GoRiLlAs!

Today we had an amazing adventure - tracking the world's only remaining mountain gorillas in their natural habitat.

There are currently less than 800 of these gorillas left, and due to the threat against them - i.e. heartless poachers who cut off their hands and heads - each family group is protected by armed guards almost around the clock. This helps make tracking easier, but it's still a trek to find them - we spent over an hour walking through farmers fields carved into the side of a mountain before even reaching the national park where they live! Once we were in, however, it was incredible!!

Our party (which included 6 of our fellow travellers) was fortunate to visit the Susa group - a society of 32 gorillas whom Dian Fossey not only studied, but died protecting...and didn't want tourists to interact with...whoops - now comprised of three silver backs (dominant males), a few black backs (males who aren't yet dominant), quite a few women, and at least four little ones - including two-and-a-half month old twins! (Apparently it's really rare for gorillas to have more than one baby at a time - females can begin having kids at age 8, but can only give birth every 3.5 years. The gestational period is almost exactly the same as humans, and they will typically stop having kids between 35-37. The life expectancy is around 45 years.)

When we had hiked through the jungle for a bit - uphill in the mud - we were suddenly surrounded! There were gorillas right next to us (less than 2 m away), in the tree above us...everywhere! They are just incredible - even more so than the chimps, I must say. They have the most intense faces, and, contrary to what we had heard, we were told it was perfectly fine to make eye contact. So we did. A lot. They seemed mildly amused by us at points, but largely just went about eating, grooming, cuddling their babies (which are waaaaaaay cuter than human infants btw), and...showing off. The first and third silver backs were particularly dramatic - pouting, rolling over with their massive hands hiding their faces, showing their teeth, sitting up with their arms crossed, tossing their heads while looking at our cameras...total drama queens. (We ate it up, of course - stay tuned for photos!) Soon after we arrived it started to POUR. The gorillas - being smarter than humans - immediately ran for cover. (Fun fact - gorillas have really thick, black hair which completely covers their bodies. They literally look like life-sized stuffed animals - soft and cuddly.) We, being stupid, stood in the rain and got completely soaked. To the skin. Thank God for underwater cameras!

When the weather finally broke, we attempted to thaw out our fingers so we could take some snaps of the emerging crew. At first it was just a couple of juveniles munching on wild celery, but then we took a walk down into a valley and saw about 15 gorillas just hanging out! You're only supposed to have an hour with them, but our trackers let us stay longer due to the rain and the positive reactions of the gorillas.

It's really hard to explain how amazing the experience was - when you're near them, it really does feel like they're way more tapped into what's happening than the vast majority of animals. It almost feels like they can read your mind. Incredible.

An experience we will never forgot - well worth the money/rain/cold/mud.