hiking in the nyungwe national park (rwanda, near borders of congo and burundi)

Here is a highlight reel from one hike we took in Nyungwe Forest National Park in Rwanda. This park was tough to get to - we drove for six hours across the entire country, on winding hilly roads - and a bit hard to access once we got there: you can only hike in the park with a ranger, and the rangers only go on specific trails at specific times of day (when we asked to go on the 9am hike at 9:05, they told us we were too late). 

BUT when we finally got out in to the forest, it was beautiful. 

A young mahogany tree.

Forest ants eat all the dead leaves off the forest floor and recycle nutrients back into the ground. There were thousands of them in this line, going back and forth. And they bite! 

More ants.

We spotted a bush viper! Our guide was really excited - these are rare. It was a small snake, barely a foot long, but apparently quite poisonous.

chimpanzee tracking, nyungwe national forest (rwanda, near borders of congo and burundi)

We began our time in Nyungwe National Forest, Rwanda by tracking chimpanzees--a much easier venture than finding gorillas!  We spotted about three chimpanzees in total and the highlight was watching this big adult male eat his breakfast of figs, spit out his breakfast into one  big handful of fig-rinds, then re-eat the fig paste (it looked like eating poo, ha ha).

I remember making eye contact with the chimpanzee and having that weird moment when your mind interprets what you see as a human face--I remember making eye contact--then feeling a strange sensation as I came to the realization that this animal had just connected with me in some way.

One of my lasting thoughts after seeing the chimps was, could this really be our closest living ancestor?  I mean, we need to go way back (about 8 million years) before we get to a time when we share a common ancestor.  That is a long time and it is weird to think of all the species of bipedal hominids that must have been brought into this world, then died off again, during that period.  It is fascinating for me to think of the Planet of the Apes-like scenarios that could have played out as different species of bipedal hominids fought and killed each other.  Even chimpanzees kill and eat each other--something you can imagine our ancestors have been doing in the practice of war for a loooooong time.  Brutal, but certainly interesting.

It's tough to imagine, but sometimes watching one chimpanzee for 45 minutes can get boring.  This bee was a good target for camera focusing practice!

The older male chimpanzee sat and ate these figs for the entire time we were watching.  The guide said that he would only swallow the juice and kept the rinds in his mouth.  Eventually, he spit the rinds back out...see below.

gorilla tracking (kisoro, uganda)

I wrote this post once and my edits did not save so I am going to do the second revision slightly differently than the original version.  Each picture in this post is astounding because gorillas themselves are incredibly difficult to reach, extremely protected, and awesomely human in a way that only a chimpanzee could be.

The pictures don't need an explanation to be powerful--the experience was surreal and beyond any other wildlife viewing experience I could imagine.  There are very few wild animals that are so powerful and yet so willing to let you be a part of their space without any physical boundaries.  It was like a trip through Jurassic Park without the safari vehicle--except we knew the dinosaurs didn't want to eat us. 

Gorillas are primates and share many aspects with human beings, yet they are so clearly different from humans in function.  I found myself reflecting on the change that humans incur upon their environment for their own gain and most other organisms' loss.  It was a sad prospect to think of how much more damage we have done to the world of animals than these peaceful beasts, our close relatives.  In the end we felt thankful for the opportunity to meet these beautiful creatures.  There have been many people in the past that made gorilla conservation possible--and coming into the forest made the impact of this work very obvious--the Impenetrable Forest of Biwindi ended at the property line and terraced farms began--farms that would have swallowed the homes of gorillas if not for an enormous effort from conservationists.

This was my favorite video of the gorillas because it shows how close and interactive the experience was.

lakes and more volcanoes (lake bunyonyi and kisoro, uganda)

Here is the excerpt from the epic summer of volcanoes post:

Uganda

We landed in Kigali, Rwanda around midnight on July 7 and got off the plane to the smell of cooking fires in the dusky night. We were picked up by Adam’s old friend and our new tour guide, Emmanuel and his driver, Emmanuel. Both men went by Emma, which got a little confusing. We visited the genocide museum in Kigali the next morning before driving to Uganda, about three hours on winding roads past miles and miles of subsistence farms terraced up enormous hillsides.

In Uganda, we spent two days at Lake Bunyonyi, a beautiful quiet spot with terraced subsistence farms on every hillside and little kids being canoed to school each morning singing songs. We took the dugout canoes out for a spin one day, and Jim and I reminisced about our wonderful Boundary Waters trips. Canoeing isn’t that different wherever you go! (Jennifer wasn’t steering the boat!!  A tree trunk is different from a hulled-canoe in more ways than one.)

