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Published: June 22nd 2003
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We bummed around Kisoro for a day and then took a 2 hour taxi to the National Forest where we had booked to stay a night before our tracking. We were the only people staying at the Park entrance and things were very quiet. The next morning we got up and met our fellow trackers - a couple of professional photographers from Germany, and a Canadian tourist. There were 3 army guys with guns for our safety (we were quite close to the Rwanda border) and 3 trackers. The instructed us on the days activity: We would go to where the Gorillas had been seen yesterday and track them to where they were today (hopefully). We would then track them as they moved through the bamboo forest eating for one hour and then we would head back. It could take one hour or many to find the Gorillas, if we would find them. We were also instructed that the Silverback of the troupe may charge us and beat on his chest and in this situation we should look down towards the ground and stay very still, definitely not making eye contact with the Gorilla!
We set of and after about 45
minutes we entered the bamboo forest. It was really cool to hike up in the beautiful mountains of Uganda in a very unusual sort of forest for all of us foreigners. The lead tracker blazed the trail for us with a large machete. After maybe another 45 minutes in the forest we came across the place where they saw the Gorillas the previous day and pretty soon we were at their nest from the night before. The Gorillas has flattened a large nest with Bamboo leaves and before heading on the next day had soiled them comprehensively. Our guides tracked for another half an hour before they went on ahead and came back instructing us that the gorillas were right over the next crest and our hour would start when we walked over the crest. It was amazing and exciting to get the first glimpse of the huge silverback as he gazed back at us. During the hour of tracking the Silverback would not eat but spend most of his time watching us and also protecting the group from us if need be. We saw an old female and a medium sized child pretty soon. After maybe ten minutes watching some of the group the Silverback made a blood curdling screech and ran a little towards us beating his chest. It was pretty scary and we all looked down and stayed still worried that he might come and rip us apart limb from limb. All the time we were in contact with the Gorillas our trackersmade sounds like a loud Gecko - apparently to assure the Gorillas that we meant no harm.After a while the Gorillas were out of sight and we followed them slowly through the forest. There were about 3 infants, 2 teens and five adults with two Silverbacks. We were charged at a couple more times - the final time the silverback got so close to us that he put his hand on the shoulder of one of the trackers who was arms length from me. We were told that this hadn't happened before and it was a little worrying given that we were supposed to keep a distance of 15 feet from the Gorillas to prevent any disease transmission. If the gorillas caught a human cold or flu it could wipe out the whole extended family! We also saw a baby rolling around in the leaves and showing off to us which was very cute. We followed them for an hour through the forest and after the hour headed back to the gate. The taxi that we arranged to take us back to Kisoro arrived on time and we tried to get a bus to Kabale. It was about 3 pm after we bought masks from a couple of guys from Congo. We got to a minibus with 4 people in and sat down. After a couple of hours the driver decided that he wasn't going to go since his minibus wasn't going to fill up. I asked around but taxis were expensive so we were getting used to the idea of staying another night in Kisoro when a truck arrived and agreed to take us. We paid a lot more than most of the locals, but this was worth it when they pointed us to the front seats and not to the flat bed at the back of the truck. It took longer than I remembered to get from Kisoro to Kabale - about 3 hours. We got there and found a nice place to stay and had dinner. We were planning to go North next to see Chimpanzees in Kibale National Forest but by this time we had had quite enough of Ugandan roads and decided to chill out for a day in Kabale and then take a bus direct to Kampala. We would then go to the source of the Nile - Jinja and spend a few days there before going to the airport to get out flight to London.
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