Following your passion isn’t always the easiest of roads. As with all things in life there are twists and turns and dead ends and hard climbs. Sometimes, when things get difficult and roads become marred, it can take a single new experience to spark things back up.

I chose to follow my passion for wildlife at university, picking up a bachelor’s course studying animal behaviour and wildlife conservation, it sounded perfect, and it certainly started out that way. Over the course of three years however, the stresses and strains of constant study, fieldwork, and especially dissertation research were taking their toll and my passion was beginning to wane. At around this same point however, my final year’s ‘International Studies’ module kicked in; two weeks in South Africa studying conservation in the field. We were stationed in KwaZulu Natal province, in the east of the country, flying into Durban and taking a four-or-so hour drive north to the border with eSwatini (formerly Swaziland). My initial concept of South Africa; red soils, arid bushlands, wild coasts and steeple-like mountains seemed dashed upon arrival into King Shaka International Airport. It was hot but far from the dry heat I expected, think more Amazon than Atacama, each rolling hill was flushed with rich shades of green, and the distant ocean seemed flat and calm, not the raging waves I had expected. Driving north, the world around me grew to much better fit my mind’s image. Hills steepened, vegetation began to distance from one another, the ground and air dried, and the heat intensified. Wildlife didn’t show itself as expected either, elephants weren’t stepping out into the road and wildebeest herds weren’t running alongside the vehicle. Maybe it was intensely wishful thinking wanting to witness these things, but I was already inspired by the new landscape.

A very green side of South Africa. © Matthew Walsh / Finding Earth

After some surprisingly comfortable hours on South Africa’s highways, we turned off smooth tarmac and onto red gravel. This was the game reserve. This was where these wild lands really came to life. “Impala, to the left, behind the bushes”, pointed out Shadreck, our Zimbabwe-born guide. This triggered my colleagues to whip out professional standard cameras with telephotos and huge zoom lenses as I sat and strained both my eyes and my iPhone trying to get a glimpse of the antelopes (I didn’t have a dedicated camera at this point), this would quickly become a theme on the last leg of the journey to ‘base camp’.

I had never stayed anywhere like it; sturdy canvas tents and narrow beds was more luxurious than I expected but it was the setting that took my breath away. The camp sat atop a small hill with a view down to a colossal lake across open floodplains and dry scrubland. Vervet monkeys played in the bushes behind camp, as many as six at one point, a pair of male nyala fed nearby, a leopard tortoise strolled calmly along the paths, undeterred by our arrival. It was like camping in Eden, a very, very hot Eden.

Giraffes became a staple of the landscape after a few days. © Matthew Walsh / Finding Earth

Our days on the reserve were long, with early starts and late finishes but time isn’t something you necessarily think about when confronted with pristine African wilderness all day. I’m not an early riser, and never have been, but something about this place had miraculously put a spring in my step at 5am. The promise of new wildlife experiences every day certainly helped this, but after a few days I realised that even the moments where wildlife wasn’t present and we were just searching, scanning across dusty plains, letting a cool evening breeze blow away any worries or thoughts beyond the here-and-now, were moments to be looked forward to. I think that really settled my passion in my head, that even in the relative “troughs” of wildlife experiences, my excitement never wavered. Sometimes it only takes a small spark to reignite a passion for something and I will always be grateful to the people and wildlife of South Africa for getting that fire going again.