Misty Mountains of the Vumba & the Vast Wilderness of Gonarezhou

[AKR1]

At the risk of offending others who produced so many magnificent trip reports over the past year, I’m nominating this one for best trip report of the year 2022🥁🥁🥁

[Atravelynn]

42 minutes ago, AKR1 said:

At the risk of offending others who produced so many magnificent trip reports over the past year, I’m nominating this one for best trip report of the year 2022🥁🥁🥁

"I'd like to thank my co-stars, my guide, the camp staff, the beautiful cliffs, the producer, the director, special effects, the nominating committee...Oh, I hear the music, my acceptance is running on too long."

 

Very kind of you @AKR1

 

 

 

Edited February 4, 2023 by Atravelynn

[Atravelynn]

2 hours ago, michael-ibk said:

And thanks Doug, great job again! This was our fifth trip together - and we just booked Nr. 6.  If you want a great private guide who´s 100 % about seeing cool stuff and maximising your time in the bush he´s your man.

 

 

I second that!

 

Brilliant conclusion, birding right up until the end.

[TonyQ]

A great job @michael-ibk , @Atravelynn, @AndMic

A really enjoyable report, thank you

[Atravelynn]

3 hours ago, TonyQ said:

A great job @michael-ibk , @Atravelynn, @AndMic

A really enjoyable report, thank you

Thanks, we had fun doing the report and even more fun on the trip, as it should be.

[Zubbie15]

3 hours ago, TonyQ said:

A great job @michael-ibk , @Atravelynn, @AndMic

A really enjoyable report, thank you

x2, really enjoyed this, definitely one for the bucket list! Thanks for sharing. 

[Kitsafari]

Gona looks wetter than when @optig and I were there a few years ago. I've been meaning to ask - are the baobabs still being stripped by the elephants or has that been reduced? when we were there, the park management had adopted a strategy of placing large rocks around the baobab trees to prevent elephants getting to the trunks. are they still doing that, or have they abandoned protecting the baobabs? 

 

Thanks for the wonderful journey, and the fabulous images!

[Kitsafari]

Chilo Lodge looks awesome! Tick

Doggies! Tick

Birdies! Tick

Landscape! Tick

 

perhaps a return trip via a longer stay at Chilo Lodge is called for, after all.....

 

[Atravelynn]

20 minutes ago, Kitsafari said:

Gona looks wetter than when @optig and I were there a few years ago.  In Nov 4-11, there had been rain so that everything was very green.  I've been meaning to ask - are the baobabs still being stripped by the elephants or has that been reduced? when we were there, the park management had adopted a strategy of placing large rocks around the baobab trees to prevent elephants getting to the trunks. are they still doing that, or have they abandoned protecting the baobabs?  Large rocks were one strategy.  Another was a wire barrier like caging or fencing.  That seemed to work best.

 

Thanks for the wonderful journey, and the fabulous images!  Thank you for reading.  You commented on staying in Chilo Lodge.  The long intricate pathways with little cutouts to view the river were like a fairy tale.  We had heavy rain during our stay which reduced our time on the paths and made them slippery.  Spending more days here to enjoy the grounds as well as the park in this region would be rewarding.

 

[AfricIan]

Thanks for a wonderful report, my September trip to Gonarezhou seems such a long way off 

 

On 2/1/2023 at 8:30 PM, michael-ibk said:

A Coastal South African specialty, forgot the name - a brilliant Curry you pour into the bread. Delicious!

That's a classic KwaZulu-Natal takeaway known as "Bunny Chow" because you eat it "on the hop" 

[inyathi]

 

@michael-ibk

It looks like you saw most of the birds up in the mountains and certainly a few that I didn’t see when I was in the Eastern Highlands, but I may have seen elsewhere, this report is a great advert for Seldomseen and birding in Zim. I think Zim gets a bit overlooked as a birding destination, because it doesn’t have any endemic species, the Eastern Highlands seem to be a bit of well kept secret, not very well known outside of Zim birding circles, this is a bit of shame, as there really are some great birds to be seen, as you’ve shown and I’m sure the area could use a few more tourists. Being up in the mountains is also a good contrast, to the more familiar parts of Zimbabwe. 

 

Whilst Zim doesn’t have any endemics, it does have a few near endemics, notably Boulder Chat, this species otherwise just occurs over the border in Botswana and then in the area, where Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia meet. Then Swynnerton’s Robin that you saw, it is a montane forest bird only found in the Eastern Highlands, on some Mozambique mountains and in some of the Eastern Arc Mts in Tanzania, so for anyone who wants to see one, a visit to Seldomseen would be a great choice.

 

For the benefit of anyone who is interested in going birding in Zim, I thought I would add the following.

