A bright explosion of lightning flashed into my retinas, temporarily stunning me. This was concerning, as I was inside, in bed, with my eyes closed. I sat up, my heart hammering against my ribcage, before deciding that sleep was not particularly plausible at the present time.
I had not been in bed long. The few hours previous had been spent happily watching the sunset from my veranda overlooking the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest in the south of Uganda. High above a valley, I had merely sat and absorbed the colours and the sounds of a paradoxical forest. Whereas the honks of hornbill became less frequent and the hum of sunbirds had quietened, the insects and amphibians of the area had awoken from their slumber. One chorus had merged into another, a handover beautifully choreographed and practised over the centuries. The forest below me had come alive in a new way. But, as the clouds began to gather, I could sense the atmosphere changing.
What had started as a gentle mist over the canopy, soon became small clouds, and the small clouds began to hook up, date one another, become engaged before finally uniting in holy matrimony, as one huge swathe of vapour. Looking down below me, it was as if somebody was beginning to rub the rainforest out, completely erase it from existence. Before I knew it, I was staring into a void of white. It was a bizarre feeling to say the least watching the world disappear into a thick, dense nothingness. And then a rumble. Deep. Long. The growl of a beast, rudely awoken from it’s slumber. The growl of an old man with an old man’s cough. The growl of a lactose intolerant stomach after an ill-advised lick of ice-cream. A storm was brewing. Like most people, I have experienced, and enjoyed, a number of storms before but I realised, as I looked down into the valley, that was beginning to flash beneath me, that this was going to be a new experience. I was witnessing this particular tempest from above.
I was staying at a delightful little lodge, right on the edge of the rainforest, high up on a cliff. It was a beautiful spot, and I was surprised to discover that I was the only guest. Dinner was a very simple meal shared with my two guides, on the veranda while listening to the rain hammer down upon the wooden roof. As the sun had set, the clouds had slowly inched their way up the cliff side, sapping away all remaining light. It is easy to forget when you are in the UK, even fairly rural Surrey, that an uncorrupted nighttime is incredibly dark. Away from the light pollution of suburbia, the darkness is almost tangible. Far from being eerie, I find it strangely comforting. Severed from Wifi, worries and the rest of the world in general, one can find enrichment from those one is keeping company with. So let me introduce you to my company for the week in Uganda:
Martin was my main guide. I am not exaggerating when I say that when I was with Martin, I felt as if I was with Ugandan royalty. Even in the short amount of time that I had spent with him, I had been so impressed with the aura that he seemed to possess. A bullish confidence oozed from his bullish stature, he seemed completely unfazed by anything that we seemed to come across. When we managed to break down within an hour of leaving the capital Kampala, Martin had somehow arranged for it to be fixed in under sixty minutes, something that would have taken days in the UK. Moreover, as we continued our 9 hour journey right to the southern border with Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, locals would run over screaming his name and waving at the mere sight of his van.
Joey, my other guide, was a completely different personality. Tall and slim, Joey’s smile was an almost permanent feature. He was not actually supposed to be with me, but as a guide in training was paired with the vastly experienced Martin. This was evident at our first meeting.
Martin: Good morning! You must be Harry. My name is Martin. Is this your first trip to Uganda?
Me: Morning! Nice to meet you. Yes, this is my first visit to Uganda although I have been to East Africa before.
Martin: This is Joey. He will be joining us.
Joey: You must be Harry. Is this your first trip to Uganda?
Me: Ummmm… yes this is still only my first trip…
Nevertheless, I really appreciated having Joey on the trip. As a learner, it was almost like having a travel companion with me, equally as excited and intrigued by all that he saw. I also learned to really appreciate his friendliness towards all people, carrying that unusual ability to strike up a conversation with anybody.
I felt very safe here. Africa has had, and still has in many places, it’s fair share of troubles, but in this remote part of the mysterious continent, I felt very much at peace. As I made my way back towards my little lodge, the rain soaking through to my skin within seconds, I thought how smoothly everything had gone so far. That was when I noticed my mistake.
