Although we are staying right next to a Chimp research station, we are not allowed to track or view the Kanayawara Chimps, as the Field Station group is known. The Kanyawara Chimps are an habituated research group and visitors, and even residents, are not allowed to view them. So we had to drive about an hour south of here to a different part of Kibale Forest to Kanyanchu. Along the way we stopped to pick up some students from Kasiisi School to share this experience with them. Unfortunately one of the students was underage for Chimp tracking and thus he stayed and had a nature walk at the Ranger station instead.
At Kanyanchu the Ugandan Wildlife Authority have set up a Chimp tracking station complete with guides and rangers for tourists. Similar to our Gorilla experience we had to divide up into small groups each with a Ranger/Guide. The Guide was carrying an AK47 in case we ran into elephants, of which there was plenty of evidence in the forest. We were also very fortunate to have Zarin, one of the Harvard chimp researchers from the Field Station, in our group. Her expertise in chimpanzee research was invaluable to us, but it was her knowledge of the forest that Christie was counting on to help her through this experience. Christie is very afraid of snakes, so Zarin would walk in front of her, and I had her back. Zarin had explained that chimps are afraid of snakes also and won’t stay around if they see them. We never did see a snake today (Christie owes Zarin a beer), but we did see the largest spider any of us had ever seen and a millipede that was likely poisonous.
We tucked our pants into our socks in order to deter safari ants and drove to an area where we knew the chimps might be. We could hear some hooting from the road and plunged right into the forest. Within minutes Sawya, our student from Kasiisi, spotted a pair of chimps high above us in a tree. It turns out that Sawya was to be our best spotter on this tracking expedition. The first one we saw was a female who was very visibly in estrus. Soon a male became visibie as well and as quick as could be, copulation occurred and was over. Zarin explained that this was very typical for chimps.
We moved on and hiked through some very dense forest. Kibale national forest is technically an arid rainforest. It is an area we would call a jungle with huge trees with buttresses, dense undergrowth and vines everywhere. The chimps use the tree buttresses to drum on, making a low pounding sound that we could hear. Zarin explained that this is a display behavior that chimps do by hanging onto the tree with her hands and drumming with their feet. It has nothing to do with communication, just with displaying the cleverness and skill of the chimp who is drumming.
We hiked for quite some time through thick going, encountering a few chimps high in the canopy and hearing lots of hoots and screams. Our guide was moving very quickly and told us that we were following some males who were moving much more quickly through the forest than we could. Finally we saw a large group of chimps on the ground making a racket of hooting and screaming. We were able to get close to them to get pictures and saw many antics in the trees and on the ground around us. One of the males charged Koojo Mathew who started to run before Zarin told him to stand still and avert his eyes. The chimp veered off, as they almost always do, but that was a very close encounter.
We stayed in that area and got a very close up view of two male chimps grooming each other. These two chimps are close friends (very close friends from the way they were grooming) and were very relaxed in front of us. One of those two males was “leaf clipping” a cultural behavior that may mean he wants to be groomed by his friend. These two were very relaxed in front of our group, and after grooming decided to hang out and take a nap.
We are only allowed an hour to stay with the chimps, but it was a very exciting hour as we got to see a lot of different kinds of chimp behavior. This clearly was a highlight of our trip, right up there with viewing the Mountain Gorillas.
After chimp tracking we met up with Pam, Cindy, Chris, Alice and Scott at the Bigodi Women’s Cooperative. This is a group of local women who set up a craft shop, with one shop at Kanyanchu and one on the main road, with the goal of raising money to build a local nursery school. They have done so well in this venture that they have almost met their fundraising goal. We patronized their shop and then walked next door to Tinka’s for lunch
Lunch with the Tinkas was another Ugandan cultural experience. There were 20 of us for lunch and we were given a humorous lesson in Ugandan hospitality and culture by John Tinka. Lunch consisted of traditional Ugandan fare, matoke, beef stew, fried sweet potatoes, rice, and groundnut sauce. This was followed by pineapple and bananas for desert. John told us that Bigoti is a derivation of a word that means “I am tired.” Many years ago when Uganda was still under colonial rule most of this area was still forest. People who were walking from Fort Portal would get as far as Bigoti and would stop for the night saying “I am tired.” Thus the name stuck for this village.
We were back early to the Field Station for showers and dinner with great conversation and humor at dinner. Christie in fact, was laughing so hard a pea lodged in her nose. This, I’m sure, will not surprise Scott.
Tomorrow is a rest day with only Ndali Lodge scheduled for a sunset dinner on the schedule.
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