January 17, 2011
Kibali Forest was seemed like just my kind of place: Cheapish, easy to get to, and filled with wildlife., especially bush babies: the closest relatives to lemurs on the African mainland. The reality didn't quite match.
At least at the time of my arrival in late afternoon, transport was a bit awkward. The advertised minibuses were nowhere in sight. I crossed the greater than expected distance from Fort Portal in a tightly packed shared taxi. The nice, but not guaranteed to be open hotel was, indeed, still closed. I barely made it to the backup option before dark. Distances were significantly greater than I expected.
The hotel wasn't as nice as I expected either. Actually, it was about as not nice as a hotel can be without being deliberately bad. As should be obvious if you have been reading along so far, I don't care much for luxury. However, running water and electricity are perks that I am reluctant to do without. Safari Lodge went one step further: Not only is there no running water but the only water available at any one time is what fits into a large jerry can. The manager could get more from somewhere but I really dislike having to beg water from the staff every time I wanted to bathe or wash my clothes. Curiously, the guide book chose not to mention any of these issues.
And it really wasn't even close. The next morning I had a nearly thirty minute walk to the Bigodi Wetlands. It is an interesting area with lots of bird life including the Great Blue Turaco. I also saw several primate species. There were Red Colobus Monkeys, which I have seen before as well as Black and White Colobus Monkeys which I saw at Lake Navasha back in 2002 but neglected to photograph. I managed marginal photos of Red Tail Monkeys and Grey Cheeked Mangabe's. The L'Hoest monkeys were too skittish. I manged only glimpses through the bush. With patience, I might have achieved decent photos of them too but the guide was following an irritating “classic bird watcher” program. Every little song bird was identified but he wouldn't stop long enough to get clear views, much less good photographs. I need to learn to be more assertive and object decisively to bad guiding as it happens.
After the irritation of getting up before dawn without running water or electricity, I would have preferred to move to someplace more convenient. Unfortunately, there was no such place, at least not that was affordable. The budget accommodation inside the park had, unfortunately, been taken over by a private company and turned into a playground for the rich. The only people who could easily walk to the trail head were those who almost certainly arrived in private transport anyway. There were a few other options but I was facing a forty minute walk to the main park from Safari Lodge and these places were much further than that.
While booking the night walk, I discovered that the operators of the expensive lodge inside the park also ran a camp ground. This was presumably inherited from the days when the park service was in control. The new overlords seems to be neglecting the facility and there was no one currently camped there. It had running water (if it worked), even hot water, if someone could be bothered to start the fire. There was no electricity nor did it seem that there ever was. Still, I decided that if I were to stay another day, I would relocate here.
I get the impression that chimp tracking is pretty much all they do at Kibale despite other options being on the menu. I was the only tourist for the night walk. The guide was equipped with a spot light, which none of my guides in Madagascar had been. Unfortunately, he didn't seem to very practiced. I spotted all the bush babies, which there seemed to be no shortage of. He thought I was lucky. Most tourists see only one. Some see none. I thought he was incompetent. At my best, I never managed first sighting more than 25% of the time on night walks in Madagascar. I lost valuable time explaining to the guide where the animal was so he could point his light at it.
That probably contributed to the crummy photos. My best are one clearly focused by badly composed and another well composed but very blurry.
I went on a nature walk the next morning. Once again, I was the only tourist. It was essentially a degraded version of the wetlands hike. The guiding was better but the seeing conditions were much worse.
If the nature walk had been good, I would have stayed another day. I wanted another crack at the bush babies but I couldn't quite justify the expense in time and money for just another night walk. I was also out of breakfast provisions. Instead of moving to the camp ground, I opted to move on to Kasese, jumping off point for Mweya sector of Queen Elizabeth National Park. I didn't know if they would have bush babies but, according to the guide book, they ran economical night drives. This was also my chance for a “Safari Lodge” style experience.
Top end safari lodges are extraordinary places. They are positioned in areas where wildlife is abundant and constructed to imped the animals' movements as little as possible. With all manner of creatures routinely passing through camp, you are “on safari” from the moment you arrive until the moment you leave. Unfortunately, these kinds of places are out of reach to anyone who has to work for a living. A week in one of these lodges can easily cost more than my entire six month tour of India.
Mweya looked like an exception to this rule. Uganda's wildlife is still recovering from the atrocities committed during the Idi Amin era. It's parks, except for those related to gorilla tracking, are still not well known. So you find little gems like Mweya: a small peninsula with abundant wildlife and a high end lodge but also a moderately priced (not quite “cheap”) hotel and an inexpensive camp site. Even if I did no game drives at all, it seemed like a good place to visit.