The Great Rift Lakes

The Great Rift is a wound in the crust of the continent, a line of tearing that runs from the Red Sea down into Mozambique, and along its floor lie some of the largest and deepest lakes on earth. Big permanent water grows big crocodiles. An animal that keeps growing throughout a long life, as this one does, reaches its greatest size where the water never fails and the fish never run out, and the Rift lakes are exactly such places. They are also fisheries that feed millions. Both things at once. Put the oldest, largest crocodiles in Africa on the same shoreline as some of its busiest fishing camps, and you have the geography of this chapter.