Overland travel in Africa has a way of stripping life down to the essentials: movement, timing, luck, and the people you meet when the plans fall apart. In this episode, Rita and I talk with veteran broadcast journalist Barry Maughan about a genuine “pinch me” journey across the African continent in a Volkswagen Kombi bus. It started as a loose plan to roam around North Africa. It turned into a route from Egypt toward South Africa, driven mostly by serendipity and the realities of geopolitics. Then a coup in Libya closed a key border, and the whole itinerary collapsed overnight. That forced a brand new set of decisions, and as Barry will tell you, the trip rewarded flexibility and punished anyone who showed up with rigid expectations. (I have a few trips in my past that taught me the same lesson, usually around the time the rental car shuttle didn’t show up.)
Barry’s story shows how fast travel logistics can change in unstable times, and how relationships can turn out to be your best travel tool. A chance meeting on a Mediterranean cruise led to an extraordinary welcome in Cairo, complete with help from a well-connected Egyptian official and access to the pyramids, the museum, and the opera. I’ve never gotten an opera out of a cruise, and I’m a little jealous. It’s a good reminder that travel planning isn’t only routes and reservations. It’s also curiosity, respect, and showing up with good intentions. If you’re after authentic cultural experiences, the lesson is pretty clear: connections can open doors that money and guidebooks can’t.
The episode also paints a vivid picture of driving Africa in the late 1960s and early 1970s, long before smartphones, GPS, SAT phones, or translation apps. Barry talked about how Michelin maps, mechanical preparation, and a calm frame of mind did the job that technology does for us now. Roads disappeared into mud, ruts, and gullies, and at one point progress dropped to two miles in nine hours. (I get irritated when my GPS says “recalculating,” so I’m in no position to complain.) Fuel became a strategy problem. You carry extra, you keep track of what you have left, and you never assume the next station will have any. The infamous “Nega” story, where “tomorrow” never seems to arrive, is a masterclass in managing expectations, understanding local context, and having the patience that slow travel demands.
Finally, the conversation widens into what travel teaches us about people. Barry described communicating with a smile when language fails, and he told a quietly powerful story about a mother and his wife exchanging babies, a moment that captures the “oneness” underneath culture and skin color. Hospitality came up again and again, often from the people with the least to give. That’s a big reason why family travel and cross-cultural exposure can be such a profound education. We also threw in a modern travel tip from our own planning. Airline pricing can be wildly inconsistent, and booking each leg separately, using your points wisely, or even renting a car for part of the return trip can cut costs dramatically. The through-line is the same in every era: stay flexible, stay kind, and keep moving.
Barry’s “Beneath The African Sun” on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F32VZZ52
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