After three amazing treks to the gorillas in Rwanda, we headed to Uganda to trek for chimpanzees. We drove across the border to Uganda and then caught a bush plane to Kasese airport to get to our accomodation near the gorillas. We’re staying a Kyaninga Lodge, which has spectacular views of the crater lake and mountains of the moon.

The chimpanzee park is about an hour away, so we were up quite early in the morning to head over. You have to get there early so the trackers can figure out where they are feeding in the trees, as the chimpanzees communicate a lot, once they’re done eating, they come down from the trees and move above, you try to get to them while they’re up there and just wait.

Chimpanzees are a lot harder to photograph than gorillas, as they don’t remain in the same spot very long.

There are two types of permits, one is the one hour deal like the gorillas, the other is an habituation permit, which is what we had. We get to follow one of the families for the entire day as researchers try to get the chimpanzees more used to humans being around. This benefits the researchers and veterinarians.

Chimpanzees are our closest relatives, and they really show it in their mannerisms and displays of emotions.

The sounds they make are just like the movies, especially if you’ve seen the latest Planet of the Apes films, it was mesmerizing to hear the screams and chants. The alpha males do their own form of the gorilla chest thumping, but smashing the bottom of fig trees, which rings out like a loud drum across the forest.

 

One of the more surreal moments was when we followed a male chimpanzees was reprimanding a female, likely because she wouldn’t mate with him. He would beat her and she would screen extremely loud attempting to alert the other males in her family. It seemed her screams were falling on deaf ears. Then twenty or so minutes later we were surrounded by at least 10 chimpanzees charging through the forest to her aid. It was like a scene from a movie.

Chimpanzees didn’t talk to me as much as the gorillas did, as I think gorillas have an almost mystical presence. I also felt at times that I had to apologize to the gorillas for the awful things humans have done to them. The chimpanzees are more humanlike and I have a love/hate relationship with us. They were a lot of fun to watch though, as they’re far more active and just outright crazy at times.

One thing I did want to witness was a chimpanzee group hunting, as they’re omnivores. They surround a tree that a monkey is in from the canopy and the base and basically draw the monkey into a trap. Our guide had seen it before and said it’s pretty amazing to watch the highly intelligent co-operation in their hunting.

Chimps are very protective of their young, so while we got to see infant chimps, they were far away and there was no way to get closer.

There was one funny moment while I was shooting video of one of the older alpha males that I can’t post, due to do internet restrictions here. He was up on his legs shaking a tree and dancing around around and then came right at me and got up again on his legs and scared the crap out of me. You see the video shake and ends with me dropping an f-bomb and everyone else in the group laughing. I was never in any danger, but a chimp can tear you apart if so inclined.

I’m off to Kidepo Valley National Park in Northern Uganda tomorrow, where we’ll be getting a unique game drive. The park is on the South Sudanese border and not a lot of people visit for that reason. I think our Canadian government suggest you don’t travel there, but what the heck?

Uganda definitely has a different feel than Rwanda, but the people have been very kind and the landscape is beautiful.