T-minus 6 days.

I remember being fascinated by the Congo before I began adventure traveling. I had seen the 1990s movie Congo, and read Conrad’s Heart of Darkness but as life has passed, the lure of this exotic wilderness has been amplified.

The Congo is a new destination – a place with great potential for adventure but hardly any for even marginal comfort. Odzala Discovery Camps, in the Republic of the Congo, seems like a proverbial diamond in the rough, remote and far from the chaos that characterizes its larger neighbour, the Democratic Republic of the Congo or DRC.

For flight reasons, we will land in the DRC’s capital, Kinshasa, and spend 3 nights there before taking a flight across the river to Brazzaville, the capital of the Republic of the Congo.

After a one night layover in Brazzaville, we will fly 2 hours into the bush, landing at Odzala-Kokoua National Park. This virtually untouched wilderness is home to forest elephants, leopards, hyenas, chimpanzees, African grey parrots, and endangered western lowland gorillas. Following gorilla tracking and other game viewing opportunities, we will then head to Franschhoek and Cape Town in South Africa for food, wine and relaxation. In Franschhoek, Babylonstoren will be an incredible stay. We visited for lunch in 2018, and now will be able to take advantage of its entire spectacular property, and full range of amenities and services.

After a week in the Western Cape, we’ll fly back to Canada.

This trip has been about 5 years in the making. For obvious reasons, it’s been a strange 5 years. What we’ve all experienced during that time has added some urgency to our cause. I have not felt the anticipation of adventure like this for almost as long. I certainly hope this is as remarkable and enlightening as it might be.

We live in the flicker – may it last as long as the old earth keeps rolling! But darkness was here yesterday.

Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness