They are moving ...

Saturday was our big day – bring on the gorilla trek! Nigel was a wealth of information as to what to expect and what not to wear for our adventure. The lodge provides gaiters (canvas waterproof covers from shoetop to kneecap), waterproof coats, water, a 'tuck box' (muffins, juice, fruit) for snacks and possibly backpacks or gloves. You need to supply a fleece, hiking shoes and preferably sturdy pants for this adventure. We were treated to staff properly zipping and clipping the gaiters on our legs and seeing to it we had all of our items as we walked out around 6:30 am.

This is probably the best time of year to take on the hike. It's just before June, when the place is packed with trekkers. The drier season means an easier footing, but it also means the gorillas move higher on the mountains to have adequate food, so you have to hike that much higher to find them.

Ngaire's weather juju (with your help) held out with a sunny start to our hike. Our driver successfully secured the hike to the Sabyinyo family, and Fidel was assigned as our lead guide. Sabyinyo is home to the biggest of the silverback gorillas, Guhonda. How cool is that? Even better, it is generally the shortest hike from the trail head. We asked how much elevation was involved on the short hike and got the answer in meters. By my calculation, the hike would likely involve 1,000 feet of elevation. We grabbed the walking sticks, returned to the cars and headed off to the trail head.

We had learned from reading a recent blog that the first road is extremely bumpy and takes about 45 minutes by car before you even reach the trail head. That was absolutely true. Champ wanted to know why we had to drive that stretch when we could have walked at least as quickly as the drive. Answer: All the local children were out in force along the roadside, smiling and jockeying for change, candy or (for the most entrepreneurial one) ANYTHING from us. Their parents and older siblings were busy clearing ground and tending to their crops. It was like running a gauntlet.

At the trail head, we joined our porters. The porters are contract workers, largely comprised of young men who made some or all of their living hunting (Rwandan term) or poaching (Western term) animals in the park. They carry backpacks and, most importantly, assist you by taking your hand, butt, arms and all the various permutations to get you through the trek's toughest patches. You are encouraged to hire a porter to cut down on the relative financial benefit of hunting for profit versus hiking support for profit. Gary got Emmanuel and I got John. Both earned their pay in getting us through this hike.

We entered the park through an opening in the rock wall (about 5 feet high) and stared at the sharp change in scenery. Open clearing changed to dense bamboo forest. Fidel, our guide, said it is the 'bamboo shoot season'. Translation: greenery grows at lightning speed horizontally, vertically, girth and at all elevations. Stinging nettle plants, thistles and strangulation vines were in abundance. Leaves averaged the size of rhubarb leaves. Thorny bush was all along the way, snagging our arms, legs and even hats. One had to step over fallen shoots and duck under branches that blocked the way – sometimes simultaneously. The 'well worn path' must regenerate itself every night, as the greenery choked off any easy access. In order to support all that growth, a lot of water is required. The path itself would have made any rhino proud .. the mud wallowing possibilities extended into infinity.

YIKES AND DOUBLE YIKES!! Another round of inquiry ensued .. exactly HOW FAR were those gorillas and HOW HIGH were they in the hill. We understood that the trackers (who double as gorilla location spotters and poacher deterrents overnight) thought we'd need ½ an hour to reach the family. We were decked out in clothing that covered our every inch of skin, minus faces, necks and throats. If it's 30 minutes, we can do this. A deep breath, and off we went. Fidel stopped regularly so we could catch our breath. The ascent of the volcano started almost immediately, in many places with only a single foot width along the path.

The radio crackled and Linda, our eagle eyed travel agent translator, quickly deduced those gorillas were on the move. She further deduced they were not only avoiding our arrival, but also moving further up the mountain to make our arrival that much more delayed. Up we went and rested; up we went some more. The temperature was cooling yet we were soaked with sweat from the effort to keep up the climb. It was time to hunker down, suck it up and keep going. At one point, we had to slide sideways through bamboo trees. Our porters (mean, lean hiking machines) could easily get through but we of somewhat stouter build got stuck. We learned to steady our selves as we grabbed one tree after the other to continue the ascent. Michele turned and said, “We've all certainly become treehuggers on this hike”. I worked out an acronym to capture our experience: The Rwanda Experience: Extreme Hiking, Underbrush, Gunk, Gorillas, Endearing Rwandan Smiles.” Our guides, trackers and porters were encouraging, gentle, respectful and persistent. They were going to get us into that gorilla family area if it was the last thing they did.

