Gorillas in the mist.. Kigali bound

Today the four of us who were gorilla trekking for a second time were up early again. Sally and I were hoping desperately that we would get the chance to take up a spare permit given that we hadn't booked in advance.

We sat waiting anxiously at the information office whilst the staff booked in people to see the Golden Monkeys and finally got the thumbs up from the Man in charge.

At that point the drama was that they would only take VISA so having processed mine (thanks goodness I took a couple of cards) Sally only had Mastercard and so she said she wouldn't be able to do it. I volunteered to pay for her and the payment went through so we joined Jackie and Stuart and some others who we would be climbing with! Luck was with us as we would be tracking the Amahoro group that we had asked for - the largest group.

We set off on a more leisurely climb than the previous day with intermittent rain and much more scrabbling through tree branches and bushes.

We emerged every now in the mist to survey the forest and the expectation amongst the group was enormous. After nearly 4 hours, we were beginning to get a little despondent when we heard the guide say that we were almost there.

We organised our cameras and headed through the undergrowth.. suddenly from our left came a big silverback and then as we edged further through we started seeing more of the group.

They would sit calmly and eat and watch us watching them, then decide that they wanted to move on and cut straight across our path - the keepers telling us to step back slowly so as not to scare them - and head to a new patch of grass or bushes.

The most spectacular sight again, I think it was even better than the previous day. I took hundreds of pictures, but for me this is my favourite shot of the day.. teh rest are on travelgirl..

The hour went fast and then we left the group and had our brief lunch stop and made our way back to the vans, our mini group stopped at the shopping/certificate place and Jackie Stuart and I decided to buy one of the walking sticks each ;0)

We got back to our hotel and then had a taxi ride to Kigali.. a white knuckle ride it turned out to be as the driver was frequently on the wrong side of the road and or putting his headphones in or playing with his phone!

We were very relieved to get to the hotel in one piece. We met up with the group then all went out for dinner which was a lovely evening and we treated the crew.

A truly memorable magical day..