 

I missed Boulder Chat on a visit to Dzalanyama Forest Reserve in Malawi, so on my Zim safari, I was hoping to see it in Matopos NP, but we’d arranged a back up spot to try, in case we missed it there. At the end of the safari, after my stay at Seldomseen, we went on to Aberfoyle Lodge in the Honde Valley, for a bit more highland birding and then headed back to Harare, but on the way stopped at a place called Gosho Park near Marondera. Gosho Park is a tiny game reserve established and run by Peterhouse Schools Group, the farmer who owned the land bordering the girls school, donated a patch of Brachystegia/Miombo woodland with lots of little rock kopjes in amongst, to Peterhouse as it was no use for farming. I believe that Peter Fearnhead the CEO of African Parks was a student at the boys school at time, and was involved in setting up the park, after putting up fencing, various antelopes were introduced, along with giraffes and zebras. Although created for the use of the school students, it is open to the wider public, and it is supposed to be one of the best sites for Boulder Chat after Matopos and also possibly the best Miombo Birding site in Zim. As it happens we had excellent views of Boulder Chat in Matopos and could not find a single one in Gosho Park, however, I'm glad we went there, as we did see Whyte’s Barbet and White-breasted Cuckooshrike and some other nice birds, there’s also a little bit of rock art there. I thought I’d mention this, if after reading this report anyone is seriously tempted to visit Seldomseen and the Eastern Highlands and is going to be going by road from Mutare back to Harare afterwards, then it’s definitely worth trying to fit in a stop at Gosho Park, or you could obviously do it on the way to Mutare, despite being only about 340 hectares or 840 acres, 237 bird species have been recorded, including Spotted Creeper, although I didn’t see it there. You can download a bird list with specials highlighted from their website. Peterhouse Gosho Park

 

On 1/25/2023 at 12:10 AM, Atravelynn said:

Why am I not surprised you have been to these remote places--and a whole decade ago!?

@Atravelynn

 

I do always like to get in ahead of the crowds. 

 

Actually, I think it was entirely down to the book Southern African Birdfinder, that we tacked a visit to Seldomseen, Aberfoyle and Gosho Park onto the end of our Zim safari, apart from looking for the Boulder Chat whilst visiting Matopos NP, on the main part of the safari, birding took a backseat, most of the time, so some of us needed to stay on a bit longer for a proper birding fix.  The book is a little out of date now, but should still have useful information, at least regarding birds and other wildlife, it looks like I seriously missed out on one thing, I didn’t know about Tony’s Coffee Shop, looks like the perfect place to go, when things are getting a bit too wet. I think Gonarezhou is certainly remote, you really get a sense of being in the wilderness, but I am now not sure Seldomseen qualifies as being seriously remote, if you can nip down the road, for the world’s best hot chocolate and cake.

 

 

In Gonarezhou, I’m a bit disappointed that you cheated and went up to the top of the cliffs by car , as I am sure you know there are trails up and down, I think from recollection it must have taken a couple of hours to walk from camp to the top, there’s no real climbing involved, just a bit of a scramble up the steep bits near the top. Whichever way you choose to get to the top, I think everyone who visits the cliffs should make the effort to go up, the views of the cliffs and the views from the top, make Chilojo one of the most spectacular places in Africa. I didn’t visit Masasanya Dam or Chilo Gorge, good to learn about those parts of Gonarezhou. With this report I’m sure you’ve added Gonarezhou to quite a few people’s safari bucket list, I'd be very happy to go back.

 

 

 

[michael-ibk]

Many thanks everybody!

 

19 hours ago, inyathi said:

I didn’t know about Tony’s Coffee Shop, looks like the perfect place to go, when things are getting a bit too wet. I think Gonarezhou is certainly remote, you really get a sense of being in the wilderness, but I am now not sure Seldomseen qualifies as being seriously remote,

 

Thanks @inyathi, very useful information. I think the Vumba Mountains do get quite a fair bit of local visitors, that´s why Tony is doing fine there. Doug told us there are two kinds of (middle or upper class) people in Harare. The ones who go to the Zambezi and the ones who do the Vumba. A lot of places to stay there, Zimbabwean really enjoy the temperate climate there. And of course a lot of peopel live nearby in Mutare and around.

 

@Kitsafari

 

You would think the wire thing around the Baobas Lynn mentioned would stick out but it´s really not noticable at all until you get close to the tree. And it´s far easier for parks to do than the rocks. Seems to work quite well against the Elephants.

[Towlersonsafari]

what a very enjoyable report!

[pedro maia]

Great report of what looks like a wonderfull remote park with beautiful landscapes.

 

Many great photos, including @AndMicbaobabs, and a surprise to see the piano man, aka @michael-ibk.

[michael-ibk]

Thanks @pedro maia! 

[John M.]

My browsing is spasmodic for various reasons, so I've only just seen this TR.  Delightful! I love the double barrelled approach.

[michael-ibk]

Thanks @John M., glad you enjoyed it. 🙂