Bugs seem to be attracted to light in the same intense manner that Donald Trump is attracted to himself. Even in the UK, you would be foolish to leave a window open and a light on, and even if your windows are closed, it is quite common to find your evening distracted by moths attempting to bash their own brains in on the window pane. But African moths make British moths look lightweight, and these moths in turn look remarkably friendly compared to some of the other winged monstrosities that make their appearance when the sun has bid the world good night for the evening. This I discovered as I returned to my home for the evening to find that in my infinite wisdom I had left the door open and a light on. Not just any old light, but the light that happened to be just above my bed, under the mosquito net that I had only partially begun to unravel. Like a beacon to distant armies, this invitation of hospitality seemed to have been heeded by every six-legged, crevice-inhabiting, stomach-turning critter in creation.
“Bugger,” I said out loud.
I then snorted a little laugh and looked around to see if anyone had enjoyed my pun. Not for the first time in my life, I was the only one laughing, and that laughter did not last long.
Target number one was the mosquitos. I am usually against killing things, not because of some noble respect towards my fellow creature but because I find the feel and sight of squishing something most nauseating. However, when I considered being intimate with a cloud of malarial vampires I decided for only the second time this year that mass murder was the only solution.
Target number two was a mass of tiny black beetles that all seemed to have embarked upon a pilgrimage up the sides of my mosquito nets. These tiny, obsidian jewels were almost beautiful up close but had tiny barbs on their legs which made it almost impossible to extricate them from the mosquito net mesh without a minor skirmish.
Target number 3 was… well in all honesty I don’t really know. By far the most repulsive to look at, and at the time, intimidating due to the fact that I had never seen anything like it, was what I can only describe as a huge caterpillar with legs and wings. No, not a butterfly, you little cretin, I mean literally, a flying, six-legged maggot. Oh yeah, and they had pincers. After a very little panic, where I considered spending the night outside on the rain-lashed veranda (yes, the storm was still raging and was in fact, yet to reach full strength), I decided to steel myself and enter battle. Armed with what must have been an entire trees-worth of toilet roll, I managed to pin down the first intruder. Even through copious layers of paper, I felt it wriggle, and a repulsed convulsion shivered through my entire body. Having gathered them all up, and still unsure whether they were in fact poisonous, I did what any self-respecting, courageous and hardy explorers would do. I flushed them down the toilet.
I returned with a new sense of valour to my bedroom. This quickly disintegrated into consternation and horror as I realised that in my haste to remove the bugs, I had left the light on and the door open. Perhaps personally affronted at the loss of their comrades, a second army had moved in. This was going to be a long night.
Closing my room off to the tempest outside, and switching off all the lights, I set to work removing the more recent intruders. It was only after smashing my knee on the bed post that I realised that switching the light off was completely unnecessary having closed the door. Limping to the door to release the myriad of beetles that I had gathered, I suddenly realised why the lights needed to be off, as upon opening the door, I was practically inviting all previously extricated bugs back into my cosy, well-lit abode. This was a battle that I would have to carry out in the dark.
With victory won, the bed felt magnificent. Warm, fluffy sheets, a hot water bottle ready and waiting for me (yes, even Africa can be pretty cold when you are up a mountain in winter), I decided to wind-down for the evening to the sound of the rain, with a book. Safe from the lightning and from the Arthropod Army of earlier, I immersed myself in fiction.
Tok-tok tok.
What was that?
It was only a small noise. In fact, so small was this noise that I was surprised that I could hear it over the thunder and the torrential rain.
Tok-tok-tok.
I sat up, slightly disconcerted. I scanned the walls expecting to see a gecko, or something like that.
Tok-tok-tok.
Still completely in the dark (well not quite completely, as the light was on, sort of in the dark but not in the dark) I got out of bed. To my horror, the floor was pulsing with the wriggling, maggoty bodies of the large, winged monstrosities that I had flushed down the toilet earlier. Turns out that these apparitions hold grudges, and like some sort of Sardinian vendetta, this repulsive clan would not stop until the blood of their clan was avenged. It turned out that the small crack underneath the door was just enough room for them to wriggle through, and enticed by my reading light they managed to find this minute sliver of space with unerring accuracy.
I won the war. Yes, with the help of crumpled t-shirts stuffed under the door, and copious amounts of toilet paper, I can declare absolute victory. But at what cost? I was pretty sure there would be an extra couple of wrinkles on my forehead come the morning. And that was before the lightning paid a visit.
I wasn’t on the finest form the next morning. The day was grey and drizzly, giving me a London sort of vibe. I figured that if that was the vibe I should probably act like a Londoner, so I shuffled up to breakfast gloomily without looking up and without saying a word to anyone.
Martin looked at me and just smiled. He didn’t feel the need to ask me how my night was. I was glad: how do you tell a man that you have single-handedly made a Ugandan species of bug extinct in one night?
It was an early start, and our 4 x 4 did a great job or navigating the now extremely boggy mud tracks down the mountain. Low cloud still draped itself over the canopy of the Forest giving it a very damp feel. I have been to quite a few different rainforests now but this was different. All of them are wet, but very few have felt icy. There was no bird song and the only life we saw were goats or cows by the road.
We were some of the first to arrive at Bugambira, a small village right on the edge of the national park. As other trekkers arrived, I had time to just sit and take in the rainforest. One of the best ways to spot wildlife is to sit perfectly still and slowly scan the foliage, looking for unusual shapes or colours. Nothing.
Another helpful way to spot wildlife is to simply unfocus your eyes and take in the biggest area possible. When your eyes detect movement you can quickly focus in on whatever has caused it. Nothing. The forest was eerily quiet and eerily still. What on earth made the gorillas live in such a cold and almost soulless place?
Unfortunately, I know the answer. They have little other choice. Like much of the rainforest around the world, the forests of central Africa have been decimated for the natural resources within them, and in order to create farmland. The Gorilla’s (and in fact every other ape’s) territories have been reduced to tiny fragments resulting in a lack of food and space. With such little area to roam, the Gorillas had ventured onto farmland, persecuted by enraged farmers and hungry hunters. To top that off, there was a horrific civil war in Uganda and Rwanda, and there continues to be tribal conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo to this day. The Gorillas have had a really torrid time. But hope is not completely lost, though there were fewer then 250 left in the entire world in 1960, there are now more than 1000, largely thanks to intense conservation efforts and initiatives within local communities to raise awareness of the Gorilla’s plight and teach them how to live alongside these magnificent but gentle giants. Each family is closely monitored by scientists, and by armed rangers as, even though they are not a sellable commodity, poaching is still a risk to the Gorillas. This is no small task, and rangers run a great personal risk doing it, but with tourists being charged $700 dollars per permit to trek Gorillas in Uganda and $1500 for the same privilege across the border in Rwanda, there is a great incentive for these local communities to protect their hairy neighbours.
Each Gorilla family is visited by no more than 15 people per day. Led by our guide, and two rangers, armed with both AK-47s and machetes, I was accompanied by a French family and a quartet of elderly Americans. We set off in very high spirits, possibly too high as our guides kept having to shush us. My American friends were delightful, very friendly and unassuming, quite un-American if you ask me! Walking and talking seemed a little too much for them however, and every now and then, we needed to schedule in a stop to let them wheeze and splutter.
Even deeper into the forest there seemed to be very little life around. Other than the honking of a few hornbill overhead, there was nothing more than the quick flash of colour from a bird that had taken out an anonymity injunction and therefore could not be identified.
Without much warning, we suddenly stopped.
“This is our turning,” smiled our guide, pointing to the left of the path.
I followed her finger, expecting to see the markings of some sort of track for us to follow. Instead I was met with what I can only describe as a wall of foliage. My face must have spoken louder than I had imagined because my guide smirked at me.
“It is called Bwindi Impenetrable Forest for a reason.”
She had a point. But Bwindi scratchy-watchy Spikey-wikey forest that will give you ouchy-wouch-woo-wahs may have given a clearer vision of what to expect. At least I now understood the need for machetes.
We were all very tired. Despite the drizzle, in so many layers it was very hard not to feel uncomfortably warm. My armpits felt like Turkish baths and every time I lifted my arm to hold on to a branch, I felt the forest wince in displeasure. My wheezy American friends were really struggling, and in their discomfort were becoming somewhat apocalyptic.
“It’s ok, go on without us.” One would splutter.
