Bijilo Forest Park

When we woke up this morning we realised that our water heater has been leaking through the night into our laundry basket resulting in quite a few clothes with rusty stain marks on them. We put them straight into the bath with some detergent and Paul started scrubbing them with some soap, some of the whites went straight into some bleach however not all the marks would come out very annoyed as three of my white tops are ruined.

We finally ate breakfast, showered and set out for Bijilo Forest Park and Nature Trail or Monkey Park as it is known to the locals situated in Senegambia area. We entered the park and were approached by a guide who explained that the ticket office was not yet open so we will need to pay on our exit. He then showed us the type of animals which frequent the park including two types of monkey, squirrels, monitor lizards, spiders, snakes, butterflies and birds. We set off walking along the sandy path and through the forest of Rhun Palms which is one of the last places to see them, they used to run along the coastline but have been ravaged by builders and developers for the use of beams resulting in the erosion of the coastline especially noticeable around the Senegambia area.

Colobus Monkey's

The park was layed out into four sections colour coded in Red, Green, Blue and Yellow and about half a square kilometre in size with benches situated at varies points on route. Bradley was happy to run off a head and pointing out things of interest. It didn’t take us long to hear the familiar noise of trees being moved and on looking up we could see a Colobus monkey with baby in a distant tree, however not in range for a good photo. We walked further passing large webs of spiders and then heard the familiar screeching noise of monkey’s fighting. We set off in that direction looking up in the trees and suddenly saw a group of Colobus monkeys jumping from palm to palm.

Vervet Monkey's

Managing to get some photos we continued on following the colour marked route looping around and following the edge of the beach heading back towards the entrance, Having been in the park for a couple of hours it was very hot and sticky and a welcome relief to have the shading of the palms overhead. We followed the path down some steps passing another visitor who told us there were lots of monkey’s further on. We then passed a thatched seated area with a guide relaxing on a bench and we were just about to carry on when on looking up we could see loads of Vervet Monkey’s within the surrounding trees. They were very inquisitive walking past us on the path and were quite happy to sit and have their photos taken, Abigail pointed out a baby suckling from it’s mother. With plenty of photos we continued on Abigail jumping when a monkey came strolling around the corner passing us just feet away.

Two Cheeky Monkey's

Peek-a-Boo

Bottoms Up

Further on the track led to a bird watching area so we decided to enter only to quickly run out when Paul shouted “Ow” as something had flew from the wall and bit his ear. We finally arrived back at the entrance passing another large group of monkey’s sat grooming each other with bums in the air and others sat on the path one of which gave Bradley a scare when it chased after him. Paul paid our fee and showed the guide the bite on his ear which he didn’t think it was anything to worry about we then headed back to the car. We were in need of a drink so we got out the frozen juice and some apples I had brought with us. No sooner had the bag rustled we had monkey’s around us trying to steal the apples Abigail and Bradley were getting a bit scarred so we quickly got into the car. On the way home we called at one of the Kariba Shopping Centres where I managed to get a few things for Abigail’s birthday making sure they were well hidden we left for home.

On the evening we were invited to Mariella’s, we arrived just before 7.00pm as we had also asked John to take a photo of us to forward onto the Gazette as they are looking at doing another article about our life in The Gambia. Some of Mariella’s Dutch friends were over visiting for the fortnight before Mariella finishes her volunteering in December. When Bradley fell a sleep on my lap we knew it was time to make our exit for home.