Written by Charlie
In March 2009 I got a call from Andrew asking whether I would like to go for a drive to Leister. At the time I was living up the road from Andrew and Dee and was always keen on a day trip out of London. It was a nice drive north through snowy white countryside to where Andrew and I first met ‘Mr Bling’, a burgundy 1997 Landcruiser. Nine months later I found myself the under the same Landcruiser at 3 am tired, freezing, filthy and regretting ever suggesting that Andrew should buy the car. Now after spending 6 weeks travelling in it, I can say that I like Mr Bling. I was never planned as a guest on this trip, but at the end of April I found myself on an SAA plane hoping to catch up to others in Cameroon. Andrew has never said it directly, but I think he may have invited me along just in case the long range tank that I fitted, falls off before he gets to Joburg.
I caught up to everyone in Buea on the slopes of Mt Cameroon. After a memorable but strenuous 3 days climbing Mt Cameroon; Dee, Grant, Paula, Neil and Mik opted to spend a few quiet days on the beautiful black beaches near the 1999 lava flow, north of Limbe. Andrew, Laura and I opted to drive up to Korup National Park. Korup is in Cameroon’s SW province and shares its western border with Nigeria’s Cross River National Park.
With the Korup detour being Andrew’s idea, it was no surprise that we took a route less travelled: clockwise around Mt Cameroon through Idnea, Koto, Ikondo Titi to Mudemba. The drive was through tall dense bush on small roads made of volcanic rock, sand and red mud. The only new infrastructure we saw on the day long drive was an MTN tower.
En route we stopped to visit Mr George, a wonderful 82 year old man who farmed cocoa. Between 1950 and 1990 Mr George had killed over a 1000 elephant as part of the government instituted culling programme. He was nothing like the ‘Elephant Hunter’ that I thought we were going to find. Listening to his stories that covered topics from snake hunting to farming, we spent a fascinating hour chatting in his lounge. I was struck most by his general and geography knowledge. We left all too soon, but still had far to travel. We had some tense moments as Andrew drove us expertly along some steeply cambered red mud roads between car-eating drainage ditches. The only other traffic that we saw were the 125cc Chonda (Chinese Honda) motorbikes that are so popular in SW Cameroon because we guess that they are the only real all-weather transport. In the late afternoon locals warned us that 2 oil workers had been kidnapped the week before by Nigerians, on that same road – which alarmed us a little and led us to choosing a very quiet spot to bush camp deep in the thousands of hectares of mature palm oil plantations established decades ago by Unilever.
KORUP NATIONAL PARK
We visited the Korup park office in Mudemba to request information and organise the compulsory guide for the park. In 1987, the Korup Project, an international funded integrated conservation and development project, provided support to the newly established park. In 2003, the Korup Project ended, leaving the Korup National Park management with little to no financial and logistical support. The WWF continued the work to improve visitor access to the park and provide local employment but the WWF has also since left. So we were happy to meet the local head official who was a helpful, well spoken man who had a son living in Joburg.
Korup National Park extends over 1,260 square km of mostly undisturbed primary forest with a network of trails for elephants and visitors. Its sandy soils are low in nutrients and their acidic nature make them unfavorable for subsistence farming and cash-crop plantations, explaining the low levels of farming disturbance in the park in the past.
We walked across the impressive 100m long suspension bridge over the Mana River to enter this unfenced park. The vegetation in Korup was a new experience for me with over 1,100 tree and shrub species, many of them endemic. The trees were breathtaking – some setting the canopy at 50m high, many of them fruit bearing. With such dense forest it was very difficult to get more than a glimpse of a bird or monkey. We were happy to see saw lots of evidence of elephants.
Our guide was a gem. It was clear that Joseph had spent a lot of time in the forest and he was happy answering our numerous questions. I most liked his mimicked bird calls and he was quick to spot wildlife in the canopy that I would never have spotted on my own.
The park receives 5000mm of rainfall annually. Temperatures vary little throughout the year with mean monthly maximum temperature in the dry season being 31.8 °C and in the wet season 30.2 °C. We sweated continually until it began to get dark at 4pm on the forest floor.
There are currently around 1000 people living around the park. During 2009 a poacher was shot in the leg by park rangers – in retaliation for this the local villagers destroyed all the buildings in the park – wooden cabins and brick research buildings were flattened. Hence the park has no infrastructure. It was disappointing to see that after a year no effort had been made by the park officials even to do the most basic repairs to anything that was broken down or to make even simple repairs to the vital suspension bridges.
When we returned to our vehicle which we had left with next to an army guard station on the Mana River, they demanded a tip for looking after the car. Simply, they were they only threat to the car. To cut a long story short: Andrew lectured the 3 probably underpaid soldiers, with AKs, in the dark on why they should not extort bribes and simply do their jobs. I was amused and impressed – lucky Dee wasn’t there otherwise Andrew may have been in trouble.
Highlights for me: the trees and the whistling sound of the wings of the many large hornbills we heard (and sometimes saw) in the canopy.
End
