wildlife

All posts tagged wildlife

Dreaming of Zanzibar – Jozani-Chwaka Bay and its Monkeys

Posted by Nesh on May 5, 2014

Posted in: life, myself, photography, Tanzania, travel. Tagged: blue monkeys, jozani-chwaka national park, Photography, sykes monkey, wildlife, Zanzibar. Leave a Comment

This post is the seventh in a set of publications which will describe the last trip I did in East Africa, back in August, leading me to Zanzibar and back again.
In my last day in Zanzibar, I had the chance to choose among several available tours: from properly visiting the east side of the island to even swim with dolphins, but I decided to visit Jozani Chwaka Bay National Park, a great place to see monkeys and walk in the woods.

Baby red colobus

Once I arrived at the park, I was assigned a friendly guide who introduced me to the park and the animals there. I was the only one in that time slot, so we had the freedom stop in some parts I found more interesting.
On the way to the first area, he told me that there are 2 types of monkeys at the park: the more common and friendly Zanzibar red colobus and the Zanzibar Sykes’ monkeys, more shy and harder to see.

Zanzibar (blue) Sykes’ monkey

Murchison Falls – Chimp Tracking

Posted by Nesh on August 6, 2013

Posted in: myself, photography, travel, Uganda. Tagged: africa, ape, chimp, chimpanzee, Digital Photography, monkey, Murchison Falls National Park, Nature, Nikon, Nikon D5000, Photography, travels, uganda, wildlife. Leave a Comment

Sleepy faces. Slow movements. Few words. A common scene from an early morning. A nice breakfast put us all back on our feet, ready for chimp tracking.
For the tracking, we had to go into the thick forest, moving slowly and staying together in a group. This is necessary in order to not be considered a threat by the chimpanzees; scattering around would give them a feeling of being surrounded, frightening them.

It took us a good hour (or so) before we could see a chimp. Until then we could hear them calling each other (chimps have a sort of language; there are up to 30-40 sounds used for indicating different actions, i.e. food, anger, danger…).
The first one, was a rather sleepy one; he stayed most of the time laid down on a large branch and chilling under the sunlight, turning around at times.
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Murchison Falls – Lunch break on the Nile

Posted by Nesh on July 25, 2013

Posted in: life, myself, photography, travel, Uganda. Tagged: africa, bush pigs, kampala, Murchison Falls, Murchison Falls National Park, Nikon, Nikon D5000, Nile, safari, uganda, wildlife. 2 comments

And as you can understand from the pattern I use in the titles, the game drive ended without us being able to see any lion.
Our guides also went to get a ranger for tracking the felines, but luck wasn’t on our side this time. Once we got to the place where they were supposed to be staying, we just found lonely bushes and grass, without any sort of cat.
After an hour, we just gave up as it was time to catch the ferry which would bring us to the other side of the river Nile for lunch.

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Murchison Falls – Game Drive – Elephants

Posted by Nesh on July 25, 2013

Posted in: life, myself, photography, travel, Uganda. Tagged: africa, Elephants, game, game drive, kampala, Murchison Falls, Murchison Falls National Park, Nikon, Nikon D5000, Nile, Park, Photography, safari, savannah, travels, uganda, wildlife. Leave a Comment

Today I will publish 2 posts as tomorrow I will leave for my Rwanda-Burundi trip and I will not be able to publish anything for few days.
I can say we have been both lucky and unlucky; lucky because we managed to see some elephants, unlucky because they were quite far from us. I know it is not much of a big deal, but other tourists had the chance to see them really close to them.

Due to them being far, I couldn’t grasp much of their behaviour; but I am pretty sure I will see them again some time soon!

/Nesh

Murchison Falls – Game Drive – Giraffes

Posted by Nesh on July 24, 2013

Posted in: life, myself, photography, travel, Uganda. Tagged: africa, digital, drive, game drive, Giraffe, giraffes, kampala, Karuma, Murchison Falls, Nikon, Nikon D5000, Photography, safari, savannah, uganda, waterfalls, wildlife. Leave a Comment

I must say I was quite surprised when I first saw a giraffe in real life. Of course, I knew they were very tall, I read it gazillion of times and saw loads of pictures, but being just few meters away made a huge difference. Even the smallest one, a baby giraffe, was tall compared to us (or our van).

