articles/Nature/ashtonsgambia-page5

Ashton's Gambia - part 5 of 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

by Jonathan Ashton Published 01/02/2011

The Experience

After a flight of about six hours from Birmingham we arrived at Banjul airport. The heat and humidity were incredible after leaving the UK in one of our protracted cold spells - going from -50°C to 34°C and very high humidity was a mighty shock to the system. After arriving at the hotel at 5.45pm (local time is same as UK) we unpacked, checked all the photographic gear and had a wee dram; I always kid myself that this is for medicinal purposes, the alcohol kills any bugs in my digestive tract! We soon discovered, however, that this was not a good idea and the whisky came back home (much to my surprise), a few local lagers were a much better idea. Food in the hotels is in general quite good and sometimes very good indeed, the local fish is always very fresh and is delicious. We had a minor bout of Banjul belly for one day, but this did not spoil the holiday at all - we soon recovered.

The following day was an easy day, we were pretty tired after the flight and getting used to the heat was, we decided, a gradual thing, so we stayed in the hotel grounds photographing various birds, lizards, monitors, dragonflies and monkeys - a very pleasant start to the holiday. As might be expected the light is best in the earlier part of the morning and later on in the afternoon, sun rises at about 6.45 am and it is pretty well dark by about 6.45 pm.

The next day we went to what has been referred to as the Jewel of Africa, ie Abuko Forest Reserve. As you travel along the roads there are many ramshackle buildings so, upon arrival, we were not surprised to see the entrance in a poor state of repair. We walked through the reserve for about a mile or mile and a half to get to the 'photographers' hides' - these are near to the animal hospital/sanctuary. The hides were in a state of disrepair and the vegetation in the viewing area was overgrown - this resulted in very poor photographic opportunities.

The light between the leaves of trees was very intense and this made for poor backgrounds (a good deal of time has since been spent in Photoshop). There is a small fee to pay for the hides - cheap enough, but we were very disappointed, apparently Abuko Forest Reserve was initially established by an Englishman who has since been unable to remain and the reserve facilities have fallen into a poor state of repair. To add insult to injury one of the staff directed us to a hide that we had missed - he requested a tip for this - we obliged and when we got there the hide had completely collapsed - it was under water! Abuko then, was very disappointing, especially after my friend had been 10 years previously and he had regarded it as one of the premier sites he had ever visited - we had expected so much and yet achieved so little.

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• Ashton's Gambia page 2
  
• Ashton's Gambia page 3
  
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• Ashton's Gambia page 5
  
• Ashton's Gambia page 6
  
• Ashton's Gambia page 7
  

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