Imagine vast herds of zebras gazelles and wildebeests — millions of animals — migrating over a plain of grassland that goes on forever, watched hungrily by lions and cheetahs. Imagine giraffes loping freely across the savanna, seemingly in slow motion. Elephants, hyenas. A rare rhino. Dust turning the sunset an even deeper red. This is the Africa of our fantasies, and despite pressure from poachers and the inevitable incursions of modernity (which, of course, includes tourism), it still exists, in this place, as we have imagined it since childhood. Much of it is within Tanzania’s Serengeti National Park, 5,700 square miles of wonder. Much of it is beyond even our imagination.
AFRICA: SEVEN MORE WONDERS
LEMUR COLONIES. Madagascar.
Parks and private reserves protect threatened lemurs on an island of delicate beauty.
NGORONGORO CRATER. TAnzania.
Its pastures lure a concentration of East African wildlife that rivals even Serengeti.
NILE RIVER. Northeast Africa.
Much of it bordered by harsh desert, its floods have nourished civilizations.
SAHARA DESERT. North Africa.
At once magnificent and malevolent, this is the planet’s quintessential dryland.
SOUTH SINAI. Egypt.
Its rugged starkness alone would put it herebut Moses’ experience adds texture.
VICTORIA FALLS. zambia, Zimbabwe.
The Zambezi River takes a fall that’s a mile wide and immeasurably breathtaking (above).
VIRUNGA NATIONAL PARK. Congo.
Among the world’s last sanctuaries for endangered mountain gorillas.
