As a result of decades of poaching and unrest, Rwanda is home to more than a thousand mountain gorillas, according to the most recent count.
As a result of decades of poaching and unrest, Rwanda is home to more than a thousand mountain gorillas, according to the most recent count.
As we drive up the Rwandan highlands to see mountain gorillas in the wild, iconic movie scenes start to come to mind.
The image of King Kong at the summit of the Empire State Building with Ann Darrow in hand and Mighty Joe Young saving a child from the top of a ferris wheel.
As the mist moves down over the valley beyond the edge of the winding mountain-side road, we remember Gorillas In The Mist.
Dian Fossey’s book-turned Academy award-winning film charted her gorilla conservation efforts at Volcanoes National Park – the very park we are driving towards, and one of only three areas in the world where mountain gorillas exist.
In the manicured gardens of the base camp, I sit down with one of the most experienced guides at the park, Dusabimana Patience.
He first saw the gorillas in the wild as a child.
“I thought it was an older man who was there, but then they told me it was a gorilla,” he says.
