Transcript
A (0:01)
Murchison Falls national park in Uganda is beautiful, but it's not safe. The landscape is massive and unforgiving. The Victoria Nile runs straight through the park, its current strong enough to pull anything under. Along the riverbank live some of the most dangerous wildlife in Africa. Their Nile crocodiles have a bite so strong they can easily crush a car. Their hippos may look docile, but are responsible for more human deaths than most predators. They have lions that move quietly through tall grass and dense woodlands. The scale of the park is part of the risk. Dense vegetation limit infrastructure. There's long distances between people. It's easy to underestimate how quickly something can go wrong and how difficult it can be to find answers once it does. In a place like this, it's easy to assume the environment is responsible. The river, the animals, the terrain. But sometimes the story is not that simple. In October of 2015, Sophia Coetzier was here. And then she was gone. The place where she was last seen raised more questions than it answered. The environment offered an easy explanation, but the scene itself was never properly secured. There were no clear signs of an animal attack. Personal belongings were left behind, details that did not fit neatly into a single conclusion. So the question remains, what really happened to Sophia Coetzeer? Welcome to National Park After Dark.
B (1:49)
Foreign and welcome back to National Park After Dark. I'm Danielle.
A (1:57)
I'm Cassie.
B (1:58)
And this park scarred me for life. When you talked about it last time.
A (2:02)
I know. I was thinking about this last episode and I actually was looking at it and I was like, what did I title it? And it's an adventure worth dying for. And I told the story of Henry Coetzee. Yes.
B (2:16)
I know. It's not. I. Yeah, yeah. The last names. I was like, wait, have I heard this before? But.
A (2:23)
And he wrote a book and go back and listen to the episode because it's actually one of my favorite ones that I researched because I really like him as a person. And it's. He's a whitewater. Or he was a whitewater rafter. Whitewater kayaker. Sorry. And he just lived his life full of adventure. And eventually he had some stuff happen to him inside of this park. But he wrote a book about. He called. He titled it Living the Best Day Ever. And it was just. He. You could just tell. He was so full of life.
B (2:55)
Yeah. And I really liked it. No spoilers, I guess, if you haven't listened to that. But it is one of the most memorable stories that you've ever told on the show, I think.