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When I explained my planned fieldwork itinerary to a colleague earlier this summer, he didn't have a moment's hesitation: "That's crazy, Abigail."
And in retrospect, he was right. In 12 days, I had covered an estimated 1500km by bus and car, slept in six communities, interviewed leaders in 10 villages, and circumnavigated most of the Ruaha-Rungwa Landscape. To do it, I'd passed down the entire western boundary of the Landscape between Itigi and Mbeya, including a roughly 350km stretch of dirt and gravel road that ranges from groomed to cratered like the surface of the Moon. Sometimes, we sped through beautiful Miombo woodland, watching dramatic rock outcroppings and hills rise and fall around us. Sometimes, we crawled, never getting out of second gear before the next gully or fissure we had to navigate appeared. If it's like this in the dry season, I can't imagine making the trip during the rains.
Being that far off the beaten track has its upsides and downsides. We drove through portions of the Rungwa Game Reserve that very few foreigners, save for adventurous big game hunters and a handful of intrepid bikepackers, will ever see. It was stunning, and I will carry those memories for a long time. But when things go wrong in the bush, resources are limited, and there is usually no way out but through.
Our second day navigating this long stretch started with a crisp morning. We got on the road early and had been traveling for almost four hours when I discovered we had a problem. A big problem.
We'd just crossed a small creek and were starting up a gentle rise as a herd of cattle broke from the bush on the side of the road and scrambled up onto the roadway ahead of us. They strung across the gravel expanse at a measured pace, showed no signs of concern about the approaching vehicle. I downshifted and began to brake instinctively. My right foot went to the floor with a distinctively spongy feeling and my heart jumped into my throat momentarily. We didn't have brakes.
Fortunately, I was able to careen through a narrow space between two cows and the truck came to a stop some 20 meters down the road, where the engine compression and incline worked together to slow us down. I hopped out and looked underneath, where I saw exactly what I was expecting: dark, wet fluid sprayed all over the inside surface of one of the front tires and surrounding suspension. A ruptured brakeline. If there had been any warning of this, it had been drowned out by the chatter of the road and other squeaks, rattles, and groans of the truck. The sound of a 1980's Land Cruiser covering dirt road at 50-80km/hr is somewhat deafening.
All things considered, it wasn't the worst place to break down. The scattered homes in the surrounding landscape suggested we were approaching a village center. What I didn't know at the time was that village center was Lupa, a hub for freight and oil trucks that travel this isolated run between Itigi and Mbeya. However, we were still in a very rural area, with no other vehicles around. Our chances of finding a truck and driver capable of towing us to the nearest village were slim, and waiting for that could easily eat up most of the daylight we had left. I made the judgement call to try to drive to the village, though any forward motion was now met with considerable resistance. I could tell the brake on the affected wheel wasn't releasing, and we were essentially dragging that wheel using the power being transferred to the other three.
While it's not a stunt I hope to repeat anytime soon, I'll skip to the punchline and say that we made it to Lupa. We found a fundi (mechanic). And thanks to my research assistant's strong negotiation skills, we were able to get the vehicle sufficiently road-worthy to continue our trip within a couple of hours. Turns out the bolts holding the disc brake head in place had worked their way loose and fallen out (thanks, washboard roads...), allowing the brake to fall onto the disc, snapping the fluid line, and jamming the brake head up against another part in such a way that it had locked the wheel in place. Dragging it to town had destroyed that tire, so we were now running on our only (and to my eyes, rather ancient) spare wheel. It wasn't ideal, but I could work with it.
You'd have to travel many, many kilometers of rough road to see this sign. While I whole-heartedly recommend the views here, I realize the access might not be to everyone's taste.
Sometimes fieldwork doesn't go as planned, but I'm always amazed by the kindness of strangers in Tanzania, like the fundi who dropped everything to get us back on the road.
While this might make for a better story if the suspense continued to build, the reality was more mundane. We drove a little slower and more cautiously, concious that our back-up plans were running thin. We reached Mbeya that night. I dropped off my research assistant the following day en route to Iringa. A few schedule adjustments were required to give our regular fundis in Iringa time to repair the vehicle properly before I continued my travels, but I was able to move on to the field camp in Kitisi where I worked last year as planned.
Over several days spent with the Lion Landscapes team, I had the opportunity to reconnect with colleagues, catch up on their research, and share preliminary results from my ongoing data analysis. I also swept scorpions out of my banda, got buzzed by bats, saw the southern hemisphere stars in all their brilliance, and listened to the sounds of the bush as I fell asleep. Much as I had enjoyed seeing new parts of Tanzania, being back in bush camp brought a deep sense of peace that it is impossible to find in the bustle, color, and entrepreneurial energy of an African city. Yes, it was one more stop in an already lengthy road trip, but these three days may have been the highlight of my summer.
And now, my crazy journey is coming to an end. I returned to Iringa to begin the final rituals. Repacking gear, backing up data, returning the truck to a colleague for safe-keeping, coordinating a ride to the airport. In four days (and five flights), I'll be in California, preparing to make the long drive to Colorado with my dog and beginning another semester. It feels too slow — like the world my friends and family inhabit has moved on without me while I've been here — and too fast, because I've barely had a moment to catch my breath and start processing all that I've experienced this summer. And yet, like many of the hurdles I've cleared in Tanzania over the past three months, it simply has to be done. Life doesn't wait until we're ready.
I love working from the desk outside my tent. Even in the dry season, there is so much beauty and life here - life we're too often separated from by walls and air conditioning.
Local herders are bringing this cattle herd back to their boma (corral) before nightfall, when the bush will become the domain of wild things.
My final evening in camp reminded me of all the things I love about living in the bush, and how important it is to pause and appreciate how fortunate I am to work in a place like this.
To join me on this journey, you can follow along with new posts in the Field Notes blog on this website or LinkedIn. I am in Tanzania on a Critical Language Scholarship for Summer 2026. My research is currently supported by the Center for Human-Carnivore Coexistence, a P.E.O. Scholar Award, and a Center for Collaborative Conservation Fellowship. I am actively fundraising for the next phase of my research, and welcome referrals to funders who are interested in supporting work on global challenges including human-wildlife conflict, poverty alleviation, biodiversity conservation, and the impacts of a changing climate on all of these issues.
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