“We’ll be just fine, you’ll see.” Another would pipe up.
This continued at every stop.
“You’re young, you shouldn’t have to wait for someone as old as me.”
“We don’t want to hold y’all up, we’ll just follow your tracks.”
At one point, one of them attempted to demonstrate his virility and independence by standing up straight to stretch his back. Weighed down by a backpack almost twice his size, and standing almost perpendicular to the mountain-side, he proceeded to flap his arms like a cartoon and keel over. Had a quick-thinking ranger not caught him upon his descent, I dread to think what would have happened to the poor man. My heart was certainly in my mouth. I had travelled a long way to trek with critically endangered apes, but waiting on the side of a mountain for an air ambulance to retrieve an elderly American man was certainly not what I had in mind.
“Okay, stop.”
We all heaved a sigh of relief. One of the rangers heaved an American just a few more steps.
“Who wants to speak Gorilla?”
My eyebrows shot up. Brits are not know for being bilingual and most American’s struggle with simple English, so attempting to learn the language of an entirely different species seemed like one difficulty too many.
“Okay, if Gorillas makes a low grumble, that is a good thing. That means he is relaxed.”
She made a few guttural grunts. It was a vaguely familiar noise, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. I almost jumped out of my skin when something made this noise behind me. I turned expecting to find a silverback staring into my soul, only to discover one of the elderly American Gentlemen hacking up an old man cough. Of either option, this was definitely the least preferable.
“If the Gorilla is disturbed, he will tell you to back off.”
She proceeded to make popping noises with her mouth, and drummed her chest dramatically, the motion often associated with adult male Gorillas.
“If the Gorilla is really mad, he will charge and scream. You don’t want to be in the way if he does that!” She laughed.
“Gorillas do not want to feel threatened. Do not stare at him. If he stares at you, lower your eyes. Submit to him. He is King here.”
It struck me how many similarities there were between Gorillas and football fans. The only main difference that I could find was that I am opposed to the extinction of Gorillas.
“Are we nearly there?” Asked the Father of the French family.
“Nearly there? We are here!”
She proceeded to point to our left between two dense bushes, where a huge ball of jet-black fluff was quietly plucking leaves in either hand before stuffing them into it’s mouth. It’s beautiful dark eyes were fixed on us, not afraid, just curious, bemused at the bedraggled troupe of apes that had entered it’s realm. Rain drops sat like beads upon it’s head, and every now and then it would pull a particularly big leaf over it’s head to protect it from the rain.
A low rumble, different from any that our guide had demonstrated gurgled to it’s right. Poking out the top of some foliage, one could just about make the back of a gigantic head.
“What did that noise mean?” I whispered to my guide.
“That means he is full of gas.” Came the surprising reply. “It was a big fart.”
The comparisons to football fans continues.
The troupe that we were visiting had 10 members. Led by a huge silver back, his harem consisted of 5 females and some of their juvenile offspring. One of the females carried a tiny baby, only weeks old. It staggered me that unless our guide had pointed them out, I would have missed this family of giants, and I was in awe of the trackers who had somehow found them on this unkempt mountainside in the pouring rain.
The next hour was spent simply sitting, and enjoying the company of these beautiful creatures. Even just a short time of observation revealed their different personalities. One of the females in particular could not stand the rain, whereas others seemed less bothered. One of the juveniles was quite timid and stayed by his mother’s side the whole time (or perhaps he had an overbearing, over protective mother), whereas some of them were bold and curiously, coming quite close to observe us. At one point, my shoe laces appeared particularly interesting to one of them before a grunt from mum saw him dashing back before I could snap a photograph.
I’m going to be honest, I don’t really like photography. I would much prefer to just enjoy the moment through my own retina rather than through a viewfinder. Nevertheless, without the accompaniment of Ethan, and the strange absence of any other cameras in the group, I felt I should try and take some. This proved trickier than I thought: the rain and the low light levels resulting in a whole album full of blurry pictures, with only a few usable ones. Having the camera had it’s perks though. Whenever the troupe moved on, I was ushered to the front of the group.
