All on her own and agaionst all advice, Mary embarked for West-Africa, in those days notorius for being the „White Man‘s Graveyard“. A decision unparalleled in those Victorian times, when women weren‘t allowed to vote in elections, and were in general regarded as adrift and defenceless without a caring husband or a sheltering home. The film is a docu drama, featuring Mary‘s travels, with South-African actress Jenny Stead in the role of Mary Kingsley.

Mary soon became the first shining light for the emanzipation of women in the British Empire, and way beyond. To this day she is regarded as a role model for little girls in England.

In dangerous and wild Africa of the late 19th century Mary had strange encounters with hippos, when sitting a boat in her underwear, with elephants and wild, unexplored tribes, like the Fang people, known as cannibals in those times. Her travel books are still among the most adored pieces of travel- and adventure literature.

Even in the most dangerous, exhausting and peculiar situations Mary acted as an immaculate Victorian lady, never without her black woolen long dress, her underskirts and always wearing a corset, even when she was roaming around in the most remote African wilderness, where no white man, let alone a white woman, has ever been seen before. Only when she discovered fresh parts of dead bodies, while she was spending the night in the hut of the chief of the Fang tribe, she felt a devastated, shocked and frightened to death.

British scientist Alison Blunt is taking care of the exhibits that Mary Kingsley brought home from her travels.