You could say that Ralph Bousfield knows a thing or two about safaris. I mean, you could say that. But you’d be significantly understating things.
Hailing from a family whose history as safari guides dates back five generations(!), Ralph experienced his first safari at the age of three. Today he draws on both his own lifetime of experience and his family’s deep-rooted history to provide in-depth and utterly authentic African experiences as the owner of Uncharted Africa, one of B&R’s trusted safari partners. We caught up with Ralph to discuss conservation, family and authentic African experiences.
Q&A with Ralph Bousfield
Owner and Founder, Uncharted Africa
The Slow Road: After establishing a reputation as a famous hunter, your father Jack Bousfield began urging against hunting big game in 1966—the year B&R was founded, coincidentally. What prompted his philosophical shift away from hunting?
Ralph: Having spent his lifetime in the bush all over Africa, my father was astounded by the wild places in Africa which were disappearing and the numbers of animals were declining at an alarming rate and realized that the lifestyle that had been my family’s way of living and also my family’s livelihood was a thing of the past.
He was a visionary, so could imagine safaris in Africa not being big game hunting but built on the idea that people would still come for the wildlife and more importantly the wide-open spaces.
You’re a trained botanist and archaeologist who in a previous life lived in New York and London. When did you come back to Botswana? What brought you back?
I studied wildlife conservation and spent time in South Africa and the States, but always knew that I would return as soon as humanly possible to the bush. Although I still have a love affair with New York, it’s the Kalahari that is my soul home.
The environment defines how we have built our camps and how the experience unfolds. The camps are also an extension of my home and family history and therefore are authentic and not merely some Hollywood movie set. The experience unfolds as the environment permits, with the rhythm of the desert from wet seasons to dry season, from night to day. We have not felt compelled to go on a game drive in the morning and a game drive in the afternoon but rather to roll with life in the desert.