There are not many things that stun me, or leave me feeling slightly star-struck. The sight of an Orca fin breaking the surface of the water, the sound of “Love Divine, all loves excelling” at Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral, Serena Williams swaggering onto Court Philipe Chatrier before dismantling her opponent in under an hour. But I have to admit that the silver-back was simply magnificent. Imperious he sat observing us, chewing nonchalantly, occasionally stepping closer and making my heart race. At one point, as I sat leaning on my side using a tree trunk as a support, taking photographs of one of his wives, he came and sat on the other side of the tree trunk, just close enough to make sure I wasn’t going to elope with her. I mean, I’m not that desperately single to consider an affair with an amorous gorilla but I guess he wasn’t to know that. Only once did someone get a bit close, at which point, he stood tall on his feet, popped and beat his chest. It meant nothing more than ‘back off’, but we weren’t going to question him.
There is a perception that Gorillas are dangerous and aggressive creatures, with films such as King Kong and Tarzan giving us the image of a Gorilla with huge fangs attacking anything that went anywhere near it but this just isn’t true. During that hour, I felt very calm, very safe, a mutual tolerance between both the Gorillas and their visitors. Until the very end…
I don’t tell this story to be dramatic, but simply because it’s true. Nor do I want to change your perception of Gorillas being anything other than gentle because this was 100% caused by human error.
Towards the end of our time with the Gorillas, the troupe came across a path trampled down by a forest elephant, and started to follow it. This was very narrow, and unlike other areas that we had been, here we had to travel single file. Because of my camera, I was at the front of the group, with only a ranger ahead of me. Stopping with the troupe, one of my American friends, understandably knackered, called to the front “What’s going on?”
In an attempt to improve the viewing for those at the back, the ranger set to work with his machete, hacking away at the foliage. Unfortunately, a bamboo cane that he hacked at fell towards the troupe, narrowly missing one of the youngsters. Mr. Silver Back did not like that at all. Pushing past his family he came and postured in front of us.
“Look down!” Our guide called forward to us, and we obeyed quickly. I was expecting him to posture and chest-beat for a second time, but there was merely a stare. And then, out of nowhere, he charged. Screaming, razor-sharp fangs bared, 200kg of muscle came pounding towards the person at the front of the group: me!
Time seemed to freeze. Rooted to the spot, I honestly thought I was going to die. Some people think about death a lot, I prefer to avoid it. But there are certainly better ways to die than others. A quick, painless death caused by old age is certainly preferable to the slow, painful process of decay that some experience. Drowning is surely one of the worst ways to die, whereas death would have been a blissful escape from some of Professor Jeremy Black’s egotistical lectures that I had to endure at the University of Exeter. But never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that my epitaph might read something like:
Here lies Harry Good
1994-2022
RIP (ped to pieces by a territorial Gorilla)
I mean, as epitaph’s go, that would be a pretty cool one!
Thankfully, making up for his error, the ranger who had upset the silverback, showing an impressive courage and quick-thinking, stepped across the path, yelling and making himself as big as possible, even slapping the Gorilla on the knuckles as it reached out for me. Seemingly surprised at the challenge, the Silverback turned and ran back to join the troupe, before grabbing one of his children and nipping it.
I stood shell-shocked where I was, my heart convulsing within me.
“Woah, that was so cool,” came a husky American wheeze from behind me.
I’m not sure that was the word I would have used, but then again I’m not sure that I can write the word I would have used because I’m writing before the watershed.
I left Bwindi slightly shell-shocked. Spending the day with Gorillas had been an absolute privilege but I felt somewhat upset that our being there had disturbed them, even if it was for just a split second. I had come to Uganda to spend the day with Endangered apes, I hadn’t expected to be the ape in the most danger.
I must have looked slightly perturbed as we made our way back to camp.
“You’re very brave,” grinned the ranger.
“Brave?”, I retorted, I thought I was going to die!
“You held your ground very well though,” he smiled, clearly impressed.
Yeeeeeesssssss. That was it. I was definitely holding my ground and not just frozen in terror.
“Don’t worry,” he continued. “He is a gentle giant, he was never going to hurt you, just trying to scare you. But, if that was a chimpanzee, you’d be dead!”
How comforting. The realm of the chimpanzee was where I was heading next.
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