Into the Heart of Madness - This is Gabon!

[Atravelynn]

Now I have caught up.  What an amazing honor to witness the Bwiti ceremony.  I hope the woman who was having trouble recovered fully.  It reminds me a little of ayahuasca in South America.

  "A few times someone came near me with fire and sparks were flying but luckily no one got hurt and nothing caught on fire!"  Good. We don't need another trip report entitled, My Ass is on Fire--This is Gabon!

 

You all had an adventure in every sense of the word.

[PeterHG]

What a fantastic report of your memorable Gabon trip, @michael-ibk, @AndMic, @SafariChick, @Kitsafari and @gatoratlarge ! Compelling storytelling and great photography and video throughout. As others have stated, it's not a destination I can see myself going to, but I do admire you for taking on this adventure and thank you for sharing it with us!

[johnweir]

A remarkable adventure expertly narrated by you all.(@michael-ibk, @AndMic, @SafariChick, @Kitsafari and @gatoratlarge). The images /videos from all your cameras are wonderful too. An outstanding trip report in my opinion should make the reader want to visit the region being described, Gabon has just crept up my wish list thanks to this report. 

The variety of the bio-diversity you encountered was remarkable. The report was particularly interesting to read as your experiences good and bad were superbly written from several different perspectives. An epic and legendary expedition, thank you all for the detailed report which has obviously been thoroughly enjoyed by so many. 

[Caracal]

Many thanks @michael-ibk, @AndMic, @SafariChick, @Kitsafari and @gatoratlarge for this wonderful report. It's been a fascinating read with many different aspects.

I always enjoy reports that include some features of day to day life such as street scenes, markets, villages etc and these were included culminating in the Bwiti Ceremony. Great!

Then there was the amazing wildlife throughout.

Always more to learn:-

I'd always imagined forest elephants had short straight tusks so I was pleasantly surprised and impressed with your sightings.

Love those Buffalos with their colouring and shredded looking ears.

I've never seen a Sitatunga but in your photos they look to me to be about the size of a bushbuck. I'd imagined them to be bigger.

Palm nut vultures everywhere for you guys! I recall one sighting back in the 90's in South Luangwa and Robin Pope saying what a special sighting that was.

Seeing a Yellow -backed Duiker - is really special.I'm envious!

 

[Photo-Kiboko]

After about 1,5 years, I have a chance to have closer look to safaritalk.

It looks like I have missed a lot.

 

I have missed this great TR.

Now, I have enjoyed it word by word and picture by picture.

What hell of a trip!

The title fits perfect.

 

This is Gabon!

 

You can be really, really, really happy about your sightings.

Gorillas, Crocodiles, Monitor, Yellow-backed Duiker and fantastic Birds.

Blue Tuarako, Blue bellied Kingfisher, Blue shiny Kingfisher, Bee Eaters, ...

Wow!

Thank You for sharing text and pictures.

 

In June 2012 I was in Gabon with my friend Axel.

We have visited Luango (Sette Cama), Pongara, Lopé and Lekedi.

We had to deal with some little gabonese problems, too.

The trip report with 387 pictures is still in a German speaking photo-forum with difficult access.

I will start a thread, after I have uploaded it onto my home page.

 

Best regards

Bernd

 

[Kitsafari]

11 hours ago, Photo-Kiboko said:

In June 2012 I was in Gabon with my friend Axel.

We have visited Luango (Sette Cama), Pongara, Lopé and Lekedi.

We had to deal with some little gabonese problems, too.

The trip report with 387 pictures is still in a German speaking photo-forum with difficult access.

I will start a thread, after I have uploaded it onto my home page.

 

Best regards

Bernd

 

 

@Photo-Kiboko I'm very excited to read of your plans to do a re-visit in ST to your 2012 Gabon trip! very much looking forward to reading the TR!

Edited March 5, 2021 by Kitsafari

[jeremie]

On 9/20/2019 at 11:39 PM, Kitsafari said:

The train station in Libreville was about a 1-1.5-hour drive from where we were to Gare d'Owendo (where the train station was located). There were a couple of baggage helpers who very quickly took our bags,and very skillfully wrapped out bags tightly with cellophane wrap. I saw my bag magically shrank into a smaller bag, perhaps that 's what I should do for the lighter planes that are always stressing small soft bags are compulsory for their tiny cargo hold. 

Then we went into a VIP room to wait,  and soon it was time to check our passports and IDs before we boarded the Trans-Gabon train. 

 

 

The nicknamed Bongo Train runs on the country's only train line that traverses across the country from Libreville in the west to Franceville in the east. There's a bit of history behind the 670-km railway line. Construction began in 1974, a result of then President Omar Bongo, who went ahead with the project , determined to complete it to show the World Bank which had rejected any funding support for what it deemed an economically unviable project. Now the railway line is the lifeline for the economy and the population, the most efficient and fastest means of transport in an infrastructure-lacking country. By day, the freight trains bring precious manganese and logs from the forests and mines, and by night, passenger trains ferry humans. 

 

The main problem was for humans that you are highly likely to arrive at your destination smack in the middle of the night which means less sleep and getting off the train in almost total darkness. 

we were in the First Class which was very comfortable and relatively quiet. We found out there was a VIP class later with very cushy seats and very plush and serene. There are two restaurant cars on the train,and we would often see ladies carrying trays of food up and down the train, and I wondered if there was a party somewhere to which we weren't invited!

 

The train ride to Lope took about 5 or so hours. The evening soft glow that faintly lit up  villages and towns along the rail line soon gave up, and darkness swallowed the outside scenes. it was a pretty smooth ride and the chair was comfortable enough to have a snooze if you could. I forgot to take photos of the internal car - maybe one of the others might have. 

The long train has outgrown the original platforms.When we reached Lope at around midnight, we found we weren't getting off at the platform but a way off it. The drop from the last step to the ground was at least a metre which made getting off with bags in tow a bit of an art to make it look graceful. We abandoned gracefulness for practicality and the guys were all on hand to help the ladies down. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think you still don't realize how lucky you got to arrive at midnight... 

 

We took the train in 2022 ourselves. We had to leave at 5 pm, but schedule changed for 4 pm. But the train only arrived a 6:30 pm. And left around 7:30 pm... Instead of arriving at 11 pm. We arrived at 6:30 am without sleeping, a freezing train... It was by far the most terrible experience of any train in the world by now! But we visited Ivindo National Park and Kongoue Falls, which is a must and deserve all these disagreements!

[Kitsafari]

@jeremie I have to agree - we were very lucky indeed that all the trains we took were actually mostly on time (give and take half an hour) as we had heard stories of much delayed arrivals. so schedule-wise, our train rides were good. and having learned after returning home that the people of Gabon can only take the train in the nights made us appreciate the train rides we had even more. 

 

I''m surprised though you said the train was freezing. the train cars we had were quite comfortable although none of us (except Michael) had any sleep on the rides.