There are still a few places left
that you can't get to from here.
Places without phones or faxesor even roads.
There are still a few corners of the globe so remote
they remain aloof from
what we call the modern world.
This is the realm of the bush pilot.
Tom Clayton is leaving behind his family
and friends for a two-year adventure around the world.
The 28-year-old Radnor resident checks out
his single engine plane for the last time
before taking a solo flight
from wings Airport in Norristown.
The purpose is to try
and go to seven continents
in different parts of the world and live
and work with bush pilots.
As a bush pilot
Claytor will fly daredevil routes while delivering
vital supplies to remote areas.
So before taking to the skies
Claytor got his hugs and kisses
while cameras recorded all the action.
And there was even a special goodbye.
Then as the crowd looked on
the pilot closed the cockpit door
and took off.
The day he left, he made the local TV news.
If he makes it back, he'll make history.
Tom Claytor hopes to be
the first to fly around the world
Stopping on all seven continents
before returning home
I had this tremendous desire
inside to look at other places
to look in places like
Greenland and the Sahara Desert.
Things that I'd only seen
on the map in high school.
So I think it's a desire
to look at different parts of the world
and to live with people
on other parts of the world
but maybe also it's a little challenge
or test for myself as well.
Claytor is 31 years old.
When he was 12 he set foot in an airplane
for the first time.
It was to be the start of an obsession
When he was just 18
he earned a pilot's license.
By his early 20s
he had begun working
as a bush pilot in Africa.
Today, Claytor owns his own airplane
named "Timmissartok"
after one of Lindbergh's planes.
Outrigged with a special reserve tank
the Cessna 180 Taildragger
can fly about 14 hours without refueling.
The struggle to keep his gas tank
full has shaped
Claytor's journey from the very start.
I left home with $20,000.
And when I got to Greenland
it cost me $1,000 to fill up
my gas tank once.
So it became very obvious
that I was going to have to
find ways of getting money.
And my idea which was only an idea when I left
was that I'd work the plane on the way.
And when I got to Niger
I found a job doing a survey of a park
which paid me $8,000.
So I've been able to find jobs
for the plane on the way.
Besides working the plane as he goes,
Claytor's writing a book
about his experience
in the far corners of the world.
So far, he's logged 46,000miles
three continents and 28 countries.
On December 2, 1990 he left Pennsylvania
heading north through
Canada to Greenland and then Iceland.
In the summer of '91, he arrived in Europe.
And early in '92
he began travelling through Africa.
The longest leg of Claytor's journey
so far has been on the Africa continent.
His video journal is testimony to a rare
and spontaneous adventure.
We're now in market
which is the largest market in West Africa
We're now in...
and Mr. has with him scorpions
And now he's going to show me that he can use his
so that the scorpions don't bite you
we just did this once before
I hope it's successful again.
Okay...
It's starting to rain now.
Now in southwest Africa
Claytor has spent the last few weeks
exploring the country of Namibia.
Today, he plans to visit
an area rich in African history
a group of abandoned towns
near the Namibian coast.
There's a town southwest
of the Namib Desert
called Kolmanskop and this town was founded
because a railway worker
working on the rail line
found a very pretty stone.
And this lead to a diamond
rush which caused
this town to spring out of the desert
and then as quickly as
it started it disappeared.
Kolmanskop was followed by other boomtowns
a sudden cluster of Diamond settlements
that sprang up in the lifeless desert.
At the turn of the century,
Diamonds were so plentiful here,
they say you could collect a jarful a night
by just picking up
whatever glistened in the moonlight.
In the saloons
you could buy your whiskey
and your woman with raw diamonds.
May 10th. It's a ghost town,
almost like the American west.
Casinos. Hotels. Houses.
There's something haunting
and magical about this place.
I keep looking in the sand half expecting
to find a diamond.
But there are none.
When the sand was picked clean,
the people disappeared.
What they left behind is am eerie memento.
An empty museum.
A movie set.
I can almost imagine
the sounds of music and laughter here.
Claytor's itinerary is deliberately unpredictable.
If he has enough money for gas
he can simply scout around off the beaten path
for material for his book.
What I'm trying to do is
visit remote parts of the world
places like this desert jungles ice caps
and places which are basically
the frontiers of civilization.
