Aidan Hartley

Aiden Hartley is the Spectator's Wild Life columnist.

Wild life

5 November 2011 11:00 am

Kenya I am proud of Kenya for taking on Muslim extremists in southern Somalia. Rather wisely, the Kenyan military has…

Wild life

8 October 2011 11:00 am

Aidan Hartley’s Wild Life Israel Jerusalem was once a very sad place for me and I feared returning. I was…

Wild Life

10 September 2011 10:00 am

Aidan Hartley’s Wild Life  Nairobi My friend Philip Coulson was shot at midnight while driving home after the theatre in…

Wild life

13 August 2011 10:00 am

Indian Ocean On Hassan’s dhow, shaped like Vasco da Gama’s caravel, I can forget about dry land for a fortnight…

Wild life

2 July 2011 10:00 am

‘So much sorting to do,’ said my Aunt Beryl. We stood in the middle of her home in Sussex. I…

Wild life

4 June 2011 10:00 am

Aidan Hartley’s Wild life Laikipia I had enjoyed a boozy lunch and afternoon in the Men’s Bar of the Muthaiga.…

Wild life

23 April 2011 10:00 am

Kenya Marriage can be hard for all of us. A friend of mine, we’ll call him Charles, works far away…

Wild life

9 April 2011 10:00 am

Weregoi Plains Three shots rang out in the night air. Rustlers had attacked my neighbour’s boma a few hundred metres…

Wild life

12 March 2011 11:00 am

Indonesia In a Jakarta traffic jam it hits me. After decades of frenetic travel, I have learnt less of the…

Wild life

12 February 2011 11:00 am

Democratic Republic of Congo It is impossible to predict how a person will behave in a tight spot. I have…

Wild life

15 January 2011 11:00 am

Juba In the run-up to this week’s referendum on Southern Sudan’s future, I flew to Juba with a bottle of…

Wild life

18 December 2010 11:00 am

Laikipia A Christmas gift of perfume smelling of chocolate caused my wife Claire to burst into tears. ‘I have never…

Wild life

6 November 2010 11:00 am

Laikipia I have a mob of finished Boran steers ready for the holidays. The butchers are suddenly chasing me and…

Wild life

23 October 2010 11:00 am

Bangkok ‘Any Thai man who is not married is gay,’ said a Thai woman to me. ‘You could say that…

Wild life

25 September 2010 10:00 am

Rift Valley The patriarch Jacob Mukhamia Omanyo, grandfather of my friend Celestina, was born in 1888 in western Kenya. For…

Last season

28 August 2010 10:00 am

Kenya Our surfing gang — average age 50 — are out in the bay again, dodging sewage, bull sharks and…

Friendly fire

31 July 2010 10:00 am

Laikipia, Kenya My cousin Charlie Williams is a young Irish Guards captain about to deploy in Afghanistan. The other day…

Battle lines

3 July 2010 10:00 am

South Africa Rarely is Jonathan Clayton, the Times man in Africa, far from the front lines — but this month…

Let’s do business

5 June 2010 10:00 am

Tanzania Here’s this Chinese guy in the midday sun. Straw hat, faggy in his mouth, bright eyes, tanned face. I…

White-knuckle ride

15 May 2010 10:00 am

Rainy Season on the Cattle Stock Route From the side of the track, a Samburu youth waved me down. I…

Let’s have an adventure

17 April 2010 10:00 am

Colombian jungle The first day I was in Bogota I saw a big yellow bus speeding by, full of old-aged…

Shooting the breeze

27 March 2010 11:00 am

Malindi, Kenya I’m at Malindi’s Driftwood beach bar, nursing a Tusker beer. I’m gazing at the Indian Ocean. The day…

Entrance exam

27 February 2010 11:00 am

Before disembarking at Bulawayo airport I stuffed the book I was reading in the front-seat pocket. It was Peter Godwin’s…

Plague of pachyderms

30 January 2010 11:00 am

Laikipia ‘That elephant is almost human,’ my wife Claire said. ‘That,’ I replied, ‘is the problem.’ I called him Stomper.…

In the line of fire

19 December 2009 11:00 am

Laikipia ‘Let us go in amongst the cattle and talk,’ said the Councillor Jeremiah. That means a serious matter is…