October is always a busy month and we have been predictably full most of the month. Less predictable is the weather which has alternated between scorching hot mornings with our guests coming home tanned and happy and sudden outbursts of rain and even hail in the afternoons! What a lovely excuse to curl up with a book in front of a log fire in the rooms and wait for the clouds to clear and give you a chance for a picture of the sun setting over the Congo and the magnificent Mt Mikeno as a subject while you enjoy a cocktail before dinner?
The Gorillas are thriving and the gossip that comes back with our guests read like episodes from the Bold and the Beautiful with indiscretions from some of the younger females getting ardent blackbacks into serious trouble from the grumpy Silverbacks! All this trouble has, of course, led to numerous babies being born, which delights us and they are clucked and cooed over by our guests like numerous grandchildren.
Mountain Gorillas, photo credit Grant Burnet
This month we have been proud to be part of the launch of the newest wildlife book, “Remembering Great Apes” at the Royal Geographical Society in London and attended by numerous dignitaries and some of our own team both past and present. All the profits accrued from this book are donated to conservation of the Great Apes and our thanks go to the generous photographers who donated their images to this cause and to the lovely Margot Raggett who has put aside a year of her life to producing this book after coming to seeing the gorillas with us a year ago. The book is available for sale in our gift shop – all proceeds from the book go to conservation of gorillas and other great apes.
Remembering Great Apes, available in our book shop.
Sacola, the governing body who ‘own’ Sabyinyo on behalf of the 60,000 strong local community have been busy both with ongoing work on the water program which brings piped water to progressively more and more settlements within our area but also with preparation of a celebration of TEN YEARS cooperation with Governors’ Camps who manage the facility on their behalf. This will comprise of a huge public feast to be held at the Kwita Izina site for the general Public and then a slightly more formal luncheon at the lodge for all the partners in both the government and private sectors who have helped us on this road.
The celebration ceremony set up at the Kwita Izina site, photo credit Alisa Bowen
We will be showing our celebratory film which documents all the hard work by SACOLA and the ongoing commitment by Governors’ Camps, plus the remarkable relationship between the two, during the ceremony.
By Philip Mason, Manager at Sabyinyo Silverback Lodge.
