Mon, Jul 2 - Driving to Kibale National Park

An Elephant watching our Pop-top Van

Yellow-billed Oxpecker

We slowly drove out of Queen Elizabeth National Park, passing several groups of elephants, before coming back to a paved highway.  We stopped briefly at the very attractive viewpoint called the Queen’s Pavilion, constructed for the Queen Mother when she visited some years ago, located just south of another equator monument. 

Savannah near the Queen Mother's Pavilion

The rest of our tour would be in the northern hemisphere.  Continuing north below the steep slopes of Ruwenzori Mountains to the west, we passed the huge Hima Cement Plant which runs 24 hours a day and contains housing, schools, hospital, everything one would need, on its grounds.  

Labor-intensive Transport of Bananas

Bob and I were riding with Brian and Eriab;  Brian treated us to his own compositions that he has written with the aid of an app called “GarageBand”, I think.  Anyway, they were quite entertaining!

Colobus Monkeys

Copper Sunbird

Leaving pavement once again we headed northeast through a hilly banana growing region filled with attractive crater lakes, finally arriving at the lovely grounds of the Chimpanzee Forest Guest House, where we learned that we are to stay for only one night instead of the scheduled two we were planning on - creating a laundry problem for some of us as at two-night stays we can get laundry done.  We sat on the terrace and ate our now usual box lunches.

Our Room at the Chimpanzee Forest Guest House

Returning to the vans we drove a short ways, stopping to bird along the way.  In the small town of Bigodi we arrived at the locally-run Bigodi Wetland Sanctuary where a guide took us on a 2.5 mile long loop trail through a  swamp with  several boardwalks consisting of 4” boards placed 4” apart, so one had to be careful!  The target bird, the White-spotted Flufftail, responded to a tape of his voice, but wouldn’t come out to be seen.  

Great Blue Turaco

We returned to our guest house along the very well-made 2-lane paved highway, but unfortunately it was placed to pass through Kibale National Park where elephants and other animals cross the highway at all hours, so frequent speed bumps have been constructed to keep the traffic slow which makes it difficult to drive and ride.

A quick bath in our stone-lined shower and then to the restaurant at 8 PM.  Squash soup, steak for RR and fired tilapia for me.  I went back to the room during the List (which frequently takes an hour!). There’s WiFi in the restaurant but it’s pretty weak.  Breakfast at 5:00 tomorrow- the earliest yet (and with bags packed!). Tomorrow is chimp day and I hope successful.