It was decided that a donation would be made to each of the Club's twenty-two trainees of 2007, consisting of a pair of Minolta Classic 8x40 binoculars and a copy of the Field Guide to the Birds of East Africa and the Kingdon Pocket Guide to African Mammals, both published by A&C Black and in our opinion the best books in their category. This trip's main objective was to deliver these items to the Club. Trainees from all over the country gathered at Bwindi Impenetrable Forest's Visitor's Centre in Buhoma, where they received the items from the Park's Deputy Chief Warden.


Of course being in Uganda I couldn't pass the opportunity to do some bird and wildlife watching. Weather didn't help much this time, with daily rains often at the best hours for birding, but nonetheless I had a great time. Once again I counted on Hassan Mutebi and Access Uganda to arrange accommodation, guiding and driving.


(A note on photography: this is the first time I have taken a DSLR camera on a trip, a Canon 400D together with a Canon 70-300 and 17-55 zoom lenses. I also took my Swarovski scope and Canon Powershot S-80 compact camera for digiscoping, but most of the images in this report were taken with the DSLR)

Bwindi Impenetrable National Park is one of the last places in the world where Mountain Gorillas (Gorilla gorilla beringei) are still found. The other Ugandan protected area where Mountain Gorillas are present is Mgahinga National Park, in the Virunga volcanoes bordering with Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, but at the time of this visit Gorilla tracking for tourists had been discontinued there. Go to my first visit's report to read more about Ugandan Mountain Gorillas.


Slash-and-burn cleared land for cultivation and pasture

Since my visit in 2004, prices for Gorilla tracking have risen from US$ 230 to US$ 500 per person and day, and groups are made of eight people instead of six. The experience is certainly worth it, and in fact it pays to reserve places in at least two days of tracking to maximize the chances of good sightings.

Reaching the forest edge

Bwindi is not named Impenetrable for nothing, and sometimes the Gorillas are found in places so densely forested that it's difficult to see them well, even from a few metres. This may account for the fact that Bwindi Gorillas are less frequently filmed and photographed that their relatives in the Volcanoes area.

In my group's case, we tracked for two hours and found the Habinyanja family, and counted 18 of its 22 members, but they were feeding up in the trees and good views were hard to get. Light was also very poor deep in the forest, making photography quite challenging.


Rwensigazi, head of the Habinyanja family group

The Habinyanja family is one of the several Gorilla groups in Bwindi that have been habituated to tolerate human presence, originally for research purposes and later as a tourist attraction, generating much-needed income for the protection of the area.
This family is unusual in that it has two full-grown silverback males: Rwensigazi, head of the clan, and Makara, his second-in-command. Their bulk looked totally out of place sitting on top of rather slim trees. Gorillas are identified by their individual facial and nose markings, and are named by park rangers after some distinctive feature.

Gorillas are not confined to remote areas of the park, however. I stumbled upon a young male feeding by a self-guided trail that runs parallel to the Munyaga River, very close to Buhoma and its camps and lodges. As usual with Gorillas, he kept feeding for a while and then left the scene without paying me much attention.


Lone Gorilla near Buhoma

Forest birds commonly encountered around Buhoma included Ludher's Bush-shrike, Great Blue Turaco (one called every evening from the same spot right in front of the Gorilla Forest Camp's veranda), Brown-chested Wattle-eye, Yellow-rumped Tinkerbird, Cinnamon-chested Bee-eater, White-chinned Prinia. Walks along different trails produced Barred Long-tailed Cuckoo, Black-billed Turaco, Bar-tailed Trogon, Least Honeyguide. Spectacular Blue-headed Tree Agamas live around the village of Buhoma, and in sunny days their colours become almost surreally beautiful.

Crested Francolin

From Bwindi we took the long drive to Queen Elizabeth National Park, where I wanted to try and see the well-known Ishasha tree-dwelling lions. As it happened, heavy rains meant that grass was exceptionally high all over the park, making game and ground birds very difficult to spot. Larks, bustards and francolins were almost impossible to see unless they crossed a trail (which fortunately they often did, especially after heavy rainfall).


Two sides of Yellow-throated Longclaw

However, we were very lucky to have a family of Common Buttonquail in the open for an unusually long time. A male with a diminutive chick and, later, a brighter-coloured female strolled along a trail right after a heavy rainfall. It is a widespread and relatively common bird throughout much of Africa, but coming from Spain it has an almost mythical status (also known as Andalusian Hemipode, it was thought to be extinct back home, although apparently half a dozen pairs still breed in the south). In any case, it's never easy to see unless flushed, and rarely offers good views. Late hour and overcast weather account for the poor quality of the images.