Ben Stookesberry | 2011 | 44 min.

2012 Official Selection

Award Winner: 2012 Most Inspiring Adventure Film

After more than a decade exploring Central Africa, Hendri Coetzee is a modern legend of African exploration. Solo on the Congo River in 2009, Hendri received an email from American expedition kayaker Ben Stookesberry. It would be ludicrous, Hendri said, to take an American who you dont know, and who has never been to Africa, into its very heart. But a year later, he did just that. Bens long-time kayaking partner, Chris Korbulic, joined the group as Hendri led the way from the Nile overland through Rwanda in order to kayak into the heart of the Congo on a previously unnavigated waterway, the Lukuga River. Seven weeks into the expedition, deep in the DRC, tragedy strikes. On this ultimately tragic expedition, Hendri’s own words will always ring true: Some of the things that were about to witness are so intense and horrible that they should stop the show; but they don’t. People still laugh and dance. Yes the bad things happen, but so do the good things, the amazing things, and the show goes on.