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February 8

Kibale Forest

I was not ready to get up at 6AM when my alarm rang, and could easily have slept more. They were supposed to have a quick breakfast ready for me at 7:00, so we could leave for Kibale Forest at 7:15. We were supposed to arrive there at 8:30 for chimp tracking. There were a few people in the dining room already. I ordered a plate of scrambled eggs with toast, and had some fruit from a buffet. Catherine and my driver were a bit late, arriving at 7:35, just as I finished my coffee. They said they were late because they had to wash the dust off the car, but the ride was short.

We drove across banana country for a while. Fires were common along the way, as they were yesterday, because fields were being cleared for planting. We crossed a large tea plantation as well. A big group of tourists was waiting to begin their walk at the visitor's center when we arrived at Kibale Forest National Park. I thought they were going to take everyone together, but it turned out that I would have my own guide. My driver would come too, but Catherine waited behind. She said she had just done the walk recently and had seen some chimps, but it was hard work. She was dressed rather elegantly for a forest walk anyway, with a nice sweater and scarf. In fact, my driver was also sharply dressed, and looked more like he was going out for a night on the town than a forest walk. In general, one thing I have noticed here is that Ugandans dress well, even in places where this would not be expected.

I decided to leave my pack, since the walk was just a few kilometers and I would not be needing raingear. I attached a water bottle and binoculars to my belt, and brought both my cameras and a long-range zoom lens (70 - 210 mm, F2.8) that I bought for this trip. I had 1600 speed film in both cameras for taking pictures in the forest.

The first primate we saw was a black and white monkey. It took me a while to find it in the foliage, though it was quite large. Another was up there too, in the tree-tops. I attempted taking a picture with the big lens, but doubted the monkey would show up among the foliage. We saw some signs of where elephants had passed, stripping bark from trees or wallowing in mud, but they were gone now because it was too dry for them. Uganda has been having a long dry period, which should be ending soon.

The guide identified various bird calls, and many kinds of plants, including parasitic fig trees that grow in pockets on other trees, after being deposited in droppings. The figs send roots down along the tree trunk to the ground, and later strangle the host tree when they no longer need it for support. There is also another non-parasitic fig tree which grows to enormous heights, and has roots that look like large, vertical strips of bacon. Chimps hammer on these roots to communicate with their friends, the guide said. The drumming can be heard for a mile.

We came upon another monkey, a big gray noisy one. It turned out that several were in that tree. The guide pointed out a couple of chimp nests in the trees, made of sticks. He said they make two of these each day, one for afternoon and one for night, and never reuse them. My book says that chimps are shy and often do not appear during the walks, but it is more common to hear them. The guide did not hear any chimps about today. We passed another tour group, who had also been unsuccessful in finding chimps. Perhaps it was too dry.

We saw a nest of safari ants, but didn't see any ants. They bite hard and attack in large numbers, and can be a big problem when it is wet. We ended up on top of a grassy area overlooking the forest, where a small lookout hut had been constructed. We climbed into the hut. The guide said this was once a hunting ground for both people and lions, but that no lions remained around Kibale, because they had been killed. He said Kibale forest has eleven species of primates, including two nocturnal ones and the chimps. These are the main attraction.

The guide showed us small shiny blue berries that are used as pearls. I put a few in my pocket. We also looked at a vine he said was used to treat malaria by guerillas hiding in the forest in the '70s. The flesh inside had a hot, bitter taste. We saw a smelly leaf thought to be an aphrodisiac, used to treat "men of weak sex". The guide also pointed out a tree that produces a fruit elephants love. They wait until it falls from the tree and ferments, then eat it and get drunk.

Giant Fig Tree

We left the path once to see an especially large fig tree, and climbed about on its enormous roots. Chimps favor these trees, but none were here today. When we finished the walk around 11 AM, it was already becoming hot. We stopped in the park office, and the guide showed us a crumbling collection of moths and butterflies.

Catherine was sleeping in the car. On the way back out the road, we came upon a baboon, crossing the road a few hundred yards ahead. It was huge, and I thought it was a buffalo at first. We stopped, and more baboons came out of the forest. We also saw a small gray monkey with a baby in a tree just to the right of the car. I got out and took some pictures, until a speeding truck scared the baboons off, and scared me back into the car.

We returned to the Mountains of the Moon Hotel so I could have lunch, and Catherine and the driver took the car to run some errands. I was a little nervous after they left, since all my stuff was in the car, and my photo equipment was all in the back seat. The menu was the same at lunch as for dinner. I ordered Maryland chicken with French fries. It was a bit tough, and not as good as the pepper steak last night. The fries were done perfectly again. It was a beautiful sunny day as I ate on the verandah.