And the venue by which I do
that is I look for bush pilots
because bush pilots work in these areas andvery often
they're not just pilots but they're scientists
they're businessman, they're researches
they're missionaries and conservationists.
These pilots also teach me the particulars of
these various areas and how to go through them safely.
Recently, another bush pilot told Claytor
about an isolated shipwreck
on the Namiban Beach.
One of the many skeletons along
Africa's infamous Skeleton Coast.
Claytor is looking for a South African
freighter called the Otavi
which sank in 1945.
A mere footnote in history,
the wreck is said to be extremely well preserved
thanks to the tiny cove where it went aground.
Just beyond this swept area and that beach,
there's a rock peninsula and one beyond it.
You'll see in between the two is the shipwreck.
Right here the ocean is
just moving back off the Otavi.
There are seals just piled up
around that wreck.
You can see the wreck
jetting up out of the sand.
And part of it's been split off.
And those are seals
they're just packed all around it.
May 15th.
I am on the edge of one of the oldest
deserts in the world.
The skeleton coast
where countless shipwrecked sailors
lost their lives.
It feels like a place I was never meant to be.
Like a ghost, the Otavi looms before me
rising three decks above the sand,
something almost lost and forgotten.
I try to imagine the men
who wrecked here half a century ago.
How did it feel to be
marooned in such a place?
The wreck of the Otavi is so inaccessible that
Claytor is probably the
lonely vessel's first visitor in decades.
His book promises to be
a guided tour of the middle of nowhere.
May 16th
Today is the 894th day since I left home.
Sometimes I worry that I will become
to comfortable being alone. Already,
I can't imagine
what it would be like to be
in a room full of people.
I miss the most unbelievably
trivial things.
A bookstore.
A movie.
A long hot shower.
A pillow.
The only sound I hear
is a hyena in the distance.
I wonder where it is.
But I relish the quite... the solitude.
May 17th. I wake up at dawn and it's freezing.
I brush my teeth and break down camp.
And then, almost as though it were a part of myself
I see to the plane.
What I'm doing.
But of course I think about it.
I check everything and the I check it again.
Three pilots I met in the Faroe Islands
were recently killed when their helicopter crashed.
That makes 15 pilots...
15 friends who have died since I started flying.
There's so much of flying
that's completely out of your control.
So I try to concentrate on what I can control.
Despite the dangers and perhaps also
because of them Claytor loves to fly
The whole world goes upside down.
And yet everything inside
the airplane stays the same. Kinda fun.
If you do it wrong
you can really get into a lot of trouble.
You can really really scare
yourself if you do it too fast
or too slow or you stall the tail
hour heart drops...
so that's when I do it by myself to practice it.
Because you don't want to do it wrong
when you're trying to show someone.
But the life of a bush pilot
is not all barrel rolls and stunt flying.
With funds running low
Claytor needs to start looking for his next paying job.
He decides to leave Namibia
flying northeast to Botswana.
Here, he'll visit an old friend and fellow bush pilot...
Perhaps, with a little luck
he'll also get a line on some work.
Bush pilots everywhere
seem to have an informal network
for news and information.
In Africa, many are involved in wildlife
management and conservation,
like Lloyd Wilmot.
Just keep a nook out for breeding herds
and any sign of vultures and hyenas.
Wilmot runs a safari camp
in Chobe National Park.
In addition
he uses his plane to help
combat poaching in the immense refuge
where he is an honorary game warden.
Today, Claytor has become along with Wilmot
to track a herd of elephants
just outside the park.
You've a huge herd underneath you right now.
Roger.
I'm turning to the right.
I want to have another look at that herd.
Okay, I'm in on your left.
Now that they've spotted
the elephants from the air
they'll continue the search on foot tomorrow.
Lloyd Wilmot is one of the few wildlife experts
who routinely approaches
elephant without the protection of a vehicle.
He and Clayton will wait at a watering hole
for a close up view of the animals.
What do you do if you're surprised by an elephant?
Is there a trick to not getting eaten?
There's no real trick.
The thing is to try and
keep the wind in your favor.
If you if you can see him
before he sees you
you can figure out
which way the wind's going
and then go down wind of him and keep clear of him
but in the ultimate analysis
if you are confronted
you get to something like a big tree, like that.
