“Take no liberties with game animals.” We giggle when we read the sign at the entrance to Tanzania’s Lake Manyara National Park.

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When I tell people I’m an avid traveler, I say so with both pride and shame. Pride: because world travelers tend to be among the most environmentally conscious, culturally sensitive, socially progressive people you’ll ever meet. Shame: because, as a traveler, I cause more damage to the environment, and more disruption in the lives others, than people who stay home.

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“It’s not contagious,” I repeated, as friends backed away from me in horror.

I couldn’t resist telling a travel tale involving skin-tunneling parasites. In turn, my friends couldn’t resist shifting back just a hair, although they insisted they understood there was no chance of worms leaping from my body to theirs. It didn’t help to explain that I wasn’t even sure I had schistosomiasis.

“Schi-what?”

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Africa’s tallest mountain was a temptress, her flat volcanic cone dripping snow, her flanks spread broadly, as if she were opening her arms in supplication. But we passed up the mighty Kilimanjaro to hike Tanzania’s second highest peak, Mount Meru.

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Zanzibar, Zanzibar,
You can’t get there in a car.
It’s too far to Zanzibar…
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