We saw them in 2 occasions and got to take pictures both from afar and very close-by. Although they tended to not get too close to us, they seemed to be very interested in us; especially the baby giraffe, which literally stood on the road in front of us, just facing us.
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Murchison Falls – Karuma Falls and close encounter with baboons

Posted by Nesh on July 22, 2013

Posted in: life, myself, photography, travel, Uganda. Tagged: africa, baboon, kampala, Karuma, Karuma Falls, Murchison Falls, Murchison Falls National Park, nikond5000, Nile, Photography, safari, uganda, wildlife. Leave a Comment

After the Rhino Sanctuary, we headed for a short stop at the Karuma Falls.
From this point on, we will be more or less following the river Nile to get to the Murchison Falls.
On the way to the falls, just after the bridge which brought on the other side of the Nile, we met a congress of baboons just next to the road. They were not scared at all, we were literally 1 mt away from them; and, among the group, there were also a mother with 2 young baboons.

It was just amazing, I was so close to them and, thanks to the zoom of my lens, I could get even closer. We had just few minutes before the group moved on and so did we.

The waterfall was very large and loud. They are planning to buy an electric dam just on it, so we might be among the last people to see the falls in its natural beauty, before being spoiled by man-made constructions.
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Murchison Falls Safari – Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary

Posted by Nesh on July 22, 2013

Posted in: life, myself, photography, travel, Uganda. Tagged: africa, kampala, Murchison Falls, Murchison Falls National Park, Nikon, Nikon D5000, Photography, safari, sanctuary, uganda, White rhinoceros, wildlife, Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary. Leave a Comment

Here we go!
Last week has been quite of a pain in terms of connectivity. I had little connection and I could not post/upload anything; so I need to catch up!
Two weekends ago, some friends and I went to a tour at Murchison Falls; it was a 3-day tour departing from Kampala, passing by the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary and then heading to the Murchison Falls national park for a game drive and, on the last day, for chimpanzee tracking.
I probably don’t even need to tell that this was by far the most amazing trip I have ever done! It was incredibly well-planned and our group was great (our whole group was composed by several groups merging together); we had so much fun together!

Our trip started in Kampala at 8am and our first stop was the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, on the way to Murchison Falls. It is the only place where it is possible to see white rhinos in Uganda.
It is a very quiet and well-kept place. It is even possible to ‘adopt’ a rhino and name it as you wish (for a donation); so there were rhinos with quite interesting and funny names (one was named Obama, as its mom was Kenyan and the father from US).
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Lake Mburo National Park – Conclusion

Posted by Nesh on July 5, 2013

Posted in: life, myself, photography, travel, Uganda. Tagged: africa, Art, blog, digital, Digital Photography, hippo, journey, kampala, Lake Mburo, Lake Mburo National Park, Life, Murchison Falls National Park, Nature, Nikon, Nikon D5000, Park, Photography, rhino, safari, Travel and Tourism, uganda, vulture, wildlife. Leave a Comment

At last, we are at the conclusion of this journey through this incredible park, considering its size.
We had the chance to see and appreciate very different species and got to finally see them in real life.

A venue of vultures on a tree.

This was my first safari and I truly loved it. My first but not my last.
In fact, in 2 weeks I am going to undertake another and much longer challenge: Murchison Falls National Park.

Skulls of several animals, including an hippo (the largest one).

Lake Mburo National Park – Antelopes

Posted by Nesh on July 3, 2013

Posted in: life, myself, photography, travel, Uganda. Tagged: africa, Antelope, digital art, Digital Photography, impala, kampala, Lake Mburo, Lake Mburo National Park, Mbrara, National park, Nikon D5000, oribi, Photography, safari, Travel and Tourism, travels, uganda, wildlife. 4 comments

Today, the focus is on the antelopes of the park.
As you will notice from the images, these animals are very curious and, after getting to know us and understanding that we are not a threat to their community, sociable; in fact, we could get quite close to them without scare them away or disrupting their behaviour.

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Lake Mburo National Park – Zebras

Posted by Nesh on July 2, 2013

Posted in: life, myself, photography, travel, Uganda. Tagged: africa, blog, D5000, digital, digital art, Digital Photography, journey, kampala, Lake Mburo, National park, Nature, Photography, safari, uganda, wildlife, zebra. Leave a Comment

Hello,
the journey at the Lake Mburo national park continues with a very beautiful animal: the zebra.
This time, the post is going to be mainly visual, meaning that I won’t write much and let you get a feeling by yourself.

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