Hix Does Uganda (Part I) - All But A Shoebill

boof said:
what an amazing experience you've had hix. Your trip report or journal with pictures is excellent. 500 photos? I hope you remembered to put the camera down and just looked at them. Thanks again for sharing this with us.
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Beginning an obsessive photographer and having seen things only through a lens on occasion I chose to go with minimal camera equipment on this day partly to make myself do just that. I got a few decent pics with my 28-75 lens and tiny old ixus but made myself spend 98% of the time experiencing it. Same with the chimps, I had full camera gear but thought "stop taking photos and just LOOK"
 
Thats good. I know what you mean by being obsessive with a camera. If you spent to much time trying to frame a perfect image you miss out on the bigger picture.
 
OrangePerson said:
Beginning an obsessive photographer and having seen things only through a lens on occasion I chose to go with minimal camera equipment on this day partly to make myself do just that. I got a few decent pics with my 28-75 lens and tiny old ixus but made myself spend 98% of the time experiencing it. Same with the chimps, I had full camera gear but thought "stop taking photos and just LOOK"
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I don't do photography for that reason partially, (the other I am crap at it). I then scrounge copies of the photographers best photos :o.
Soaking up the atmosphere of an exhilarating event is special and I agree somewhat lost behind a lens.
What were your feelings and senses like (and Hix's too) when close to the Gorillas and Chimps? You said you could smell the silverback, what did he smell of?

Fantastic write up Hix about your adventure, equally as good as the previous at Tokelau. Really enjoyable reads at my desk in my lunch hours, thanks.

P.
 
I think it says you need a reasonable level of fitness but I read in Mark Carwardine's book about animal experiences either him or Stephen Fry saying it was extremely tough and I saw a programme where a British wildlife rescue chap went and he was just about to give up when they spotted the gorillas so I was prepared for more than a walk in the park.
 
great diary Hix. I visited the rwanda gorillas in1981 at the age of 43. It seemed tough,mainly because the ground is all broken vegetation. The exhaustion vanishes when you meet the first group. I went again in 1988 and visited the four habituated groups,with a rest day beteen each visit. On 2 of the trips I was the only tourist; the 1 hour visit had not been imposed and the guides were not used to return visits by people ; I got the impressin that once they had visited it was time to move on.
I stayed in Gisenyi in a lovely beachside hotel and drove up every time in a self drive suzuki. Thats 25 years ago and I have just turned 75. Still the best experience ever
 
mukisi said:
great diary Hix. I visited the rwanda gorillas in1981 at the age of 43. It seemed tough,mainly because the ground is all broken vegetation. The exhaustion vanishes when you meet the first group. I went again in 1988 and visited the four habituated groups,with a rest day beteen each visit. On 2 of the trips I was the only tourist; the 1 hour visit had not been imposed and the guides were not used to return visits by people ; I got the impressin that once they had visited it was time to move on.
I stayed in Gisenyi in a lovely beachside hotel and drove up every time in a self drive suzuki. Thats 25 years ago and I have just turned 75. Still the best experience ever
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What an experience, so different to now when it is so organised and regulated I'd guess. The young British chap we met had been the only tourist in his group, the rest were researchers and it was pretty relaxed.
 
Sorry to jump into your discussion. I have been reading your Ugandan blog with great interest, as your trek was a few weeks before I was doing my own gorilla trek in the volcanoes national park in Rwanda. I did the gorillas and Masai Mara trip, starting in Rwanda and going through Uganda finally finishing it off in the Mara. Someone asked if the Rwanda trek was more difficult. On a personal note I did not find the trek difficult as I am 25 and play sport 3/4 days a week so I consider myself quite fit but the altitude still effected me for the first few minutes at the start of the trek. One of the lady's in our group wasn't very fit and the porters pretty much dragged her up into the mountains and another guy who was 53 who was on my trip but was doing a different trek as there was 15 of us, passed out for 20 minutes because of the altitude and was literally dragged up in a stretcher to see the gorillas and then dragged back down again. I must say the porters were amazing giving everyone a hand up the steep parts of the mountain. The trip notes said it was moderate but half the group found it alot more challenging than moderate. I read somewhere before I left that Rwanda was better for seeing the gorillas I don't know how true this is, with the gorillas that we trekked I don't know if we just got lucky but we were right in the middle where they were literally running past me brushing my legs, the silverback did a fake charge when we first saw him also which was amazing. Our group was called the wabukuro group which had 2 silverbacks who were brothers I don't know how common this is in the wild and 2 babys. It was the greatest experience of my life. I have some photos if anyone is interested to see? you were so lucky to see a leopard it was probably the animal I most wanted to see on the game drives but I did see a serval in the Mara in the daytime which kind of makes up for it. Your blog has been a very fascinating read and sounds amazing I would love to do more of Uganda in the future as we only went to lake mburo national park. Sorry about the long reply.
 
