Discovering São Tomé and Principe T he

remote two-island nation of São Tomé and Principe off the coast of Gabon in Central Africa is as close as any of us will ever get to The Lost World — without, of course, the prehistoric animals and vicious apes. The landscapes are dramatic, almost untouched and boast enough endemic species to earn the pair of volcanic islands the moniker ‘the African Galapagos'.

But there's another association with the sciences: Principe Island's link to Albert Einstein is largely unknown, but an experiment conducted on the island by British astronomers during the 1919 solar eclipse served to confirm the physicist's theory of general relativity. While Einstein and his theories went on to achieve global fame, Principe Island retreated into obscurity.

In 2011, South African tech billionaire Mark Shuttleworth visited Principe as part of a look-see while shopping for an island. But that notion was quickly shelved and instead he decided to invest in a sustainable eco-tourism model. Shuttleworth saw the island's impenetrable rainforests, vast sapphire seas and dramatic volcanic mountain peaks and realised that the islands' insularity and equatorial location provided the perfect environment for the unique evolution of its many species. He saw the opportunity to ensure that change, when it inevitably came, could be sustainable and benefit the local population. For despite their beauty, the islands are very much a developing nation, with around twothirds of their 200,000 citizens living below the poverty line.

A year later, on Shuttleworth's initiation and in partnership with the local government, Principe was declared a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. Today, his investment of millions of dollars into Principe has resulted in several luxury accommodation offerings, as well as infrastructure projects on the island.

And for those in search of new frontiers, Principe does not disappoint with its fascinating history, culture and ecological wonders to be explored — it's no wonder that time spent here is best described as a slow and sybaritic sensory overload.