We are very happy to have had a visit from Nates momma and Aaron. They arrived at the end of March. Aaron has now joined us here until we leave at the end of June and we are very happy to have him here with us. We were overwhelmed with goodies sent to us from our wonderful family and friends in the States! Our Sis and Clint, Miss Casey, Al and Tara, Jake and Jen, the Nolettes and of course momma Charlotte, you are all so sweet and we thank you all for thinking of us.
We had an amazing experience together. Nate and I had to leave the country to renew our Tanzanian visas so we decided to take a trip to the neighbouring country of Rwanda to visit the mountain gorillas. What an experience! Only 700 mountain gorillas remain in the world. They can also be visited from 2 other countries, Congo and Uganda. We visited them in the Volcano's national park. There are a number of different groups to visit but we wanted to visit the largest group called ‘Susa’. It has 39 members!
Our day began very early at the park head quarters. We were divided into groups and assigned a guide. No more than 8 in a group. We drove 1 hour from there to the edge of the volcano where our group live. We were very fortunate not to have rain as it is the rainy season! We were also fortunate because it can take up to 5 or 6 hours to reach the Susa group but they decided to head down the mountain towards us making our hike a little over one and a half hours.
We had an amazing experience together. Nate and I had to leave the country to renew our Tanzanian visas so we decided to take a trip to the neighbouring country of Rwanda to visit the mountain gorillas. What an experience! Only 700 mountain gorillas remain in the world. They can also be visited from 2 other countries, Congo and Uganda. We visited them in the Volcano's national park. There are a number of different groups to visit but we wanted to visit the largest group called ‘Susa’. It has 39 members!
Our day began very early at the park head quarters. We were divided into groups and assigned a guide. No more than 8 in a group. We drove 1 hour from there to the edge of the volcano where our group live. We were very fortunate not to have rain as it is the rainy season! We were also fortunate because it can take up to 5 or 6 hours to reach the Susa group but they decided to head down the mountain towards us making our hike a little over one and a half hours.
After hiking for a while through thick forest our guide received a radio call from the trackers to tell him that the group had changed directions. They can travel up to 40km per hour! We turned around and followed the guide along the path until we stopped and suddenly started in a direction where there was no path. The guide used a machete to clear the way for us. Before we knew it we were pulling our way through thick bamboo shoots. Then suddenly we stopped, and the guide told us to be quiet. We looked up and just a few feet away was a huge female sat eating bamboo! We were so excited we could hardly contain ourselves. I was shaking so much from excitement i couldn't hold the camera still to get a picture! The guide then began to grunt at the gorilla and she replied! Apparently it was a series of calming noises to let them know that we were no threat. He then led us right up to her! We walked just a couple of feet from her. We then were led past a mother nursing her young and then out into an opening where about 28 of the family were lazing around and playing! What a sight! It really was amazing. Mothers feeding their young, adolescents play fighting, little ones rolling down the hill over and over, silver backs beating their chests. For a whole hour we stood in awe watching these amazing creatures in their home just enjoying life! INCREDIBLE!!!
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