Been There, Done That

A South African checklist for the curious and the brave

At the age of 14, author David Bristow stuck a large touring map of South Africa on his bedroom wall, determined to mark off every road one day. It was the start of a life-long love affair with the land – indeed, in 40 years of dedicated travelling David has pretty much ‘been there, done that’, visiting almost all of South Africa’s game parks, nature reserves, mountain ranges, beaches, towns and dorps, as well as hiking and biking countless trails. This book is the accumulated knowledge of all that exploration: the very best (and sometimes the worst) of everything this country has to offer: wildlife, history, geography, art and culture, things to do, places to stay and routes and trails to be discovered by car, bike and on foot … Anyone who’s ticked off more than a tenth of the entries in this book is, according to the author, qualified to wear the T-shirt. David Bristow began his writing career as a news journalist before reading for a Master’s Degree in Environmental Sciences. Although he claims to prefer riding his mountain bike, surfing and playing with his children to working, he has written around a dozen books for Random House Struik alone and spent 13 years as the editor of Getaway travel magazine.