From the Archives: Book Review: Whatever You Do, Don’t Run

(This post was originally published on Travel Books and Movies in August 2010.) The “Okavango Delta in Botswana. It is one of the planet’s most spectacular and beautiful places, wild and open beyond anything I’d ever seen. It felt like a playground for wildlife.”

This is where Peter Allison, an Australian that discovered he loved Africa while on vacation there, found himself working as safari guide. In Whatever You Do, Don’t Run, he shares a wide variety of his adventures with a great sense of humor, an obvious love and respect for animals, and honest insight into the glamorous-and-not-so-glamorous life as a safari guide. It’s a fascinating, delightful, and fun way to go on safari—you get the whole safari experience: from what it’s like to live in a tent to some facts about animals, the beauty of the landscape to the fear of being faced with a large animal.

His honesty about his life is humorous and eye-opening: mice take over the camp, safari guides party into the night, and some of the groups that he must guide are…interesting.

It’s clear that Allison respects animals and he makes deep connections with some animals, almost becoming friends with some of his “neighbors” like the chipmunk that comes to live at camp, the honey badger that joins them for dinner every night, or the elephant who led her herd. In fact, “A lot of people come to Africa hoping to see some action, namely a predator making a kill. Guides are normally happy to show this, but when the victim is an animal that you have known, and named, it is like losing a friend.”

Within the funny vignettes and picturesque descriptions are interesting facts about the animals (did you know that an impala sneezing was a sign that a predator was nearby?) and information on Botswana (one chapter is dedicated to “the man who made Botswana the country it is. The surprise is that the story is not a history lesson or about politics. It is a love story.”)

This collection of True Stories of a Botswana Safari Guide is everything a good travel book should be: educational, interesting, fun, and honest. And it left me wanting to book a ticket…