Chasing chimps

Thursday 6 October, morning

We had to be ready at 4.45 am to depart for our chimpanzee trek. It was an hour's drive and even at that hour, still pitch dark, there were heaps of people walking along the roads on their way to work in the fields or on the roads.

The trail to where the cmimpanzees were believed to be started easy but quickly plunged steeply down the side of the mountain. We trekked for about an hour before we heard them - straight out of the sound track of a Tarzan movie! We heard them some time before we saw them - well, actually before the guide saw them. To see them we had to leave the trail and climb up the hill through the undergrowth. Unfortunately they moved fairly quickly, so we had to as well. However we eventually saw a small group up in the trees, and a couple of them climbed down fairly close before heading off again. So it was a fairly fleeting glimpse. Equally entertaing, if not more so, was a small family of mona monkeys playing in a tree not far away. These hung around in the tree for quite a while so we got a good look at them.

Heading back up the steep climb took a while. We were behind an Irish couple on their honeymoon, who had been way out in front on the way down. On the way back they stopped to take a photo of every blade of grass, every ant and every mushroom. We weren't complaining - it gave us plenty of opportunity to catch our breath and get some feeling back into our legs.