In 1972, 25-year-old adventure-seeker, Frances Kendall decided to backpack overland from Egypt to Johannesburg, South Africa.
A few days before she set off on this momentous journey - long before smartphones and Whatsapp - Frances received a telegram from her dad, which read: DO NOT UNDERTAKE OVERLAND TRIP THROUGH DIRTY DANGEROUS DISEASE RIDDEN AFRICA. Click here for link to Amazon Kindle version.
In her travel memoir, titled after this iconic telegram, Frances shares the diaries she kept and posted to her parents during her journey through “dirty, dangerous, disease-ridden Africa”.
In this lively account she entertains readers with evocative descriptions of fourth class travel, magnificent monuments and breath-taking scenery at a time when tourists were rare. Join her in Egypt as she climbs the Great Pyramid of Giza and cycles to the Valley of the Kings. Meet the other backpackers and local tribespeople with whom she shares the deck of a Nile steamer in the southern Sudan. Visit the pygmies at the foothills of the Mountains of the Moon, and return with her to her childhood home in Kenya. You will be entertained from the very first page to the last as Frances regales you with stories of her travels, her insights and the people she meets along the way.
This book is for any avid traveler - or armchair traveler - who loves a great travel memoir, especially one illustrated with maps and sketches and set in the 1970s era of civil rights and womens’ lib and me-too moments. And don't miss the appendix, which covers Frances' travels hitchhiking with a girl-friend through Europe.
Kendall’s earlier books
1987 South Africa The Solution, Amagi Books (with Leon Louw)
1989 Let the People Govern, Amagi Books (with Leon Louw)
1991 Heart of the Nation, Amagi Books
1993 The SeXY Factor: Gender differences at home and at Work, Amagi Books
Updated edition of Heart of the Nation will be published as Kindle eBooks in 2019.