocean currents...life arrived...floating, swimming or flying...to inhabit this desolate archipelago...this very epitome of the edge of existence.
Charles Darwin called it...the relentless.

And this meagre handful of species began rapidly evolving...adapting...changing...in order to just survive...thus providing the cornerstone to our conceptual understanding of natural evolution over time.

I sat on the side of a motorized dingy staring at this Marine Iguana draped across a rock formation that centuries before had poured from a nearby hillside as flowing lava.
Galapagos...I find myself constantly shaking my head in disbelief...at the diabolical otherworldly nature of it all.

It is the very edge of everything...harsh...unforgiving...and entirely and utterly spellbinding.

Wish you were here.

.kuzo.group .roode

East Africa...Tanzania...a remarkable wildlife region...and the birthplace of the very idea that became our much beloved...
26/04/2026

East Africa...Tanzania...a remarkable wildlife region...and the birthplace of the very idea that became our much beloved profession...the very origin of the safari.

We have rambled once again across this breath-taking countryside surrounding the Rift Valley escarpment...Tarangire...a baobab studded bushscape...Manyara...a liana draped jungle shadowland inhabited by Silvery cheeked Hornbill and Blue Monkey and Crowned Eagle adjacent to an imposing, shimmering soda lake.

And then...the lost world of Ngorongoro...the world's largest collapsed volcanic caldera...containing its own bewildering ecosystem.

These enormous pachyderms stood quietly feeding as dense clouds floated against the steep edges of this most diabolical of natural wonders.

And then...Serengeti...the endless plain...and the vast drifting multitude...Wildebeest and Zebra in numbers too overwhelming to even consider counting...and the myriad carnivores that stalk them, chase them...and devour them.

It is to my mind...emphatic wilderness...seemingly infinite...incessantly begging exploration.

My heart stands vigil still on a lonely hill somewhere on the Serengeti...and I am homesick for it already.

It calls me out...and I must go...

.kuzo.group .roode

There is something fundamental to India...it is extraordinary...essential...thoroughly, chaotically intrinsic...complete...
16/03/2026

There is something fundamental to India...it is extraordinary...essential...thoroughly, chaotically intrinsic...completely otherworldly!

After an alluring time in the Himalayas we gathered additional members of our travel family and began an exploration of Rajasthan and Assam.

We reveled in the sights surrounding the evocative Taj Mahal and the fairytale like vistas of the Floating Palace...called Jal Mahal...near the pink city of Jaipur.

But it was also the iconic wildlife that we sought...and the Jungle Book setting so inherent in the hill country of Ranthambore beckoned to us.

We explored this wonderland over three days...seeking Chital and Sambar Deer, Wild Boar, Sloth Bear, Leopard...and Tiger.

This magnificent male strode down the road under ancient archeological ruins that have occupied the space for a hundred centuries...nonchalant yet defiant...I was reminded of that ageless verse by William Blake..."Tiger, Tiger...burning bright...in the forests of the night...what immortal hand or eye...could frame thy fearful symmetry?"

Kaziranga too...in the east... was utterly spellbinding...One Horned Rhinoceros, Asian Water Buffalo, Asian Elephant and jaw dropping avian splendor.

India continues to call to us and we long to return to her beauty, her archaic timelessness and the wilderness landscapes that still resound with a primordial sense of mystery...of savagery...of infinite, magnificent vitality.

Wish you were here.

Photo by Joel Silverman.

.kuzo.group .roode

It was a day to remember...a day that will forever reside in the tapestry of adventure that populates my mind. We had sp...
15/02/2026

It was a day to remember...a day that will forever reside in the tapestry of adventure that populates my mind.

We had spent two days previously bridging the distance between Delhi and Himachal Pradesh in the Indian Himalayas...two days of driving across some of the most arresting landscapes on earth...on winding roads that defy any kind of logical description...across the roof of the world and into the remote and utterly breathtaking Spiti Valley.

We had come here to seek out Himalayan wildlife...Himalayan Ibex, Blue Sheep, Tibetan Wolf, Golden Eagle, Bearded Vulture...and...Snow Leopard.

I have long dreamt of one day seeing this carnivore denizen of the remote montane stretches of central Asia...have yearned for it since I first laid eyes on a picture of one as a child.

We left the homestay in Kaza early in the morning and headed into snow covered hill country above an altitude of four thousand meters. We joined our leopard search team and they orientated us on the far ridge though spotting scopes and binoculars to the remains of a Blue Sheep carcass lying adjacent to a cave...in the cave and out of sight...lay a Snow Leopard tom.

And the wait began...in sub zero temperatures with the team keeping us fed and hydrated...every lens and scope focused...we patiently held vigil.

And then...great excitement at the spotting scopes...as the tomcat strode out into full view...all pale and wooly and rosette adorned with an imposing head, huge paws and an impossibly thick tail...he was magnificent...this supreme apex predator at altitude...this spangled assassin dominating the earth's ultimate high country.
I was spellbound.

We stayed the day with this beautiful creature...we watched him feed...watched him groom himself...watched him doze...we stayed until the light dissipated and the temperature plunged.

Friday the 13th of February 2026 shall remain ever etched in my memory.

Wow. An entirely surreal day!

It calls me out and I must go.

Wish you were here.

Photo by Pradeep Singh



.kuzo.group

The start to our 2026 season has been nothing short of surreal.Christer Perrsson and his wonderful family flew into Vict...
06/01/2026

The start to our 2026 season has been nothing short of surreal.

Christer Perrsson and his wonderful family flew into Victoria Falls from Sweden on December 27...I was there to receive them.