If you can't climb it
you just get behind it and you have a clot of earth
like a lump over there or a piece of wood,
and throwing that at them
often turns them and distracts them.
In their sort of terms of reference
nothing has ever thrown anything at them
so they get a bit disconnected
when you actually throw something at them.
Wow...! There is
Notice how they skim the top of the water
because that's where it's cleanest and clearest.
The sediment sinks down and you have about half
half an inch to an inch of clean water on top.
So they suck just on the top,
much like you see them doing now...
you have to look carefully, the ears are cocked.
Claytor approaches a bull shoot some video of him
but the large make has no interest
in posing for the camera.
What did you just do there?
It's a bluff charge.
It's to get you to go.
Just call his bluff.
Stay put.
May 22nd.
I have just been charged by a wild elephant.
Lloyd laughs lightly,
like he's seen it a thousand times.
Neither one of us says much.
There's really not much
to say after an elephant charge.
After a while
a large group emerges from the bush.
Its an extraordinary thing
to be so close to these magnificent creatures.
It's so easy to feel small
in the face of such splendid power.
Thanks to bush pilot grapevine,
Claytor has secured a job
in an international park in Zimbabwe.
The two pilots part company in the Botswana sky
Claytor's headed for Hwange National Park
in Western Zimbabwe,
but first he'll make a slight detour to one
of Africa's most spectacular natural wonders:
Victoria Falls.
I'm now flying low over the Zambezi River
approaching Victoria Falls
and as you look ahead at the trees
you just see this mist
this towering mist rising
our of the trees that are above the water.
And the Africans call it
"Mosi-oa-Tunya."
Which means the smoke that thunders.
The Zambezi River drops up to a million
gallons of water a second over the 350-foot falls.
Even before it comes into sight,
the roar of the plummeting water is deafening.
The rainbow everywhere.
You see the mist sailing the screen.
Look at that chasm,
and there's a rainbow coming across it.
Wow, look at that
right below the falls
you can see there're gorges
that just zig back
and forth about five times.
And in these gorges
it also drops down
to this boiling black water below.
It's spectacular.
May 26th. I can't resist
flying down into the gorge
even though it's risky.
Not only could I be killed
I could probably get arrested.
As I corner
the water explodes into
a torrent if frothing white waves.
Sometimes flying is just a fast way to travel.
And sometimes it's the greatest thing in the world.
Leaving the falls behind
Claytor reaches Hwange National Park.
Before he can land in a remote area
Claytor has to clear the runway.
Collisions with animals are
one of the greatest dangers bush pilots
face in Africa.
Okay, are you feeling strong this morning.
On the ground,
Claytor gets some help refueling and prepares
for his next assignment in the air.
Conservationist and researcher Janet Rachlow
has hired Claytor to help track an injured
rhinoceros in the park.
Rachlow is part of a controversial program
designed to protect severely endangered rhinos.
Park officials in Zimbabwe have been removing
the horns from dozens of rhinos in a desperate
attempt to deter poachers.
Claytor was there during one of the dehorning
operations and videotaped it.
The first time
I saw rhinos getting their horns cut
off it was in the southeast section of Zimbabwe.
This huge rhino was lying there sedated
and this man pulled the
started ripping the horn off its face.
And you start to ask yourself,
"why made clear tome
was that there's nothing else that can do here.
The rhino Claytor and Rachlow are searching
for is an adult female named Zola.
Even though she was dehorned,
she was shot and badly wounded by poachers.
In the vast 5000 square mile park,
the only way to locate individual animals
is from the air.
Even then, it's no easy matter.
We're starting to get a signal.
Okay
Once we get a little bit closer,
we can listen out of both wings...
and we wanna balance the volume that comes
in on the two wings
and that'll keep us going right towards it... Okey
Geez, it's hard to see
through this bush, isn't it?
Okay, straight... Real close real close
directly under us.
Nothing under us on the left.
It's quite possible that her collar has come off.
It's come off several of the other animals.
So what we'll need to do is just come in on foot
and find the collar or find the animal. But,
you know, now we know the area.
With the help of expert trackers,
the search for Zola continues on foot.
