The Great Rift Valley of East Africa

A pictorial journey across the length and breadth of the East African section of the Great Rift Valley.
Shah, Anup; Shah, Manoj
the-great-rift-valley-of-east-africa
978-1-77007-450-7
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Title: The Great Rift Valley of East Africa
Authors: Anup Shah; Manoj Shah
Publisher: Struik Publishers
Cape Town, South Africa 2008
ISBN 9781770074507 / ISBN 978-1-77007-450-7
Hardcover, dustjacket, 24 x 24 cm, 144 pages, throughout colour photos

About: The Great Rift Valley of East Africa

From the Jordan Valley, the rift valley runs through the ocean-filled trench of the Red Sea, reaching Africa in the low-lying Danakil Desert of northern Ethiopia. From here it continues as a huge chasm, only rarely wider than 48 kilometres (30 miles), climbing and plunging through the landscape of East Africa. It rises steeply into the Ethiopian Highlands, and continues south at 1 860 metres (6 000 feet) above sea level, its course marked by a series of lakes where the walls of the valley are broken by cross-fractures. In Kenya, it proceeds through Lake Turkana, rising further to Lake Naivasha, the highest lake in the valley, and beyond, to a further series of lakes, before descending into Tanzania and Mozambique. Heading toward the Indian Ocean, it eventually culminates beyond Lake Malawi. From this great fissure in the Earth's crust, there are other lesser cracks that branch off: the Gulf of Suez and the Gulf of Aqaba stretch out from the northern end of the Red Sea, and the Gulf of Aden from its southern end; in Africa, a lesser western rift containing, among other lakes, Lake Tanganyika, curves northward from Lake Malawi. A striking feature of the Great Rift Valley is that, within its confines, there are innumerable smaller fault scarps where the land has moved up and down. These form a complex landscape of cliffs and lake basins, dotted with volcanoes, within which a great diversity of species has evolved and continues to flourish.

Content: The Great Rift Valley of East Africa

Foreword
Introduction
Wolves of the highlands
Flamingos of the soda lakes
Wildlife of the Crater Highlands
Migrants of the ash-covered plains
Gorillas of the Virungas
Chimpanzees of Lake Tanganyika
Prehumans of the ancient lakes
Hunter-gatherers of Lake Eyasi
Transformation
Index