On the Road: A Russian Town in the Norwegian Arctic

by Bill Murray Two dozen strangers meet by the fjord at the edge of town. We are utterly out of our element, tourists through and through. Today we shall pound across the tundra on snowmobiles, a means of conveyance most of us have never been aboard. We’re all curious about our tour company-issued Arctic wear.…
On the Road: The Maneater of Mfuwe

by Bill Murray Just about everyone who visits the famous South Luangwa wildlife park drives through Mfuwe, Zambia. A mere wide spot in the road, a trifle to tourists, Mfuwe holds a fearsome, searing memory. It will forever be known for the Man-Eater of Mfuwe, a lion that killed six people over two months in…
On the Road: Time Was

by Bill Murray 47-year old Teburoro Tito stood at the head of his delegation on an island way out in the Pacific Ocean. At the stroke of midnight on January 1st, 2000 the President of Kiribati handed a torch to a young man, ceremonially passing the future to a new generation. Nobody lived there. Nobody…
On the Road: Inside Papua New Guinea

by Bill Murray John Allen Chau, the missionary killed in the Andaman Islands in November, reopened the ‘uncontacted people’ debate. An advocacy group called Survival believes “Uncontacted peoples make a judgment that they are better off remaining uncontacted and independent, fending for themselves.” Most everybody else wants in, missionaries on their missions, doctors preventing disease,…
On the Road: In a Tough Neighborhood

by Bill Murray In the middle of the night of March 24, 1992, a pressure seal failed in the number three unit of the Leningradskaya Nuclear Power Plant at Sosnoviy Bor, Russia, releasing radioactive gases. With a friend, I had train tickets from Tallinn, in newly independent Estonia, to St. Petersburg the next day. That…
On the Road: Wildebeest Crossing

by Bill Murray The crocodiles know. They form pincers on either side of the crossing point. Richard says they feel the vibration of all those hooves along the riverbank above them. Waves of animals surge toward the river then fall away. If they all go we’ll witness a frightful, deadly crush of beasts in motion,…
On the Road: Europe’s Invisible Corner

by Bill Murray Hyvä asiakkaamme, Ethän käytä huoneiston takkaa. Se on tällä hetkellä epäkunnossa Ja savuttaa sisään. Dear customer, Please don’t use the fireplace. It is for the moment out of order and the smoke comes into the apartment. Now wait a minute. We might need that fireplace in Lapland in December. Just now it’s…
On the Road: Giraffe Spotting

by Bill Murray It all started with zebras. Hard to believe, but sustained, hands-on field work in east Africa only has a sixty year history. Today Hans Klingel is an emeritus professor at the Braunschweig Zoological Institute, but when he arrived in Africa in 1962 Herr Klingel was one of only three scientists in the…
On the Road: Rapa Nui

by Bill Murray Polynesia could swallow up the entire north Atlantic Ocean. It’s that big. Only half of one per cent of Polynesia is land, and 92 per cent of that is New Zealand. Then there’s Tonga and Samoa, the Cook and Hawaiian islands, the French possessions, and back in its own lonely corner, Rapa…