I walked around the hotel and took pictures of some of the beautiful flowers on the grounds. Catherine returned later than I expected, around 1:30, after I had been dozing off on the verandah in the afternoon heat. She said they had to wash the car again. We then headed toward Kasese, which would be my base for the Rwenzori Mountain trek. It was just a couple of hours away, they said.

Upon leaving Fort Portal, Catherine pointed out a large circular fort-like structure on top of a hill. She said it was the home of a local king. She said all of the traditional local kingdoms in Uganda had been restored, and that this king had been in place for only four years.

The sky was getting dark, and it looked like rain, but it just sprinkled a bit as we passed some people picking cotton. We stopped at a roadside stand to buy beans (pea pods) for my trek. The driver also bought some passion fruit, which were stacked like the tomatoes I saw yesterday, making tall pinnacles like rock cairnes. We passed a police checkpoint, due to an accident ahead, where a matatu was on its side in the ditch beside the road.

We came to another checkpoint upon entering the Kasese district. Here, we were stopped while an officer with a machine gun and asked questions and examined some things in the front seat, before examining my passport and inspecting the trunk. Catherine said this was a special security measure due to fighting across the nearby border in Zaire, and they wanted to be sure none of the wrong people got through. Some guerillas had gotten into Kasese a few months ago, and there had been some shooting then.

We soon arrived in Kasese, a big town, and went to Rwenzori Mountain Service, the major (and for a long time, the only) outfitter for Rwenzori treks. One man occupied the small office. He was a jolly man who smiled and laughed a lot while talking. Catherine complained to the man that she could never get through by phone. The number, 44115, was always busy or not picked up. The man just rolled his eyes and smiled, and said he could not explain why this would happen.

He presented Catherine with a bill for $340 for my trek, including a guide and two porters, one of whom could cook. Each porter would carry 15 kg of my stuff, plus 10 kg of their own stuff. Catherine thought I would be getting one more porter, at $2 per day, but he said that was unnecessary. The porters' food was included in the price, but Catherine would be buying my food. The trek was scheduled for eight days. The number of days is standard, and included one extra day because I wanted to climb the highest peak, Margherita. I planned to try to finish in seven days, combining the last two stages, to have more time to recover before the gorilla tracking. This would not affect the price.

I would be renting two ice axes, two sets of crampons, and a climbing rope for my guide and me. These would be required only for the peak climb. There was also a $50 park entrance fee, which Catherine gave me 50,000 shillings to pay upon arrival. Catherine and I discussed the food some more in the car on the way to the hotel. I wanted it to be vegetarian, which meant lots of pasta, rice and beans, plus breads and fruits and maybe some cabbage, depending on what she found in the markets in Kasese.

I would be staying at the nicest hotel here, the Margherita Hotel, which was on a hill outside of town, overlooking Kasese and the Rwenzori foothills. It was a nice place, well-maintained with beautiful grounds, but having a somewhat sterile institutional atmosphere. My large room had no shower, just a tub, and there was no hot water when I first checked. I put all my valuables - traveler's checks, cash and plane tickets - into sealed envelopes and brought them to the office for safe deposit.

I packed for the trek. I would be carrying a large day-pack with my day-time clothes, camera equipment, and other things needed while walking. My down sleeping bag was in a waterproof stuff-sack. I would also be bringing two compression sacks with all of my other clothing and equipment, plus a pair of high gum-boots which I brought for the track's notorious bogs. All of these items would be carried by porters.

I checked the hot water in the bathroom again. It was now hot, in fact very hot, and arrived immediately. After my bath, a person came to the door wanting to spray for mosquitos. He said malarial mosquitos were a problem here at night, though I had not yet seen a single mosquito in Uganda. He suggested turning off the overhead light, and using only the smaller ones, to avoid attracting mosquitos. There was also a mosquito net over the bed.

I went down to the dining room just after 8 for dinner - onion steak with fries. I asked the hefty waiter what his favorite Ugandan beer was, and he suggested a Chairman ESB (Extra Strong Brew, 7% alcohol), which came in a half-liter bottle. The waiter asked where I was from. He said few people from America hiked in the mountains here, which where known mostly to Europeans.

The steak was good, but a bit tough, and the fries were once again perfect. Ugandans definitely know how to cook fries. But they need to work on the ketchup, which is as bland and watery as it is most places outside the US. The beer left me feeling a bit drunk. I headed back to my room to make some final adjustments to my packing, and I could hear the news on a TV somewhere. I thought I heard a mosquito in my room, so I pulled the mosquito net down over the bed before going to sleep.

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