Mzungu in the Mist

First of all, very honored to be invited on as a guest blogger on roundtheworldwego. I speak for Ben and Leighanne when I say that tracking the endangered mountain gorillas through the jungle was by far one of the best experiences of our lives. There are 3 gorilla families to track in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest in the Southwestern corner of Uganda; Habinyanja (our group-26 members), Mubare (first group every habituated) and R group (known for being up and over the mountain). Bwindi holds around 300 mountain gorillas, half of the world's population. The other half is located down the road in the Mgahinga Volcano Range. Here is the tracking process: 2 trackers are sent out in the early morning to find the gorilla group. They first hike to where they left the gorillas the day before, and use their night nests, dung and eaten vegetation trails until they locate them. The vegetation is so dense it has to be cut away with machetes to create a path. The trackers stay in constant contact with the guide through radio, and then at mid morning the guide takes the group to the gorillas in the most direct route. To get to Habinyanja group, we took a 4WD about 50 minutes to the Northeastern side of the park, and then did some serious uphill hiking for 40 minutes until we reached them. When we were nearing the group I noticed these large black mounds in the distant trees and was assured by our guide that they were just monkeys. As we got closer, he changed his mind and told us we had found the gorillas, so I was actually the first to spot them! We had no idea gorillas could climb, let alone balance their 400 lbs on a small branch above our heads. When we arrived the lead silverback and 4 or so others were chilling in the trees. We spotted a mother and her 2 week old baby on the ground and quickly snapped pics. We were lucky as about half an hour into our visit the lead silverback slid gracefully down the tree with a branch in his mouth, wandered over and proceeded to mate with a female gorilla right in front of us. Our guide told us this was a very rare thing to see, so we felt lucky and horrified at the same time. It was unreal to be so close to these huge wild beasts, at the closest we were about 8 ft. away. They behaved like humans, each with their own distinct personality. They acknowledged our presense with some intimidating eye contact and then went about their own business. We then happened upon a mother and her small infant playing. The little one was showing off for our cameras, sheepishly eyeing us and rolling around on his mother's back. We all felt incredibly humbled to be in on such an intimate moment. Our hour was up before we knew it and we begrudgingly left but with some amazing photos and a memory we surely won't forget. Overall, had the time of my life in Uganda and now I am anticipating when I can return to Africa to see the rest.