Golden Monkeys

A major tourist draw of Rwanda is the ability to visit mountain gorillas (the ones of Gorillas in the Mist fame) in Volcanoes National Park.  It’s a pricey trip, running for over $600 USD when I checked, but we learned that it’s been sold out until October when some people checked.  With around 60 permits available on each day, it seemed that we’d be able to find available dates, but that wasn’t the case.  Even still, there is a separate trip to visit golden monkeys in the bamboo forests of the same park for about 1/6 of the price.  We take the same trip out to a welcome center, mingle with the gorilla-destined muzungus, and watch the same tribal dance over coffee (definitely tourist oriented)... but where they headed up the volcanoes, we hung out around the base.  In the process, I learned something today: When it comes to gorillas, it’s not if you want to visit the gorillas, but how often you want to visit the gorillas.  We talked to multiple people who were there for a repeat gorilla visit (often days in a row) or were splitting up gorilla visits with monkey visits.  It seemed selfish to me given the limited supply of permits, and given the woman we met who backed out of her second visit after finding the previous day too strenuous, but at least I saved some money in the process. 

/rant

Anyway, we left the house around 4 AM this morning, arrived something like 3 hours later, and were hiking by 8:30-ish.  We were at elevation, so the temp was probably only in the 60s (far cry from what it sounds like they’re dealing with back home), and it was even cooler in the shade of bamboo.  The monkeys themselves travel in groups, and our tour guide was in contact with trackers during the hike.  When we finally arrived, we saw a single monkey in the trees, but we quickly learned that they were all over the place.  There were little ones who liked to put on shows, hopping from tree to tree, and larger ones who seemed prone to fights (at least two fights broke out while we were there, dropping to the ground to duke it out a bit).  It was a fun trip, and the volcanoes looked great in the distance.  Even the trip there and back was an experience, with most of the hills (essentially mountains) covered with a patchwork of crops and clay huts.  If there’s one thing to take away from today, it’s that Rwanda is a gorgeous country, with sites to spare. 

-Scott

The bamboo kept the area pretty dark, meaning the monkeys had to be quite close to get a decent shot with the flash.  I ended up shooting a bunch of video (so you could at least see the movement), but I was able to get a few good shots.