From the lake, we went on to Kisoro, a small town near the Rwandan border with three great volcanoes on its horizon, and a famous hotel in its center – the Traveller’s Rest, where Diane Fossey and other gorilla-studying pioneers came to stay during their explorations. We went gorilla tracking from Kisoro – mountain gorillas live in a few national parks in Uganda, Rwanda and the Congo, and some groups have been habituated by trackers, so you can pay for a license for a day and literally walk up amongst a group of gorillas and hang out with them (with a park ranger, a group of trackers, and 7 other tourists assigned to your group). It was a magical day that started with a long hike across fields and into a rainforest, up hills and through underbrush, until we suddenly popped out of a bush and a gorilla was sitting about ten feet away, looking around at the trackers who had led us there. We were flabbergasted. The brush made it tough to keep track of where all the gorillas were, but we stayed in their midst and watched one pop out, then another, and watched them climb trees and beat their chests and eat leaves and stand and look at us for an hour. We got lucky – we were assigned to find one family group, and they happened to be across a narrow ravine from another group. So not only we were close to about 10 gorillas, but we could turn around and watch another large group eat and climb and play as well. When we left the gorillas, we all agreed it had been a surreal experience.   You can watch some videos of the gorillas by following links to Jim’s youtube channel here: 

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCINFOjy1tO2X7zfKMjNnazA

One aspect of gorilla watching that surprised us was the relative tranquility of the gorilla groups.  Despite two neighboring groups meeting, in relative competition with one another, there was absolutely no violence.  It struck me because of the anger I felt rising towards one of our human group members in particular, pushing to be in the front and not letting others have a turn, that humans are so much more violent then these creatures.  It was a reminder that humans are the most dangerous things in our lives, not gorillas, spiders, lions, or whatever other wildlife you could imagine.  This realization instigated a feeling of reverence for the gorillas that I had not felt before—huge vegetarians that live in relative peace despite some occasional male-male aggression that is almost never fatal.

The day after our gorilla trek, we climbed one of those big volcanoes, Mhuravura, at 4,127 meters high.  The trek begins at 2400 m, which equates to a climb of just under one vertical mile. Jim and I pushed through some tough steep climbing and a little altitude funkiness to reach the summit in about 5 hours, and spent three hours returning. Jim was struggling a little more than Jennifer with the altitude and steepness of the trail and at one point our guide Emmanuel felt compelled to ask, “Why is Jennifer stronger, Jim?  Does she work out more than you?” We enjoyed stepping across the border to Rwanda at the summit.  Although the top was cloudy when we reached it, we enjoyed seeing the variety of plant life at various altitudes, and got some beautiful views of the neighboring volcanoes on the descent. We also were followed by a large group of cute kids on our way back to the car, who shouted “Mzungu! Mzungu! Hi how are you! Give me money!” at us (most kids in Uganda did this – apparently there is a long tradition of white people – mzungu – throwing money out of car windows for children).

These are fields of tea--this was the most organized form of agriculture in the part of Uganda that we visited.  It was also the place where people seemed the poorest.  People were paid an infinitesimal amount to pick many kilos of tea--to the point that back-breaking work would accomplish something like $2 to $5 USD per day.  It seemed pretty bad for the people in the area that would otherwise use the land for small farms. 

The hills in Uganda and Rwanda were covered in farms--almost entirely subsistence agriculture.  Some goods would make it to market in the local towns, but none seemed designated for export (besides the tea from the tea plantations).

A new way of canoeing!  Check out Jennifer's low seat.  It was interesting to sit near the surface of the water.  Less leverage, but a very relaxed ride.  Think of driving in a low rider.

This is Adam and Lindsey paddling away.  When asked who was messing up the direction of the boat fingers pointed at the other person, ha ha ha.  Jennifer and I sounded about the same in the afternoon when the wind picked up.

BWCA???  Nope, Lake Bunyonyi in Uganda.  Crazy how similar it felt to be on the water in Uganda.  Minus the boats full of children singing on their way to school.

Another close encounter with the Davis's.  We stopped for an amazing lunch of fresh fruit, avocados, and fry bread under nearby under the trees.

A cool shot of the Davis's in their canoe.

The Petoskey ride.