A dusty neotropical breeze has been steadily moving us along...across wild landscapes and profound natural wonders...from the mighty Falls themselves...Mosi oa Tunya...the smoke that thunders...to the waterlogged wildlife paradise that is Chobe in Botswana.

We then winged our way north eastward into the New Year...to Arusha...at the foot of Kilimanjaro...gateway to one of Africa's most prolific wilderness spaces...the Rift Valley escarpment...Ngorongoro...and the endless plains of the Serengeti.

The migration was in full swing...moving up a lot earlier than expected thanks to early rains and verdant and succulent green pastures emerging on the short grass plains.

Nearly one and half million Wildebeest drift each year across this safari wonderland...and around three hundred thousand Plains Zebra follow suit.

These striped ponies took time out to roll in the surrounding sodic dust...a way of eliminating those irritating ecto-parasites.

We find ourselves now...as I write this...in tropical splendor on the spice islands of Zanzibar...decompressing the visual overload of the last ten days...sipping cocktails...and celebrating this grand thing called life.

Wish you were here.

.kuzo.group

Here's wishing our beloved travel family warm compliments of the season and a peaceful and prosperous New Year.See you s...
22/12/2025

Here's wishing our beloved travel family warm compliments of the season and a peaceful and prosperous New Year.

See you somewhere wild...real soon.

"It calls me out...and I must go..."




.kuzo.group

I sit writing this at 37 thousand feet on a turbulent flight to Rio de Janeiro. We are on our way home at the end of an ...
01/12/2025

I sit writing this at 37 thousand feet on a turbulent flight to Rio de Janeiro. We are on our way home at the end of an incredible season filled with adventure, with exploration and the most beautiful, awe inspiring wildlife experiences.

This last one was simply surreal...a true expedition...one that had us gathering at the southern tip of South America...in Ushuaia...to once again board a ship...traverse the infamous Drake Passage...to the very edge of the world...Antarctica.

We have reveled in the most breath taking wilderness scenery and...perhaps...have come to know something of the real meaning of the word "remote".

This is a landscape devoid of our species...unfettered...true, austere, natural magnificence...bliss...in the absence of man.

We have journeyed through Shackleton and Scott's realm...and we have been fundamentally...intrinsically changed.

"By endurance...we conquer."

What a magical journey!

Wish you were here.

.kuzo.group

We have returned to a wild country...an endless, untamed wilderness...one of the most beautiful anywhere in Africa.Remot...
02/11/2025

We have returned to a wild country...an endless, untamed wilderness...one of the most beautiful anywhere in Africa.

Remote Namibia is absolutely fundamental to understanding Africa...it is basic...unfettered...one of the emptiest spaces on earth in terms of humanity.

Here ecological excess is stripped away and the skeleton of a super continent lies exposed...displaying clearly the very stretchmarks from the birthing of a continent.

The Namib Desert is often disturbingly quiet...cathedral like...the blood audible in one's veins as one stands in bronze infused dune country at sunset.

This Desert Sidewinding Adder attempted to hide from us while we were out and about on a morning exploring the vast dunescapes of Dorob...on the primeval and desolate skeleton coast adjacent to Namibia's Atlantic seaboard.
This snake buries itself in the sand in preparation for ambush...patiently waiting...strategically calculating its moment...as it prepares to attack...to feed.

Wish you were here.





.roode .kuzo.group

I find myself back in a strange land...a complex centre of endemism often referred to as the eighth continent...in reali...
13/09/2025

I find myself back in a strange land...a complex centre of endemism often referred to as the eighth continent...in reality...the world's fourth largest island...a break away from Gondwanaland over 100 million years ago...it is evocative...entirely unique in its species variety and composition...and a diabolical mix of African, South East Asian and French culture...Madagascar.

We have left the endless hustle and bustle of Antananarivo...layered French architecture and narrow streets heaving with a population fast outgrowing the quaint hill country town steeped in colonial history.

We headed east...a winding descent down towards Andasibe...the gateway to Mantadia...a profound rainforest conservation landscape...and home to...among many others...the largest Lemur species of them all...Indri.

We trekked today into the cathedral like stillness of the forest...towering buttressed trees, massive ferns, muddy pathways and the surreal, haunting sounds from somewhere within the canopy far above. I closed my eyes and attempted to absorb it all.

These unusual creatures are incredibly vocal...the high pitched nasal howl they are famous for echoes for miles across the forest. This particular Indri took some down time on his branch, all the while gazing down at our group of odd, bipedal, clothed primates.

Wish you were here.

.kuzo.group

Fellow safari gypsy, Gregor van Kleef, and I have spent the last three weeks rambling in South Africa's northern provinc...
25/07/2025

Fellow safari gypsy, Gregor van Kleef, and I have spent the last three weeks rambling in South Africa's northern provinces.

Tepid winter winds pushed us first westward into the vast desertscapes of the Kgalagadi...a wonderland of rolling bronze colored dunes and dessicated golden grasslands. Here we found a startling array of wildlife...Oryx, Springbok, Hartebeest...and the large, voracious felids that stalk and chase and devour them.

Next the evocative hill country of Pilanesberg...Rhinoceros, Elephant and herds of plains game abound in this most beautiful of bushveld settings.

We finished all the way east in the endless neo-tropical savannas of the Kruger lowveld.

One crisp morning on a drive out of Pungwe...the lovely little bush camp where my career began over three decades ago...we happened upon a large clan of Spotted Hyena in the process of opening up a Zebra they had just coursed and taken down.

With sudden and unexpected fury...these two maned warriors arrived bristling fiercely and rumbling like rolling thunder...Hyenas scattered in insane squealing chaos and these battle scarred lords of their domain claimed the prize and set about feeding.

Pure safari magic!

Wish you were here.




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