Ok…I promise that for the following blogs on Gabon, I wont complain how difficult and frustrating my travel was all the good stuff from here onwards.
The train journey was on the Trans-Gabonese train that extends from Libreville to the west to the city of Franceville in the east of the country. My stop was roughly halfway through this stretch and I was supposed to get down in a village called as Lope which was located on the outskirts of the Lope National Park which is the oldest and probably most easily accessible park in Gabon. On the train, I had asked a lady who was getting down at the same station how big the village was and she said “petite petite Ville” which translates to “small small Village”. I got the idea; the train arrived in Lope ahead of schedule and I was glad that the same woman woke me from my slumber 15 minutes before the train arrived at the station else I could have slept through my stop.
View of the northern region of the park as we are climbing Mount Brazza
Alternating patches of savanna and forests which creates a unique habitat
From what I could see in the dim light, the station resembled a quintessential station from rural India. It was 2 am as I got down from the train and the first thought was the distance of the park from the station and how to get there. The second thought was where to spending the night.
River Ogooue
Perhaps it was a sign that my luck was finally changing…as the same train brought along some park rangers and I proceeded to ask one of them on my options. He tried helping me but could not get his idea across due to the language barrier so he called out for a guy from the back of the vehicle and out stepped Eddy…a park ranger with perfect English. He told me that the entrance to the park was not far off and asked me to see him the next morning. Safe in the knowledge that things looked quite positive for the park visit the next morning, I turned to the woman who had helped me thus far to thank her before proceeding to pullout my sleeping bag and finding a good spot to see the night out.
Wild Guava
Lope Station
The kind lady said that I didn’t need to sleep at the station and offered to let me sleep in an extra room she had in her humble abode. I readily agreed. Along the way to her house I learnt that she was a teacher at a local school and that’s why she could speak a little English.
The next day I woke up early, packed up and went to the lady to say goodbye and give her some money for helping me. As I proceeded to take the money from my front pocket she waved her hand and said No….Mon Amie…Frrrriend”. Her house was basic and she probably lived a very modest life but I was amazed by her kind gesture without the expectation of any benefit. In a lot of developing and underdeveloped nations it would be a norm to expect some tip but her generosity stood out. I thanked and hugged her as she showed me the directions to the park.
At the park, Eddy assigned me a guide and we hiked to a hill called “Mount Brazza” to get a very impressive view of the Ogooue River as it snaked around the surrounding hills of the park. The landscape consisted of gentle rolling hills with alternating patches of savanna and thick rainforest. It was a real surprise to see savanna grassland in Gabon since it is so close to the equator and its existence is debated but the version I find most plausible is that the region of Central Africa has always fluctuated between savanna and rainforest with global cooling and warming. Ice age resulted in savanna and now the forests are gradually retaking the region.
Savanna view
The hut where i camped the night
Made for a nice resting spot
Later in the afternoon, I took a ride in the park vehicle around the northern area of the park to try to spot forest elephants and buffaloes. My first sight was a solitary elephant a bit far away but I was able to see it with my binoculars. That day we saw about 5-6 elephants though none were close enough for a good view or a good picture. The safari was certainly unlike the one I did in South Africa as the elephants were shy and come out of the forest only in the evening and generally avoid human interaction. Below is a video of the last elephant we saw as we returned back to camp. The video is courtesy of Monfang who was a Gabonese also visiting the park and was during a research on infracture for eco-tourism in Gabon's National Parks
Droppings of forest hog
At night, I walked back to the village for dinner and was pleasantly surprised at how delicious the road-side grilled chicken was. After dinner, it was time to walk back to the camp with my torch light on hoping to spot buffaloes and elephants that might have come out of the forest for grazing at night.
Moustached Monkey in the tree (if you can see it)
Eddy allowed me to camp in a small hut right by the entrance of the park. Before he gave me the permission though, he told me that elephants and buffaloes frequently forage around the hut at night and asked if it was still ok. I nodded in agreement as he wished me good luck and we called it a night. I tried to stay awake for a while hoping to catch a sight of the mammals but soon dozed off just to wake up in the middle of the night when I heard some noise. I was hoping it would be a buffalo or an elephant but it happened to be the branches of a nearby tree scratching the thatch of my hut.
The second morning the guide took me on a walk in the forest and all that the forest offered after four hours of walking was a fleeting sight of a forest antelope, and a few Moustached Monkeys jumping through the canopy.
Fantastic view of three Forest Elephants and the forest in the background
The evening tour in the 4X4 was far more eventful. After about an hour of driving around the savanna we encountered three elephants that seemed far less shy but still wary. The lighting was also much better for pictures and although I was not able to get top quality pictures with my point and shoot camera, the binoculars were very handy and allowed me to see the amazing animals up close.
I hoped to spend the next couple days in the south of the park where the savanna gives way to dense rainforest and brings with it possible Gorillas and Chimpanzees sightings. The Mikongo camp as it was called was run in collaboration with the Wildlife Conservation Society but the transportation to that part of the park was difficult and unfeasible for a single traveler. Eddy told me that I could wait for three days and join another group that was scheduled to go there but three days waiting around was not a viable option for me so I decided to skip Mikongo with the hope that I can see the Great Apes in some other parks later.
Awesome food served with a smile
That signaled the end of my time in Lope and it was time to move on to the next national park. Eddy hooked me up with the chief conservator of a park further east of Lope called as Ivindo National Park who happened to be vacationing in Lope with his family. I got his phone number and promised to call him when I got there.
Waiting for the train
I packed, thanked Eddy for all his help and the park vehicle dropped me back at the railway station where I slept few hours and then caught the train around 2am to the next station east called Booue.
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