Eric Close is one of those actors who is talented, good-looking and works steadily, but flies way under the radar.

I’ve been a fan of his since the underrated Dark Skies and became a big fan when he played a long-haired, soft-spoken sharpshooter on the short-lived TV series based on The Magnificent 7.

He hasn’t had much to do onscreen lately on the CBS hit Without a Trace, although he has started directing, so I was pleasantly surprised to see an article on his recent trip to Africa in OK!

Eric and his wife Keri spent a week at CC Africa’s Ngala Private Game Reserve in South Africa.

“It was the greatest trip I’ve ever been on,” the Without a Trace actor tells OK! “And I’ve been to a lot of places. We were witnessing nature, watching the animals interact and observing their behavior. When you go to a zoo, you don’t see that.”

[From OK!, print edition, October 13, 2008]

The two weren’t exactly roughing it. They stayed at the luxurious Ngala Lodge, but did track white rhino for hours on a walking safari.

Eric says the highlight was watching a mother leopard playing with her cub.

The trip wasn’t all vacation. Eric and Keri visited a local school near Ngala to help raise awareness about HIV/AIDS. Eric has taped several PSAs for CBS Cares about the issue. More than 12 million African children have been left parentless due to HIV/AIDS.

“A lot of these kids have HIV, or they’ve lost their parents to HIV,” he explains. “So there was sadness. Where I really saw it was with the preschoolers. The majority of them were either really sad or a little subdued, and it was moving.”

[From OK!, print edition, October 13, 2008]

CC Africa has founded a nonprofit organization called the Africa Foundation, dedicated to the empowerment of local communities. CC Africa generates money from tourist safaris and puts the money back into the care of the land, the animals and the people.

Eric and Keri have two daughters and are active in the Brentwood Presbyterian church, where Eric is reportedly a deacon.

Without a Trace airs Tuesdays nights at 10 p.m. on CBS.

Eric Close is shown on the set of Without a Trace on 8/7/08. He is also shown with his wife, Keri, at the Golden Nymph awards ceremony in Monaco on 6/12/08 and at the Monte Carlo TV Festival on 6/10/08. Credit: WENN