Dr. Michael Kock is the veterinarian
for Zimbabwe's national park.
Once they find the rhino,
Dr. Kock will shoot her
with a tranquilizer dart
so he can treat her gunshot wounds.
I need... The hole is swollen here.
That's from a gunshot there?
What I need is, I need an eye cover
My shirt?
She looks good.
You can see she's done
some wearing here around the edges.
If Zola had died,
the poachers would probably have cut off
what was left of her horn to sell. Still,
dehorning does appear to reduce poaching overall.
It's easy to want to take an emotional stance
to conserving these animals.
And if you take that stance,
dehorning is hard to justify.
But I think we have to be realistic,
and we have to look at what's happening.
And, I mean, I'd be really sad to tell my
children or my grandchildren that,
sorry,
there used to be something as magnificent as
a dinosaur,
but we killed them all
Strafed with machine gun fire
the huge creature's legs
are swollen with infection.
Once her wounds are treated
Zola will be given an antidote
to the tranquilizer and freed.
May 27th.
The immense animal awakes
and rises to her feet but does not move.
Then, slowly she lowers her massive head
to the ground and uses her chin as a crutch
to limp off into the bush.
The doctor sounds optimistic
but I am not.
She might survive these wounds
but to a poacher,
her life is worth far less
than the sad stump at he end of her nose.
Four days later,
Claytor receives a wire from Janet Rachlow.
Despite all their efforts Zola has died.
Back on his way,
Claytor returns to the explorer's life.
He has decided to pay a visit
to an orphanage for chimpanzees in burundi.
Claytor heads north toward Burundi.
But first he'll cross Zambia,
and an area called the Kafue Flats.
I'm now somewhere over the Kafue swamps,
and as far as you can see in every direction,
it's absolutely flat.
And it's this green patina over dark blue water.
If you didn't see the sun reflecting, you know
that it's just a green patina
of growth on top of this vast swamp.
I think if you lost your engine here
I'm not sure how deep it is
but you'd probably just mush into this green gunk
and just sit on top of the
wing and then try to call someone.
You just can't crash here.
If he did crash here,
Claytor's tiny plane would be
almost impossible to spot from the air.
The orange stripes on the tail
and wings are a safety measure.
If he goes down, the right color might make it
easier to find him
in the empty terrain he frequents
Claytor hopes
he'll never have to find out if it works.
And crashing isn't the only thing a pilot
has to worry about.
I've had a couple of close calls.
When I got to Algeria,
it was right after the military took over.
And they thought that a bush pilot
was a pilot for George Bush.
And right after the gulf war,
George Bush was not a very popular person.
I tried to quickly explain that a bush pilot
had nothing at all to do with George Bush.
Claytor decides to make a brief stop in Zambia
to refuel and chart his course to Burundi.
Bueno Bungee.
How's everything here?
I am from Ndola, but I needed to refuel.
Hello.
How are you?
Nice to meet you.
I'm Claytor...
We are just from around here.
The lanky American is
an unusual sight wherever he lands
and his grasp of African
languages is often a crowd pleaser.
This is my first time ever to come here.
It's nice to meet you.
Oh, it's very nice to meet you.
When landing,
you're suppose to pay
something - a landing fee.
How much should I pay you?
I want to pay.
How much?
How many kilograms?
It's one ton.
5-60
5-60. How many U.S. Dollars is that?
It's about one U.S. Dollar.
I understand that
Can I pay you two U.S. Dollars?
So is that okay?
This is more than okay.
Okay
no but please the change is for you guys
You can have it.
Because landing fees here are very reasonable...
so it's one cent.
These are for you to do
as you wish to improve your airport.
I think that's the cheapest airport
I've ever landed at in my whole life.
When you fly in the day it's very bumpy,
because the sun heats the surface
of the African earth
and it just gets these currents
of air straight up.
At night,
it's completely different.
The air is calm and still.
You can see the stars.
You can see fires on the ground.
You can see the moonlight
reflecting off of lakes.
And it's very calm and
peaceful and kind of reflective time.
You're suspended in space
over this large black think
that you can't see.
It's mysterious.
The chimpanzee orphanage in northern Burundi
was founded by the Jane Goodall Institute in 1989.
