A woman was worried she'd never be able to enjoy a holiday again after losing her vision at the age of just 17, and couldn't see the point of going sight-seeing if she couldn't actually see anything.
But everything changed however after she embarked on what she now regards as the 'best trip' of her life.
Lucy Edwards, 27, recounted her life-changing trip to the 90,000-acre Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya, where her assumptions about travelling while blind were changed forever. Accompanied by her guide William, Lucy started 'from scratch' when pulling together an idea of what the animals would look like, her visual memories having almost 'completely gone'.
The trip of a lifetime began with a visit to a museum in Nairobi where Lucy was allowed to touch the stuffed exhibits. As she now largely relies on her other senses, this helped Lucy begin to 'see' the animals she would be encountering on safari. She recalled how, as they drove back out of the city, her senses began to 'awaken'.
Lucy wrote in an article for BBC News : "At the Ol Pejeta sanctuary, William and the keepers brilliantly described the rhinos and elephants in front of us - how they were moving, eating, reacting to us and each other. It all helped paint pictures in my head. James Mwenda, a global ambassador for the sanctuary, crouched down with me and we felt the footprint of a rhino in the dusty ground."
The group then headed out looking for lions, driving up so close to one lioness that Lucy could actually hear her breathing through the car window. William confirmed to her that the cubs looked just like baby Simba out of The Lion King, one of the strongest visual memories she still has of lions.
Lucy continued: "The sensory overload continued on our midnight safari. It seemed as though I could smell so much more than in the daytime, and hear every little sound."
Next on the agenda was a visit to a village of the Maasai tribe, where Lucy felt as though a 'wall of sound was all around' her as she listened to 'traditional Maasai singing and chanting'. Then it was time to experience the 'great migration', a natural even which sees millions of wildebeest travel from the Serengeti in Tanzania to Kenya to find fresh grass.
Recalling the sights and smells, Lucy remembered: "Deep in Masai Mara, in the early morning, we found tens of thousands of the animals. They were all around us. Herd leaders were calling out, making moaning sounds. The noise was everywhere - like it was in 3D."
This incredible experience was enhanced further by Lucy holding a small model of a wildebeest, all while William described the extraordinary scene unfolding before them.
Although Lucy had initially been concerned she'd miss out on the 'sundowner' moment, a time when people enjoy a drink at sunset when the sky turns brilliant shades of red and orange, she needn't have worried.
According to Lucy: "But when the moment actually came, there was no sunset - it poured with rain instead. I cried happy tears. It was as though the world was letting me know that I didn't need to see the sun.
"It hadn't rained for weeks and weeks, but the heavens had opened just for me. The giant raindrops, and the sound they made as they splashed down, felt like a perfect sensory end to what had been the best trip of my life."
Have you embarked on a life-changing trip? Email us at julia.banim@reachplc.com