Chilly - Welcome to the group!

As for your photos, feel free to post them in the appropriate country's gallery; I for one would like to see them! We were really lucky with the leopard, I never expected to see one, just passing the right place an hour and a half before the right time.

And Lake Mburo is the next place we visited so I'll be writing about that in a couple of days when I have some free time.

:p

Hix
 
I had to add them to the Uganda-wildlife gallery as there wasn't a gallery for Rwanda. So I don't know if anybody can create one. The photos are from my phone camera as I still need to finish sorting the photos out from my proper camera so I might add some photos from the rest of the trip at some point. One of the best places to see leopard was ment to be at lake nakuru national park, but this year they have had tremendous rain so it has had the worst floods in 65 years so we could only do half the park. Are guide was saying that they might have to shut it to the public if it continues as they have to build new routes each week. It is also ment to be the lake with other a million flamingos but because the lake had risen so much there number were heavily depleted. Which was disappointing.
 
I've requested they create a gallery for Rwanda, it should be up in a couple of days so hold off uploading anymore until then. Unless the pics are from Uganda or Kenya, of course.

:p

Hix
 
Pootle said:
You said you could smell the silverback, what did he smell of?
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The 'travellers' haven't answered so I will- adult male Gorillas give off a powerful smell- very similar to human sweat or burning rubber. Even more noticeable if he's excited or frightened- it really hangs in the air then.
 
Pertinax said:
The 'travellers' haven't answered so I will- adult male Gorillas give off a powerful smell- very similar to human sweat or burning rubber. Even more noticeable if he's excited or frightened- it really hangs in the air then.
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The Western Lowland Gorillas found in the impenetrable forest are thought to communicate through scent / body odour. From what l understand the forest is so dense the gorilla could be 5 feet away from you and u would not see him, however you could definitely smell them.

I am constantly amazed when l remind myself just how little we actually know about wild populations of Lowland Gorillas.
 
zooman said:
From what l understand the forest is so dense the gorilla could be 5 feet away from you and u would not see him, however you could definitely smell them.
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The recent Port Lympne blog recorded that the day after the release of Djala's group onto the river island in Gabon, they saw several individuals but not Djala, but they knew he was close as they could smell him.
 
Pertinax said:
The 'travellers' haven't answered so I will- adult male Gorillas give off a powerful smell- very similar to human sweat or burning rubber. Even more noticeable if he's excited or frightened- it really hangs in the air then.
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I was going to say like strong human BO but less unpleasant with a bit of sweetness!
 
I didn't answer because I didn't notice it, I was waiting for Orangepreson to reply as she got a bit closer than me.

If it was like strong human BO then I definitely wouldn't have noticed, as we were all sweating heavily by the time we found them!

:p

Hix
 
Hal and Roger Hunt used to comment that they smelled like burning rubber, but I didn't find that.

:p

Hix
 
Hix said:
Hal and Roger Hunt used to comment that they smelled like burning rubber, but I didn't find that.

:p

Hix
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No, I've heard the 'burning rubber' description too but it doesn't really remind me of that, much more like Human sweat IMO. I think they produce it from glands in their armpits too- in some captive males these get blocked and swollen.
 
So I suppose human BO had a function rather than being an unfortunate accident! And then clothes make it worse if not washed!
 
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