Helen Kennedy

My interest in seeing wildlife, especially primates, has taken me to all sorts of weird and wonderful places around the world. So far, I’ve been to over 100 countries (and still counting!), but I keep returning to my favourite continent, Africa.

Some personal travel highlights in Africa include:

• Hearing the call of the indri (similar to that of a whale song) in the Andasibe rainforests of Madagascar
• Taking in sunrise views and game from a hot air balloon over Ruaha in southern Tanzania
• A helicopter flight in Reunion, as I got to see the cirques and waterfalls from above in a scene ripped right out of the opening of Jurassic Park
• The wilderness, wildlife and stargazing in remote parts of Botswana and Namibia, with no civilisation for miles around
• Experiencing the unique history and off-the-beaten-track wildlife of Sierra Leone
• Being a ‘Mzungu in the Mist’ in Rwanda – during which, I got to meet the individually named gorillas and their offspring that years earlier I had read about in the original book by Dian Fossey

I like to get off the beaten track and am always looking for new and unusual destinations. Madagascar will always be a favourite, and I’ve travelled extensively in various parts of the island. I worked for a charity in the south of the island researching lemur behaviour and helping educate the local community about conservation. I’ve also worked with primates in UK zoos and completed a BSc in Environmental Science from the Open University.

Growing up in rural Lincolnshire, I’d never even been on a plane before, yet I travelled to the USA by myself at the age of 19. Another, longer trip followed, and shortly after, I moved to Australia for a year. I thought of Melbourne as my home, but I travelled extensively all over the country. I returned to the UK for a year but was soon off again, well and truly bitten by the travel bug! This time, it was a round-the-world trip featuring mainly African and South American countries. Many further travels to all seven continents followed, but always with a focus on nature and wildlife destinations.

All this personal travel experience has led me to work in the travel industry for more than 20 years now. This includes a major high-street travel company, a wildlife specialist tour operator, and, for the last ten years, as a Madagascar specialist at Rainbow.