Adventurer Levison Wood completes his epic journey walking the Nile

2 September 2014

Nine months and 3750 miles after he began his epic challenge to be the first person to walk the entire length of the Nile, explorer, writer and photographer Levison Wood has arrived at the river’s mouth on the shores of the Mediterranean.

Levison began his journey on 4 December 2013 high in the rainforests of Rwanda before following the river’s banks through jungles and swamps into Tanzania, Uganda, South Sudan, Sudan and Egypt. He has travelled through savannah, deserts, cities and war zones in some of the continent’s most remote and spectacular locations. He’s encountered modern Africa coming face to face with its extraordinary people and unique wildlife - from mountain jungles to the great expanses of the Sahara, ancient pyramids to modern metropolises, close encounters with crocodiles and highway robbers to 21st century witchdoctors and abandoned colonial resorts.

In a test that has pushed him to the very edge of his mental and physical limits, Levison has had to spend much of the time living off his wits and bushcraft skills. Accompanied by local guides he’s battled temperatures of over fifty degrees Celsius, slept wherever he could, and often had to catch his own food along the way.

Inspired by his lifelong fascination with Africa and the great explorers of the nineteenth century, Levison had set himself the challenge of being the first person to walk the full 4,250 mile length of the River Nile. Having walked through Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda and entered South Sudan, Lev experienced at first hand the violence of that country’s newly renewed civil war and found part of his route blocked by the fighting.  However, he resumed his journey at the border with Sudan and walked every step of the river’s remaining path to the Mediterranean.  He hopes to return to the region to fill in the missing section when the situation improves. 

Levison’s journey has been filmed for a television series to be broadcast on Channel 4 and Animal Planet in the US early in 2015, and his progress charted on Twitter (@WalkingTheNile), Facebook and a dedicated website (www.walkthenile.com).

Levison Wood said: “This has been the biggest adventure of my life, bigger than I could ever have imagined. I’ve achieved a lifelong dream, to walk in the footsteps of history and discover modern Africa. There were times when I wondered what I had let myself in for but I have discovered so much about this incredible continent. The people that live along the Nile were a true inspiration and I feel very privileged to have been able to undertake it.”