This story is excerpted and adapted from Will Burrard-Lucas’s The Black Leopard: My Quest to Photograph One of Africa’s Most Elusive Big Cats, published in March 2021 by Chronicle Books. I set off at 5.30 a.m., aiming to get through the center of Nairobi before the terrible rush hour traffic could build up. Ahead of me was a four-hour drive to the town of Nanyuki, at the foot of Mount Kenya, and then another two hours onwards to Laikipia Wilderness Camp. For the first part I could use Google Maps…
