Good Primate Karma!

En route from Myewa Lodge in the northern sector of Queen Elizabeth National Park to our current location, we stopped off for our second scheduled chimpanzee trek. A single group of chimps have been habituated in the K Gorge, a spectacularly beautiful mini-Grand Canyon. For perspective, our family has enjoyed many hours in the Rio Grande Gorge near Taos, New Mexico. This Ugandan gorge is less wide and considerably less deep, but as you descend you encounter lush tropical forest.

The Park Rangers will only allow groups of 8 to visit the chimps. Since


there are 13 of us, we had to go in two shifts. Alex and I volunteered to go in the second group. As we waited approximately two hours at the Ranger station, Alex and I played SkeeBall on my iPhone: I can't remember who won.

The first group returned enthusiastic but not ebullient. They saw half a dozen chimps but all were quietly resting high in the trees. They said the walk in the base of the gorge was spectacular, however.

Our group readied to go. We got a short briefing from our guide, Bernard, a very charming and knowledgeable, AK-47-toting, Ugandan. As we were about halfway down the easy descent, the chimps started SCREAMING. We reached the small river at the bottom of the gorge in about ten minutes, turned right and there were Hatari and Brutus sitting in branches about 15 feet above the ground! Hatari is the alpha male of this group and Brutus is number 3. They were both lounging in the tree and seemed to intentionally keep their backs to us. We waited them out, however. We moved around the base of the tree as best we could given the density of the ground foliage. Finally they both turned toward us and, eventually, the sun broke through the dense forest canopy, albeit briefly. Hatari finally gave us this view. We watched him for a half hour or so and then walked through, and out of, the canyon. Yes, the scenery and vegetation were beautiful, but nothing compares to gazing eye to eye with one of our ancestors.

WCB


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Location:Ishash Tented Camp, Southern Uganda