Wed. OIct. 14. We are working our way home the slightly slow way. We waved good by to Mt. Kilimanjaro and Mt. Maru as we flew over. The plane took the scenic route north because there are some new closed airspace areas on our old route. Huh!!!? What has been going on in east Africa over the last two weeks?!?
We arrived at the Tembo House Hotel in a dark maze of twisty passages, all different. Once you figure out what Tembo means, the rest of this post might make more sense. Our room is three floors up, in an old building with tall ceilings and no elevator. We can use the exercise after riding for so many days.
The Bwindi Imp. F. has more than gorillas. We spent today on a hike to a waterfall through the jungle.
We met at the same location as the gorilla seekers, only later in the morning and met our ranger/guide Martin. He had been working with the gorilla trackers that found our group yesterday, and was assigned to us today to take us to the waterfall. The usual hazards apply; avoid the elephants, don’t slip, keep your pants tucked into your socks.
Off we went. As you can see from these pictures, “trail” can be a generous term for this route.
Yesterday had some thunder and small rain downpours, so we knew what to expect. The gear list said long pants, long sleaves, rain coats. When we arrived at the briefing for our adventure, 75% of our fellow travelers had gloves (to protect from stinging nettles) and gaiters on their pants/shoes to protect against fire ants in the shoes. There is no local REI to get last minute gear, so we improvise with pants tucked into socks.
There were about 80 people at the trail head, and we would be broken into small groups, and sent to different gorilla families. Some went to the “easy”, some to the “intermediate”, and some to the “difficult” destinations. Yesterday some groups came out after 8 hours. We were assigned to an intermediate adventure. Fine with us. We are there for the gorillas, not for the walking around in a rainy jungle. That is reserved for tomorrow.
Six days ago Frank arrived at our lodge with our missing bags from the airport in hand. Since then, he has been our guide, driver, and local expert. He has driven from Arusha to Kogatende (500km), toured us through Ngorongoro Crater, and spent three days chasing (and finding) hidden animals in the Serengeti. If all goes well, by the time you read this, he has driven another 450km back to Arusha for a well earned break at home with his family.
Of course we took some pictures this morning of Frank and the truck:
