The Last Eden
This July, I had the opportunity to join a tour through Gabon - often referred to as the last Eden on Earth. Gabon is a pretty much undiscovered country in western Africa and is covered by 85% of rainforest of which 11% is protected as national parks, and these are rich in wildlife.
Clare and I had planned and booked this trip to do in 2020 together, but because of Covid we had to postpone. This year, since we now have Mara (our labby), Clare decided to stay at home as it was a 3 week trip and we haven’t yet trained her to stay with other people for this long. So I went alone.
I started my African adventure in the capital of Libreville. Despite being one of the richest and most expensive cities in Africa due to oil resources, the chaotic and dusty African feel and commotion in the city. There's not that much to discover though, but there are some lovely beaches and good restaurants to get into the swing of holiday mode.
To acclimatise I stayed on the Pointe Denis peninsula for a few days at the lovely bungalow resort “La Baie du Tortues”. Only a 30 minute boat ride from Libreville and you arrive in a completely different world: white beaches, turquoise water and a backdrop of tropical rainforest - wow!
At the weekend, about 200 locals came over to enjoy loud African song and dance around the pool! But by Monday they’d all gone back to the “mainland”, back to work, and I had the resort almost all to myself.
The very friendly owner invited me on a safari tour within the Pongara National Park – here we saw elephants, buffaloes and a chimpanzee bed-nest up in a tree. Apparently, the day before they even saw a leopard! It was really amazing to see how close to the resort and the capital that nature and wildlife exists.
After the peninsula I was ready for the big adventure when I suddenly had a high temperature. For 3 weeks I’d continuously had strange pains in my back and only painkillers helped me to find some sleep. I was a bit worried, so I went to a doctor at a clinic and they found a sign of infection in my bloodwork. Next day, however, the fever was gone and after discussing with Clare, I decided to continue my trip.
We started by doing an intro tour north of Libreville to Akanda, another national park just bordering the capital. After a short drive we left the last suburbs of the city and continued offroad. About an hours' drive later we took a boat to a little island to go in search of the Gabon talapoin - a very small monkey which are very hard to find. We spent hours looking and waiting and finally found one small one sitting in a tree.
Next day after a short city tour and a nice lunch at the beach restaurant, La Voile Rouge, the real adventure began. After a 12 hour train ride through the jungle we stepped out seemingly in the middle of nowhere, at Ivindo. Another few hours of driving and some trekking took us to our destination of the day at an observation tower in the middle of the rainforest. The tower had already decayed but it was still intact enough to call it our ‚home‘ for the next 3 days.
From the tower there was a great view across the Baie – meaning a clearing in the language of the Baka pygmy tribe. This clearing is rich in minerals and salt which animals both need and love to eat. The forest elephants are crucial for the other animals, because they have the power to dig up the best soil. The animals spend hours at this place and then move back into the protection of the forest when the day is ending.
You never know what animals you will see. On the first day we saw 44 red river hogs with their lovely fluffy ears and colourful coat. But they didn't show up in the following two days. These very cute animals were among the highlights I wanted to see and here they are! What a great start 😊.
The other amazing wildlife to see at the Baie are the lowland gorillas who have not been habituated to humans. They are truly wild! We had to be very patient but after 2 days suddenly 3 lonesome silverbacks emerged from the jungle into the grassland. One silverback was very brave and approached an elephant mother. She wasn’t at all happy to share the treat and tried to scare the gorilla away. What an amazing scene to observe!
In the group there were two “birders” from England and I learned so much about birds and really started to appreciate and enjoy them. But right at that moment when the silverback and elephant were clashing, Mike shouted “ooh there are 2 ducks over there”! We had such a laugh about Mike’s priorities 🤣!
Right near the tower where we were camping, our guide found a footprint of a leopard. Later during a night visit to the bush loo, I was shining my torch straight ahead and two bright eyes were looking right back at me… Only a little bit spooked 🤣, I made it back to the tower in record time! I learned later that it was probably only a civette and not a leopard ☺️.
Our next destination was Lope National Park. To get there we had a rough and dusty 8 hour ride in the back of a car. With 9 people in a Toyota Landcruiser and the luggage on the roof, this is the type of travel we did when we were younger and wilder... On this trip, I was the youngest and the oldest was 75 and our bones did suffer a bit!
In Booue, back in 'civilisation' we stopped for lunch at the station restaurant where crocodile meat was the special of the day! It was the first time in 3 days that I had mobile connection 😊.
When travelling in Gabon, anything can happen. One example: When a car was approaching us, our driver realized that the two guys who run ferryboat across the river that we were headed towards to cross, were actually sitting in that car going in the opposite direction! Apparently, because it was Sunday, they thought they’d head off early to their Sunday break. Fortunately, they stopped and agreed to turn around again otherwise we wouldn’t have made it to our next lodge!
Kongou Falls further north would have been another highlight but unfortunately the detour was too long. The most beautiful waterfall in Central Africa is in the middle of the jungle, is 3.2 km wide and 56m high. A few kilometres later, the same Ivindo river drops again and we were able to see the beautiful Toune waterfall from the road .
Lope is currently the only place in the world where you can see mandrills in the wild. Mandrills were actually the main reason why I booked this tour. Dr. David Lehmann was the first person who managed to put a GPS tracker on some of these monkeys, which allows him to find and follow them.
But finding the biggest monkey on earth and then taking a good photograph are two separate challenges! I underestimated that these beautiful animals live in the jungle. Therefore, trees and vegetation are in the way and the mandrills are constantly moving around the tops of the foliage. On the first trek we were following them for hours before we had a first clear view.
The timing of our trip was set to see the mandrills during mating season. This is when the older males have the beautifully coloured faces. To avoid inbreeding, females are sexually mature from 4-8 years and males only from 10 years on. For their next three years on, the only thing they think about is sex. Fully exhausted, but truly satisfied, they die around the age of 13.
The trek was really tough! On the return leg, we were already close to our car but because of swamps we had to find ways around them. Then suddenly we saw smoke in the forest and David started to run shouting to us to follow the second guide. When we arrived at the car we then had to cross a bush fire - David only just managed to extinguish the burning rubber of his tyres in time! What an unreal moment that was!
You can see elephants and buffaloes in a spectacular landscape in Lope, but the key attraction here are definitely the monkeys. Lope is a monkey's paradise but not only for mandrills. We also saw other amazing monkeys such as the moustached monkey, the putty-nosed monkey, grey-cheeked mangabey and the black colobus (pictures from left to right). All these monkeys can only be found in this part of our planet!
We also saw many beautiful birds such as the lovely African pied hornbill (picture), flocks of grey parrots, white-throated bee-eater, African hoopoe, woolly-necked stork and green-headed sunbirds. Lope really is an amazing place!
The location of the Lope Lodge is fabulous. It‘s next to Africa‘s 5th largest river - the Ogooué River. I skipped two afternoon tours and tried to recover a bit. Three hikes through the jungle were tough for my body. Unfortunately, my health situation didn’t approve either and I had a second night with a temperature.
Luckily, again, I felt better the next day and we continued towards Lambaréné. This is where famous Alfred Schweitzer built a hospital and did all of his malaria research there. I still felt his vibes walking through his house which is now a museum. The highlight in Lambaréné was the hot shower - the first time after 7 days 😊.
From here, the next adventure was waiting: a boat ride on the Ogooué River to the coast. It was a beautiful 5 hours ride through untouched, pristine nature. We were charged at by a hippo and saw a beautiful pink-backed pelican. Certainly, not many people have ever come to this corner of the planet.
In this photo, I‘m sitting next to Martin Royle, the owner of Royle Safaris. His specialty is to find ways to spot animals that are almost impossible to find in nature. Ever dreamt of seeing snow leopards, Siberian tigers or giant pandas? Royle Safaris is the company to go to!!
The last highlight was Luango National Park. I have never seen so many beautiful birds as here. Just the variety of kingfishers was amazing - we saw the giant, shiny-blue, pied, and woodland kingfisher.
I took so many pictures of various gorgeous birds that it is impossible to show and mention them all. Here are four more of my favourite photos: a white-throated blue swallow, a hamerkop, a rosy bee-eater, and a yellow-billed stork.
But the most impressive bird was the great blue turaco with such a unique look that I‘d never seen before. Taking a picture of a bird out of a boat was difficult enough but trying to capture one in flight was almost impossible. I tried my best 🤣.
And then got lucky!
We also did a night tour by boat and spotted this vermiculated fish owl. And we saw the shiny eyes of slender-snouted crocs in the beam of the torch too! Our planet Earth really truly is amazing and I now know why National Geographic called this park The Last Eden!
Travelling by boat is a great way to spot and observe wildlife such as the forest elephants. There are around 100‘000 forest elephants or 95% of the global population in Gabon. They are smaller than the savanna elephants with a different shape of tusks that are straighter and point downward.
Beware, they are very dangerous! Every guide in Gabon was extremely cautious during a hike through the forest and we weren‘t allowed to talk. In case of an elephant encounter the rule was: Run but not too fast because if you fall the elephant will kill you! Unfortunately, recently such a deadly accident did happen, and it’s now prohibited to do night walks in Gabon.
It’s really astonishing how an elephant can hide in the thick forest. Once, we were silently walking through the bush when our guide signalled to back up. At that moment an elephant was walking towards us with only about 10 metres distance, and he or she wasn’t making a sound… That was when we did what we were taught and ran 💨!
Thanks to the protection of the thick forest, Gabon offers an abundant amount of wildlife. But compared to a safari in the savanna it’s so much harder to spot the animals! It’s the knowing that you are surrounded by elephants, gorillas, chimps and even leopards when you’re hiking through the forest, that makes the experience so uniquely exiting. As suddenly, when you least expect it, a gorilla runs by or you spot wild chimps. These animals usually disappear quickly again. This forest tortoise was also very hard to see but not fast enough to run away 😊.
On the last day of our tour I was lucky enough to experience another last highlight: a hike to a family of lowland gorillas. At Luango there is one habituated family that can now be tracked and visited. But first we had to pass a Covid test. And if one person tests positive then the whole group is cancelled. Since I didn’t feel 100% well, I was wondering... It was the longest 15 minutes to wait for the test results but we all ended up testing 'negative'.
The maximum number of tourists per day are four. The day before, the group had a difficult trek with a wet landing by boat and a crossing through swamps. But we were lucky and after only a 30 minute hike from the research center we already reached the family. First of all, the silverback “Kamaya” introduced himself and made sure we understood who’s boss.
Only a few minutes later though, he was lying on his back relaxing with his feet up 😊. We learned that one of his 3 females had just lost a baby and left the group. Kamaya has since been trying to find her and so he treks up and down the forest to try and bring her back.
His other two females were also carrying a little one each. It was really funny to observe the two year old active youngster. First, he unsuccessfully tried to motivate some of the adults to play so in the end he found a stick and was so happy playing with it. I could have watched him for hours!
After one hour with the family it was time to leave them alone again. The behaviour of the lowland gorillas was very similar to what Clare and I observed in Uganda and Rwanda. Luckily these gorillas are not as endangered as their relatives in the mountains. The estimated population of the lowland gorillas in Central Western Africa is around 360‘000 compared to only 1‘000 mountain gorillas. But, it's less easy to visit them since you have to come to Gabon or Congo which is harder to get to and there are only very few places to find habituated lowland gorillas.
Currently, the national park is also trying to habituate a group of chimps. But this might take some more years. The tour was almost finished now and we had a transfer to Port-Gentil from where we took a short flight back to the capital. The next day we still had some time to have lunch at the beautiful beach location of the restaurant Tropicana where we took a last group photo. Thank you Wilf, Mike, Lesley, Richard, and Rita (from left to right) for this experience together and the super team spirit!
Gabon was a very challenging trip but it was an unforgettable experience in one of the last untouched places on earth! It was now time to get back home and take care of my health issues. Back in Switzerland I went to the hospital to do some health checks. Unfortunately the diagnosis was metastatic melanoma cancer at stage 4 and I and my wife were – and still are – shocked. After 4 weeks of detailed analysis I was finally able to start my therapy on Friday 26.8.22. I‘m ready for the biggest challenge of my life because I want to see more of our beautiful planet together with my beautiful wife Clare and our lovely Labrador dog Mara.
Our other African blogs so far:
"One crowded hour of glorious life is worth an age without a name"
(The Call - Thomas Osbert Morsdaunt, 1730-1809)
Travel blog and travel guide by Aaron Matzinger & Clare Walker
© Aaron Matzinger & Clare Walker