U3A Takapuna

A visual account of the world’s longest river journey co-led by Neil McGrigor (UK) and Cam McLeay in 2005/06 from the Mediterranean Sea in Egypt through Sudan (now Sudan and South Sudan), Uganda, Tanzania and Rwanda to what has now become known as the ‘Mac Source’ of the Nile. Their team, which included Garth McIntyre from Wellington, made the first, and only ascent of the world’s longest river traversing a myriad of cultures, climates and topography. On this remarkable journey they completed what the ancient Egyptian armies, the Victorian explorers (Livingstone, Speke, Burton, Baker, and Stanley) and many others had been unable to do. En route they encountered the world’s tallest race, the shortest, and all of the wildlife you would expect in the heart of Africa. Cam has an unrivalled reputation as an expert on the Nile and has guided Prince William, Joanna Lumley and Top Gear along the mighty river. Cam is a Chartered Accountant, originally from Ngongotaha. Just after his last year of school, his mother booked his entire family on a rafting trip down the Rangitaiki River, near Rotorua. He remembers telling her he had much better things to do with his day, but acquiesced and joined the rest of the family as the eldest of four children. His father helped him build rafts of inner tubes and bamboo, and he has since become one of the world’s most experienced white water rafting guides, founding rafting company Adrift that operated in six countries around the world.