I don’t do the sort of six-country, ten-day tour across Europe where you just see the highlights, nothing else. “I believe in ‘slow travel’, which means you move about slowly, seeing lots of things. Having decided to first tackle West Africa, he mapped out a plan that would take him through Cameroon, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Namibia, Mauritania and Guinea-Bissau. His idea was that the older he got, the more concerned he would have to be about health issues that might restrict his travels or prevent him from travelling. “Then I thought, ‘Right, where do I go next? Africa is fraught with dangers of one sort or another, maybe that’s where I should go next.’”

He next went into South America where he visited every country except Venezuela because of the crime and civil unrest. So whilst I was going around Central America I settled on eight weeks.” “I wanted to experiment with how long the trip should be. And so I retired in September and by November I was on the plane to Central America.”Īlthough interested in tourism, his purpose was to work out a plan for further travel. “When I retired, the thing that I really wanted to do is just this – to travel,” said Mr Lister, who spent his business career as a partner with Deloitte. Of the nine awards he has received, three named Immersed in West Africa as “the best book” to read for travellers going to Mauritania, Senegal or Guinea-Bissau. “The intention was to put the story out when I was doing that I had no thought about the book winning awards of any sort.” “It’s a bit of a surprise,” said the former Cabinet Minister, who retired from politics in 2014 after 21 years. The latest in a string of accolades it has earned came last month, when he received a “coveted” Book Excellence Award in the international competition’s adventure category. Little did he know that so many other people would be interested.Ĭonvinced to share his tales in book form, he published Immersed in West Africa two years ago. In 2017, Terry Lister went on a slow tour of Africa. Author and former Cabinet Minister Terry Lister

Travels in Senegal by Terry Lister