Camping à Kagera

We took a three day weekend, hired Jacques (our amazing naturalist, driver, cultural translator, camping equipment supplier, and guide) and went to Akagera National Park.  Jacques actually told us that in Kinyarwanda the park is named Kagera but with all the French speakers over many years saying "nous allons à Kagera" the name was joined with its preposition to become Akagera.  Let me start with the list we made last night of all the wildlife interactions we had and then I'll describe the trip, the park and all of our experiences.

1. Animals we saw:  Impala, Topi, Vervet monkeys, Baboon, Mongoose, Zebra, Buffalo, Girafe, Warthogs, Hippopotamus, Reedbucks, Waterbucks, Crocodile, Leopard
2. Bird sightings:  Marabou stork, Weavers, Eagle, Kingfisher, Grey Crowned Crane, Goliath Heron, Cormorant, African Jacana, Francolin
3. Animal signs and tracks:  Python track, Elephant scat, Aardvark holes
4. Animal sounds at night:  Baboon, Leopard, Impala, Hippopotamus, Hyena

Are you impressed?  Did you feel like saying "oh my"?  I can't even find the adjectives to describe our awe and wonder at the beauty of this park.  Here then, is our camping story complete with a few photos.

We drove off to Akagera on Saturday morning.  The terrain on this trip is quite different from that of North Rwanda, flatter with many more areas for larger herds of cattle.  Most Akagera trips are to the south entrance of the park but Jacques took us north because he feels it is more beautiful, less traveled and there are more animals.  We arrived at the north park entrance around 1:00, even before the entrance we spotted Impala wandering among the cattle.  Jacques told us about the reduction of the park's lands after the genocide to provide places for the returning exiled Rwandans to live.  The park is now 1/2 of its size before 1994 and though many animal populations have returned, there are no lions because they were killed to protect the cattle.

At the entrance to the park, I found a weaver nest.  Later we saw a tree that was filled with  the nests of a whole colony of yellow weavers.  Seeing the nest up close helped us to appreciate the intricacy of creating these structures for the birds.

The entry way to the park is a woodland and immediately we spotted baboons and vervet monkeys (Nava: "what is the blue thing on those monkeys?" Me:  "Um, uh, its their private parts" - seriously the male vervet monkeys have, well, sort of a torquoise coloring).

Vervet Monkey

The woodland soon opens up into a plain that was full of birds, buffalo, antelope of various types (topi, etc.) and zebra

Topi

Buffalo and Egrets

Zebra

The park's buffalo are dangerous and mean.  When they are in herds they will not attack but a lone buffalo will attack a human who is not safely ensconced in a car.  For that reason, as tempting as it would have been to hike everywhere, Jacques insisted that we stay close to our car, or at our campsite, close to our campsite. 

Oh, did I say birds on the planes?  Many small birds flew around our car and then we spotted some large Marabou Storks wandering around.  Although they look awkward when walking up in the sky they are amazing flyers.  We drove toward some vultures who were enjoying someone else's kill (a topi).  I couldn't help but start to quote from Jungle Book when I saw the vultures..."whachyouwannado?" but they didn't look as if they wanted to start a conversation.

Marabou Storks

Vultures

Up the hill from the planes area we drove into a grove of trees and were greeted by some taller friends snacking on the tree tops

At about this moment it really all felt surreal, we cautiously got out of the car and found ourselves hanging out with a family of giraffes. 

After this amazing first experience with game viewing Jacques drove us deeper into the park to seek out our campsite for the night and to see more of the terrain.  Akagera has a beautiful landscape variation from plain Savannah to bush and woodland Savannah all surrounded by mountains and filled with lakes.  I think as Jacques drove our mouths were always open in wonder and each time we spotted an animal, flower or bird we had to hold ouselves back from shouting.  To his credit, Jacques was patient and always willing to stop to let us view most anything.

Here is where we ended up camping

Our campsite had a view of two lakes and was up on a hill.  We set out to put up the tents, two of which were easy and one of which was confusing to say the least.  It took some time and after getting the tents pitched we gathered firewood and made a campfire to cook our meat (no, not our kill, poaching, thank goodness, is illegal).  Nava delighted in gathering rocks to build the firering and by the time we left the campsite two nights later she had constructed the perfect stone wall.

Two nights of hard Rwandan ground may have been tough on our aging backs (Saadya and Nava never complained) but completely worthwhile for the experience of being out of a car in the park, hearing or viewing our night visitors and seeing the night sky that was full of stars and distant lightening.  On the first night the loud noises we heard were hyenas and hippos.  In the morning I asked Jacques what that barking dog sound was, turns out it was the baboons.  On the second night Patricia and I were awoken  at 2am by a very loud sound that we could not identify.  We heard Jacques get up to get the fire stoked up and then he called us and asked if we wanted to see a LEOPARD!!  Yes, we saw a leopard out hunting at night, a very rare sight.  Jacques stayed up for a few hours to follow his movements and it turns out there was not one but two leopards around our campsite.

In the morning it rained and we drove to the lakeside to see some of the water animals

In the photo above you can probably spot the Hippos, but can you find the crocodile?  Hippos are noisy noisy guys in the water; constantly huffing and puffing and blowing out water.

We spent most of the morning driving around the park, returned to our campsite for a brief respite and then went out again in the late afternoon for more viewing.  The next day we asked for one more visit to the Savannah plain area and to the giraffes and we made our way out of the park. 

In total, I probably took well over 200 photos (most of which came out fuzzy and hard to see) and we had well over 200 different things happen that I could have written about, maybe you can still get a feel for it all from this posting; I hope so!