“I immediately was struck by the physical magnificence of
the huge,
jet-black bodies blended against the green palatte wash
of thick forest foliage.”
~Dian Fossey
The beautiful scenery of Uganda
reminded me a lot of Togo.
The highlight of our time here was trekking through the mountain jungle to
visit the gorillas of Bwindi
Impenetrable National
Park. We stayed at a lodge on the shores of
beautiful Lake Bunyoni for a few days. One morning we
left very early to make a two hour drive to the park, which is home to 300 of
the 700 remaining wild gorillas in the world. Fortunately, our driver is best
friends with one of the head trekking leaders, so he told his friend to find us
a gorilla family not too far away. We were lucky and after about 1 1/2 hours
hiking we arrived at the location of the Bweza gorilla family.
Our group was the first one to find the gorillas. The trek
was very hard, going up steep, muddy, slippery hills at about an 80-degree incline.
Thank goodness I decided to hire a porter to carry my pack, and help me climb
and descend the hills. Those who didn't really struggled, and most were
slightly covered in mud by the end. When we finally arrived at the site where
the gorillas were it felt SO worth it!! It was incredible to be only about 10
feet from a whole gorilla family. I couldn't believe that I wasn't in a zoo,
but sitting in an African jungle watching them eat, relax, and chill out. It
was so entertaining to hear all their sounds, like munching food, grunting to
each other, and even farting! They were
so calm and just looked at us like it was no big deal. I was awestruck!!
To protect the privacy of the gorillas, we were only allowed
to view them for an hour before heading back down. There are trackers employed
by the park who stay near the gorilla families during the day to monitor and also
protect them from poachers. This was an incredible day that I will remember
forever. Absolutely worth every penny!!
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| Painting classrooms in Jinga, Uganda |
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| An African birthday party |
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