Sunset on Lake Bunyonyi.

epic trip of volcanoes (athens, santorini & crete, greece)

Here is the excerpt from the epic summer post:

The volcanoes bit has to do with us always traveling around volcanoes during this trip--we realized that volcanoes were the major commonality through Greece, Uganda, Rwanda, and Tanzania.

Greece

We left Ann Arbor on June 26th to join Lindsey and Adam and Adam’s parents Diane and Grier for a beautiful 10 days in Greece. Jim and I landed in hot Athens, lugged our backpacks onto the metro, and walked through the streets in our hiking boots, positively sweating, to find our hostel room’s AC didn’t work! But we had great souvlaki (kebab) for dinner along with Alfa beers, and walked the pedestrian streets around the Acropolis (the center of ancient Athens) in a beautiful Friday night twilight filled with street musicians, kids playing soccer, couples walking arm-in-arm, and the lights on the Acropolis shining dramatically above us.

The next day, we took a ferry to Santorini and started in on some aggressive sun-bathing and beach-going. Santorini is a volcanic island that erupted around 1700 BC, eliminating most of its population as well as much of the population of Crete, an hour by ferry to the south, where an enormous tsunami engulfed most of the coastal towns—almost every town is coastal on Crete. Today, the volcano’s caldera is filled with Mediterranean sea, and the dramatic cliffs left from the eruption make for a stunning viewpoint. The Davis’ had a beautiful hotel and pool which we got to share for three days with views out over the caldera. We also explored local beaches, including one with a nude beach down the way, where we played volleyball with some professional soccer players from Italy. Lindsey and Jennifer especially enjoyed their volleyball attire and rippling abdominal muscles. Their girlfriends were pretty nice looking too. We also got to enjoy the tradition of drinking raki before and after every meal at a beautiful little mountainside restaurant called something like Myxonos, where we had the most amazing lamb in yoghurt sauce served with bulgar wheat.

They mix the raki with honey and cinnamon and heat it up for an after-dinner treat – absolutely delicious. Even Diane and Greer, who don’t drink, enjoyed it. From Santorini, we went on to Crete where we saw the ruins of an ancient Minoan palace (~2300-1400 BC) and then went on to a beautiful little town called Chania, which had been occupied by Venetians who left their mark with an old walled city that looked like Italy. The whole group especially enjoyed a day trip to the southern side of Crete – a stunning 2-hour drive through a mountain pass, then we arrived in a tiny quiet town with about 8 restaurants and not much else, situated on a secluded beach with cliffs all around. We hiked to some Roman ruins called Lissos, where we found almost no people and the clearest water ever. Jim was in heaven with his swim goggles after walking through ancient tombs and a church that dated to Byzantium—a period he studied in his only art history class. We found a water taxi there—Jim had to run to the water 1⁄2 an hour ahead of the crew to ask for a ride—to take us back to the town.

From Chania, Adam, Lindsey, Jim and I flew back to Athens to mentally prepare ourselves for our return to Africa We visited the Acropolis and the museum, and spent a night frolicking in the city before heading to the airport. After many drinks at dinner the waiter felt compelled to give us directions to our hotel, which only required one right turn.

This is the Davis Suite that Jennifer and I were indulged with.  Behind this camera angle you would see the view below.

These are the cliffs of Santorini--facing the left-center of the cauldera.

This was the nudey beach that we discovered.  Swimming naked in the day is a lot of fun--or at least that is what we heard.  The crazy rock formations are caused by the uplift of the island, and erosion over time--the rock is a very soft pumice that was deposited after the latest eruption.  Think Mt. St. Helens, but an even bigger explosion/eruption.

These are some tasty rock lobsters!  And way too expensive to purchase. 

This is the port of Hia with the town above on the hill.  If you look closely you can see the lit pathway that donkeys and people travel every day to and from the port.

A sunset with Grecian wine and fresh olives.

Here is the whole sunset crew--minus Adam who is taking the picture.

This pretty much sums up what life on Santorini was like for us.

This is the first picture in the town of Hania on the island of Crete.  This hill has been occupied for over 6,000 years continuously by many famous civilizations including the Minoans, Romans, Byzantines, Venetians, Ottomans, Germans, and most recently Greece.  This particular building was destroyed by German bombs during WWII and has been left in this condition because the owners are still saving money to cover the cost of repairs.  There were a few buildings like this in central Hania, but tourist dollars have helped to instigate many renewal projects so vacant buildings are less common.