The stars

The stars of the wild chapter of the trip, by expense, effort and accumulation of good fortune, cannot be other than the mountain gorillas. We had the privilege and the big luck of getting permits at the very last minute to track the Rushegura group, and indeed we tracked them. Kicking the ground with my shin has left my leg looking like an impressionist painting and we got mud and water up to our ears, but seeing those creatures behaving with such familiarity in front of us was something simply incredible and worthy of any vicissitudes.

Mouths watered seeing the little one crawl on Silver Back’s back. The female that feeds the babies performed a meticulous nail cleaning under our sight. The games of the youngsters while the older made a lazy digestion laying on the ground were a real joy. The exhibition of power of the big boss left us petrified, although the guides translated the movement for us as a signal to the rest of the group that everything was ok – more than one got their heart jumping for a while thanks to the call to calm. The melting point was when the favorite female extended her arm towards the big guy, with a movement that could very well have been a caress, to let him know that she was also leaving with the rest of the group, and it was time that he moved his lazy ass. Shortly afterwards, the yet-to-be-named little one  played with the branches until mum passed by to follow the group in the migration. At that moment he just hopped on her back with a grace that we bipedal primates are incapable of hanging from a branch. We wanted more, but we accepted what we got knowing that invading their privacy once a day is already at the border of what such a susceptible creature can stand, and conscious of the GREAT fortune that we had had in contemplating those scenes.

That same afternoon we followed the Waterfalls trail to get another of those memorable “falling elephants and hippos” kind of rain (four days later my boots are still wet). The day was exhausting and simply unforgettable. It was very nice to share the sunset chatting with part of the gorilla-troop. A few hours of slippery trek under the rain don’t allow to get to know people at all, but sharing moments of that intensity somehow opens the paths for communication, gives something important in common, and makes it very easy to feel affectionate for whom just hours before where absolute strangers (and I owe very good friends to that!). Later that evening, the guard to whom we had invited for dinner and a beer as thank you for giving us the opportunity to track the group, offered us (good trap) a delicious dinner with African plates made out of fresh local produces. Yummy!! And what a nice guy. I am sure his new tourism enterprise is going to be a hit in less than a couple of years. Maybe I should have asked him if he accepts business partners; I could even find a stable source of income after all!