Going on safari is a bit like visiting the world's great museums and galleries. A photograph or print of Da Vinci's Mona Lisa or Michelangelo's David do nothing but teach you how to recognise the masterpiece and identify it. They don't give you anything near the awe, amazement and sense of wonder that you get from seeing the original.
In 2008 I narrated The Cheetah Diaries for the BBC. Back then I sat for hours in the studio doing the voiceover for the footage. The cats were interesting enough on film, but today, at Phinda in South Africa's KwaZulu-Natal province, I get up close to a cheetah. And suddenly they take on a dimension that is personal, emotional and intimately powerful.
Our tracker Jabu spots it, and points to a cheetah lying languidly in a patch of grass, only its ears and the top of its head visible. It is a young male, perfectly camouflaged, and I am amazed Jabu has seen it at all. Seth, our ranger, drives closer carefully. For all their magnificence, cheetahs are skittish animals and easily spooked, says Jabu. But Seth and Jabu are specialists and manage to get us to within a few yards.
When you see a cheetah in real life in its natural habitat you understand why this is the fastest animal on land. To call it athletic is an understatement. It's superbly streamlined from the tip of its jet-black nose to the end of its long, elegant tail, and surprisingly light-footed, treading carefully and deliberately.
Seth explains that the cheetah uses its tail for balance, that it has an enormous heart and lungs to oxygenate that athletic frame and that it has superb eyesight and excellent hearing. It lies down in the grass again, turning its face to us and it looks me direct in the eye. It holds my stare for what seems like ages. It is regal, aloof and athletic, and certainly one of the most beautiful animals in the world.
The thing nobody tells you about going on safari is that when these animals look you in the eye they form a bond with you. It may be a tenuous bond, but it's a bond nevertheless. And it stays with you just as powerful beauty ought to.
There on the African savannah I thought of those flickering images of cheetahs that featured in the BBC documentary of three years ago. I remember being impressed enough back then in the studio. But out here in the veld I understand in an instant the magic and the bewitching power of the cheetah.
The sun is setting and Jabu says we must return to camp. But there is a surprise in store, for instead we arrive at a clearing in the bush where dinner is served. The table is dressed in linen and laid with silver cutlery and crystal glasses, and there are kerosene lamps hanging from trees, creating the prettiest restaurant I have ever dined in.
We eat perfectly roasted lamb and drink fine South African wine while the Phinda rangers regale us with tales of buffalo herds so big it takes three days for all the animals to pass the big thorn tree in the scrub veld by the waterhole. Nearby, a giant eagle owl hoots, and further away, a lion roars.
