Day 12: Monkeys, Hiking, and Defying Gravity

Today we got up, pretty sore, and hobbled our way to breakfast. We left from there and drove about 1.5 hours to the site where we would track the Colobus monkeys. The group we were looking for is thought to be the largest remaining group in the world with a total number of 400-500. We got to where the trackers said they saw them and made our way down off the trail through thick ferns and other small plants down and down we went. Finally, we got down to a spot where we could see tons of them running around, eating, staring at us, and grooming. It was really cool to spend a good chunk of the morning watching them interact and live. After that trek we had to climb back up the hill which was very steep. We finally made it to the top and we had some lunch. Following some lunch we hiked about 30 minutes down a path to the canopy walk. The canopy walk is a large suspension bridge that is up at the tops of the trees of the rainforest. Not being a fan of heights I was a little nervous. It was a little nerve wracking to go across the largest part, but the views were great and I’m glad I got to experience it. Then we hiked back out 30 more minutes and we were done for the day. While hanging out at the visitor’s center we saw a large group of mountain monkeys running around and we were able to snap some pictures of them as they passed through. It was really cool to get to see another type of monkey that we hadn’t gotten to see before and that we hadn’t planned on seeing. Some people have cats running through their yards, in Rwanda they have monkeys. Crazy! 

Day 11: Hiking to the waterfall

Today we got up and grabbed some late breakfast, luckily our generous guides were willing to stretch the departure time to allow use to order some eggs, and they were delicious. We were all slow today after all of the hiking yesterday. We were a little sore, and a little tired, but we got around and hit the road by 8:20am. We met up with our guide and drove to the trail head. It was a long walk, but it was well worth the steep trails and me falling on my butt. The waterfall was amazing, and we got to hang out there for about 30 minutes taking pictures. Then we had to hike back up through the switchbacks from hell, but it seemed not as bad as yesterday in terms of intensity and heat. We were able to stop on the way up to see some mangabeys. It was awesome getting to see some monkeys that we had never planned on seeing. They were not habituated, and were completely wild. They were pretty interested in us. We made our way up and out and went for some lunch and back to the guest house. All in all it was good to do, but most of us are pretty sore and glad that tomorrow shouldn’t be too much hiking. I’m sorry these posts are shorter, but I’m tired from the hiking and there is not as much to write about when you hike for 6 hours and see a lot of the same stuff. I’ll try to flesh this out a bit more when I get some more sleep.

Enjoy some pictures of the monkeys we saw!