Chimps confiscated from smugglers
are brought here to be cared for by
conservationists and volunteers.
Dean Anderson is the director of the refuge.
At the moment, it is home to 17 chimpanzees,
and one baby gorilla.
How old is she?
She's about three
She was confiscated at the airport.
She was taken from her forest
home as all the other chimps here...
In Zaire... eastern Zaire,
because she's an eastern lowland gorilla,
by poachers and then she was brought to ;
she was in transport...
now what they were going to do with her there
I don't know.
Probably a zoo or...
Is that where they were
mostly going to zoos at one point?
Zoos probably.
A gorilla would probably go to a zoo.
'Cuz a private person would just...
No...
Not be so interested, right,
because they get too big and too violent?
Yes, well too big.
I mean, how do you keep
a 300-pound gorilla or something.
June 4th.
There are baby chimpanzees everywhere.
They are affectionate and smart.
Each one has a distinct personality.
One has mastered the art of threading a shoelace.
If they were returned to the forest,
they would be killed by wild chimps.
They can never go home.
My mind drifts back to a day
I spent in Equatorial Guinea
and that little chimp I found.
We just had something to eat
at a restaurant and I came out.
And sitting here tied to
this chair is this little baby chimpanzee.
I don't know how old it is.
He seems very cold.
He was hugging himself when I found him.
And it's, I'm shocked by it.
I don't know what to think.
He's just sitting here.
Oh my god.
I've got to go.
Most of the chimps in the orphanage
were captured by poachers to be sold as pets.
Though they are extremely appealing as babies,
growing chimpanzees are too smart
and too destructive to make good pets.
Once the chimps become powerful adults,
they must be confined in cages,
a lonely place for these social primates,
who quickly become bored
and desperate for attention.
Soon,
Dean hopes the orphanage may be able to give
some chimps a little more freedom.
This is a temporary situation.
We're hoping to get money together to out
them into the sanctuary that we're talking about.
And there they'll be, they'll all be together.
They won't have cages, they won't have ropes.
They'll be on an open space
where they can have a semi-natural social life.
Which is so important for chimpanzees.
Wildlife in Africa seems to be in direct conflict
with people here because they need space
and the animals need space
and the animals end up losing...
I was impressed that someone was trying
to take these chimps that
had already basically list so much,
they were trying to in a way give them back
to themselves and nature.
May be its not perfect.
Nut it was something.
Soon Claytor must leave Africa,
and make the rest of his way around the globe.
But first, he wants to make one more stop.
For some time, he has wanted to visit Zaire.
But so far, he hasn't been
granted clearance to land there.
Okay, this is Mike Oscar in southern Zaire.
Over.
Mike Oscar...
is there any way for me
to confirm a clearance from Ndola?
Over
That's very difficult because of the fact that
there's no telephone communication between
the two places. Over
Okay, roger.
If I arrive with my copy of my AFTN request,
how easy is it to negotiate
once on the ground?
Over.
How much money do you have? Over
I've got a fair amount.
How much do you think it would cost? Over.
At least $250 each. Over
Roger, I understand.
The turbulent political situation in Zaire
makes it extremely difficult
to get permission to enter the country.
Claytor decides to go in any way,
without an official clearance.
He'll touch down at a small airstrip
where he can refuel form his own supply.
If he's lucky, no one will
ask him for his papers.
In Africa there's a rule an unwritten rule,
and that is that it's easier to
get pardoned than to get permission.
Because of communications and how difficult
it is to get clearance and things,
its sometimes easier
just tot do them and afterwards,
of course, you get in trouble.
But the Africans are very forgiving.
Good people,
and very often they'll forgive you.
For Claytor,
everyday is part of
a grand-if solitary-adventure.
He's been away form home for nearly three years
and it could be three more before he returns.
From Africa,
he will head east to the
four remaining continents
between him a home.
Claytor has grown accustomed
to being a stranger everywhere he goes
but he is also changed
by every place he visits
and every person he meets.
I think there's a part of me
that's become a little bit African,
because the Africans have a saying
which is when you ask them
when they'll come back or
what time something will be ready
they'll smile and look at you
and say anytime from now.
So when people ask me
when I' going to get home
sometimes I just can
only say anytime from now.