After two hours of heavy duty slogging, we arrived at the family location. I figure we've hiked about 1500 feet in elevation during that time. We received our final instructions:

Stay together; stay calm; no flash photography; minimize talking; stay 7 meters (23 feet or thereabouts) from the gorillas; take a step back if a gorilla got near you; follow your guide and tracker instructions to move or stay; turn to the side if a gorilla was running towards you; we have one hour with the family; no water beyond the backpack drop off point.

Fidel forget the most important instruction: all of this is subject to the gorillas agreeing to abide by the same principles.

We grabbed all of our cameras to hand to the porters and guess what? The porters stop with the backpacks. Gulp – it still looks like a jungle up there.

Still naïve, I am thinking we will achieve National Geographic programming nirvana in a New York minute. You know .. the ones with the gorillas gathered in a clearing near trees and a lake in the distance, with the males chest beating for dominance, the mothers are nursing, the babies are playing and jumping on all the other family members and there's lots of preening and perfect light for pictures.

The reality – no such luck. These gorillas were in dense bamboo on a steep hillside, not interested in company, doing their best to make sure we got lots of butt shots and nothing else. The ledges for taking pictures were barely a foot wide, and there weren't too many handholds to stop us from falling. And let's not even talk about the light (or lack thereof) for pictures.

Boy, did the adventure get going at that point. Champ took a little too long on one camera shot, leading to the second ranking silverback jumping to his feet, grabbing a small tree and throwing it at Champ on the way to denser cover. The mother with the 5 month old baby was tenderly caressing, cleaning and feeding it. She grew a bit uneasy and left for a greater distance from us. Two trackers were whacking away with machetes to try to open the paths a little, explaining “they are still moving”. We caught a butt shot of Guhonda, who was tearing out of camera reach as we approached. The machete tracker was hacking and slashing his way to the gorillas while we went up, down, slipped, slid and finally arrived at Guhonda's feeding frenzy on a mid-sized bamboo tree. He likes to eat about 30 kilos (66 pounds) of food per day; he's weighing in these days around 600 pounds.

Fidel gently tells us our hour is up. Ngaire forcefully tells him we get a few more minutes given our arduous journey. He complies and we finish up our camera shots. We start to trek back but .. wait for it .. the gorillas can't figure out why we are leaving so soon. Linda and I are bringing up the rear with Machete Tracker (“MT”), and soon enough one of the teenagers decides to drop straight out of a tree and land within striking distance of Linda and MT. Teenager then crashes through, where it jumps out at Champ and Ngaire. Oh man .. and to think we paid for this privilege. Linda and I make haste while we've got an opening and head down further with MT. I look over to see one of the blackbacks (older male who hasn't started sporting the silver fox look) is coming around the corner. I calmly alert Linda and MT there's a huge gorilla on my tail heading straight for them. Meanwhile, back at the front of the pack, the female who felt really neglected by Guhonda sees the gorrilla of her dreams, Ken. She gloms on to him, right hand firmly placed on his right cheek and left hand on his thigh. Tracker #2 had to extract Ken from his newest lady love. OK then .. continue down while the gorilla family is crashing alongside of us. We finally heard them settle into a particularly juicy bamboo field, so we made our escape to the lower regions. Whew! Who needs Disney land when you can experience gorilla full frontal and on the move?

It was thrilling and exhilarating to be part of that gorilla family for even one hour's time. all of us were glad we made the trek and got so much help to actually get here. We learned about 40% of the people who start the trek turn back before they reach the families.

We make our way to the bottom where we hike through open fields for close to another hour to reach the cars. We were exhausted & headed back to the Silverback Lodge. We slowly tackled the walk up to the main lodge, where the staff plopped us into chairs, handed glasses of mango juice with a smile, took our shoes & gaiters off & replaced them with bright green sandals and hurried off to make our muddy, soaked shoes as clean as the day we bought them.

The gorilla trekking permits are $500 per person per day, partially deployed to support the gorilla populations. Lots of the population also makes a living as part of the trekking business. We hire a driver, who arranges the guide with the park service and the specific walk you'll take to visit a gorilla family. The guide has trackers out on radio spotting the family. All told, including porters, the daily tip guideline means tips runs around $125 per couple.

Cheers, Anne