Because of my capacity for listening to strangers' tales, or the details of their lives, my patience with their food and their crotchets, my curiosity that borders on nosiness, I am told that anyone traveling with me experiences an unbelievable tedium, and this is why I choose to travel alone.

The job of the travel writer is to go far and wide, to make voluminous notes, to tell the truth.

The people I've known who've done great things of that type - you know, building hospitals, running schools - are very humble people. They give their lives to the project.

When I left Africa in 1966 it seemed to me to be a place that was developing, going in a particular direction, and I don't think that is the case now. And it's a place where people still kid themselves - you know, in a few years this will happen or that will happen. Well, it's not going to happen. It's never going to happen.

When I started out in the industry, I turned to magazines like 'Flex' and 'Muscle & Fitness' - the people on their covers were my inspiration.

If you have a love for something, you persevere.

Sometimes I look up a recipe for chicken and tomatoes and end up cooking pork. The inspiration gets lost in translation.

Obviously, as long as I enjoy it, I'm fit, and have the desire to work 100 per cent every day with the same motivation, then I want to play.