Thursday 19 July 2012

Task #8 - See the Gorillas

If you believe in evolution you will believe that humans are directly related to apes.
I got the privilege this year (July 2012) to see the endangered Mountain Gorillas of Rwanda! What an experience! There are only about 700 gorillas left in the wild and they are very well conserved. In the national park in Rwanda where you can find these gorillas only 80 people are allowed in per day to track various gorilla families of which only 8 people are in each group. Once you find these massive animals, one gets only an hour to take as many Kodak memories as possible!


My family and I tracked the Agashya group. Consisting of about 25 members all up and one set of one year old twins! And they are exactly like how the youngsters in Tarzan where - rolling around, climbing trees, eating, etc. There is one silverback in the group and eight adult females (greedy silverback!). I felt like Jane, just without the yellow dress, umbrella, and high heels!

They are beautiful, calm creatures - there only tasks in life is to eat, sleep, and play! Not a bad life to live. Watching them in their natural habitat was extraordinary, especially knowing that these apes might not be around in 50 years... Its daunting but so magical. A once in a lifetime experience (because thats all our wallets can handle!), but so worth it, just to see such a powerful and famous animal without any cages or fencing in-between (literally 5m away from the family!)

 




Make sure bloggers that you put this one on your bucket list, its worth it! Till next time :)