Her two journeys weren't remarkable so much for their geographical exploration as for being undertaken, alone, by a sheltered, middle-class, Victorian spinster in her thirties without any knowledge of African languages or French, or much money.

Kinglsey was educated at home by her father – a medical doctor who travelled extensively. By 1886 her father had become too ill to travel and, with Kingsley's help, started preparing his notes for publication as a comparative study of sacrificial rites around the world. It was still incomplete when he died in February 1892. Kingsley's mother died just six weeks later.

Kingsley decided to travel to West Africa to continue her father's "study of early religion and law." Unfortunately, Victorian social convention required that Kingsley, a spinster, stay at the beck-and-call of her brother, Charles, who controlled the family finances, and so she moved to his home in London. In 1893 he decided to travel through China, leaving her free to travel.

Apart from a brief trip to the Canaries in 1892, Kingsley had not travelled abroad. Her first trip took her to San Paul da Loanda and Ambriz (just to the north), then to the port of Matadi, at head of the Congo River Estuary in the Congo Free State (now in Democratic Republic Congo), from there she travelled to Kabinda (now Cabinda), and through the Congo Français (Gabon). Her final leg was to Fernando Po and the port of Calabar in the (British) Oil Rivers Protectorate. Kingsley returned to Britain early in 1894.

By 23 December 1894 Kingsley was on her way to West Africa again. She stopped briefly at Freetown, Sierra Leone, and at Accra, Gold Coast, before arriving at Calabar. From there she sailed down the coast towards the mouth of the Ogowé (Ogooué) River in the Congo Français. From Libreville Kingsley travelled down the coast to the mouth of the Ogowé and then up river to Lambaréné.

In July 1895 Kingsley explored the lower reaches of the Ogowé River. At Lake Ncovi, Kingsley had her first encounter with a gorilla. She then travelled overland from Lambaréné to the Rembwé River, which she followed down to the coast and capital, Libreville. In September 1895 Kingsley climbed Mount Cameroon, which at 14,435 ft (4,095 m) is the region's highest peak.

On return to England in 1895, Mary Kingsley began writing her book Travels in West Africa. She lectured on her explorations and discoveries.

In 1899 Kingsley departed for South Africa to collect specimens of fresh-water fish from the Orange River. By the time she got to Cape Town, the Anglo-Boer war has started. While nursing Boer prisoners at a camp in Simon's Town, she contracted typhoid. She died on 3 June 1900, aged 37. At her request, she was buried at sea.

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