Camera advice? Good camera to go to Africa?

I'm going to Africa in the spring for a volunteer program and I need too buy a new camera for the trip. My criteria are:
-something small, and relatively compact so that it doesn't weight me down when I'm trekking everywhere
-something with great zoom. I will be volunteering with wildlife so I want to have to capability to zoom on something far away so zoom better than you standard camera is required
-something that snaps pictures quite quickly to capture the moment, a and fast than digital cameras (they are so slow)
-something cute…

I was looking at the Nikon J1 but my understanding is that the pixels is low and so the quality of the picture isn't as good as it could be. Also the lens it comes with doesn't have great zoom so another lens would be required and it was huge. However, if you have different opinions on that camera, please share them. If you know of other cameras that would be good options, share that too!

We have the same choice of camera - I also recommend you the Nikon 1 J1 of Nikon 1 system. It is cute, handy or compact with interchangeable lens and it is quite fast compared to other cameras. Or maybe if you want, you can have other choices such as Nikon 1 V1 or Nikon Coolpix P7100.

http://topdigitalcamerassite.com/nikon-coolpix-p7100-review-2/
http://topdigitalcamerassite.com/nikon-1-v1-review/
http://topdigitalcamerassite.com/nikon-1-j1-review/

Yes, the J1 would be an excellent choice.

Why is it people are still so hung up on pixel counts? This is NOT the be all and end all to image quality.

On pixels

http://www.kenrockwell.com/...mpmyth.htm

It is the size of the sensor and size of the pixel that determines the quality of your images. NOT how many can be crammed onto a sensor.

Just visit your local camera shop and look at the J1 system and see what YOU think. We could all type on about this and that, but in the end, it will be YOUR camera and you have to make the choice.

On one hand, the J1 is not going to seriously dent the sales of dSLR cameras, but with its sensors being larger than ANY P&S camera, the ability to use interchangeable lense, it may become one of the most traveled camera not used by professionals

The last time I was in Africa, I used a 35 mm camera and three editorial size lenses, the 24 mm, 55 mm macro and 105 mm. I was there shooting editorial assignments, NOT wild animals, so long lenses were not needed.