Calabar...

Last week I took some holidays to join some friends on a trip in the south of Nigeria. Calabar is an old colonial town and one of the most popular tourist destinations in the country. So I travelled to Abuja on Monday evening in order to start by 6am on Tuesday morning. Our ‘luxury bus’ (i.e. air conditioning, a seat each & a driver with a will to live) took 9.5 hours to reach Calabar. There I joined Helen, Julia and Edel who had just spent their Easter break in Ghana, and we stayed with another volunteer Yikii for 3 days. Theres plenty to see in Calabar – probably the best Niaja museum (although light went after 20 minutes so we only saw the small section with natural light); and the monkey sanctuary at Pandrillus where they take care of endangered drill monkeys and chimpanzees and prepare them to be returned to their natural habitat in the Cross River rainforest. Unfortunately these primates are very endangered and there is still a huge culture of hunting them for food and for sale. The sanctuary is full of rescued animals that have been taken as pets or entertainers. We also took a slow boat to Creek town – a beautiful trip up the almost Amazonian Cross river. It was funny to climb into a boat of Nigerians commuting between home and the city who were undoubtedly wondering what these crazy obiyos could enjoy about their daily journey.
By Friday we left Calabar and headed north. We spent the morning at the spectacular Kwa Falls thanks to a kind friend of Yikii’s who drove us. It was hard to leave that very peaceful place but then we went back to Calabar and chartered a car to take us 4 hours north to a little town by the rainforest. Early the next morning we headed into the rainforest. An hour drive followed by a 40-minute okada ride on a rough dirt road brought us to Afi Mountain before 8am. This is the second part of the Pandrillus monkey sanctuary. After the animals have adjusted to life in the Calabar sanctuary they are brought to live here in their natural habitat. They stay in large enclosures that are surrounded by electric fencing; this helps them to adjust back to life in the rainforest. At present there are 5 groups of drills monkeys and 1 group of chimpanzees at Afi. In the coming year there are plans to release the first group back into the wild. The drill monkeys are a joy to watch but Ive got to admit I loved the chimps. My two favourites were Pablo and the mad bad Murphy. Pablo is an elderly chimp who was rescued as traffickers tried to abscond with him to the Far East. By that time he had been in a hot ship container for so long that he suffered a stroke, and the effects of this are still clearly evident today as he limps about. But he was benign and curious and an utter gentleman. The same couldn’t be said for Murphy. Murphy was one of the many chimps rescued from bars in Nigeria; he was a source of entertainment for the customers and frequently tormented by children in the area. He has a good memory and a reputation for throwing stones at people. And he did. He started by lobbing a small stone at us grinning oyibos and then an orange. When that didn’t work he moved onto to a coconut (see wobbly picture as I was in fear of my life); when he came out of the bush with a big branch his effort finally paid off. We ran. But maybe my favourite story of all is of Kingston. He used to be in the chimp enclosure but had to be moved. Apparently one of his preferred pastimes was to go into the bush and find a long log. In the evening when the staff thinned out a bit he figured how to lean the log against the electric fence and climb out. Resulting in mayhem! Seeing these primates in their natural environment was a very special thing. The work done on behalf of these animals is amazing but it is not really supported here. Infact Nigerian zoos are regularly implicated in the hunting and selling of primates to both rich Nigerians and overseas zoos/private collectors. Its an uphill battle for the Pandrillus staff and others like them.
The rest of our stay in the rainforest was brilliant. Our cabins were hidden away in the trees. The walls were waste-high wood and then there was clear mossie-netting up to the roof. So you really felt like you were sleeping out. Infact if you lean back in your bed you could watch the stars. The bush shower was also a wonderful experience – out in the open with a bucket of warmed water over your head. The Cross River tourist board have built a canopy walkway in the forest that starts at about 14 feet up and climbs to 35 feet in the air. It is a swinging bridge up in the trees – equally spectacular and terrifying J All in all it was a fantastic trip and a great break before I go home. I left the rain in the south and I know it will soon start its journey north so I may see some rain before I finish up.