The story behind the photo 9/10

After visiting Nick Brandt's amazing "Inherit the dust" exhibition today in A Galerie, Paris, I had to blog on wildlife and lost territories.
Rwanda is home to a well protected national park where Mountain Gorillas roam. This region was famous by "Gorillas in the Mist" in the 1980's and Diane Fossy ultimately gave her life to highlight the plight of the Mountain Gorilla. The Virunga Mountain range was ravaged by poachers and humans farming up the slopes. Gorillas were either being murdered or dying from respiratory diseases passed on from the close contact of these humans. Thankfully action was taken to protect them and these volcanic mountains now have a healthy number of Gorilla families.
We were lucky enough to meet one of these families on the slopes of Mount Bisoke. I always dreamed of climbing an active volcano but I had envisioned lava flows rather than dense vegetation and the beating chests of Gorillas! Andy took this image of one of the juveniles who spent our hour wanted to play with us. He spent his time doing tricks on the low lying branches, always looking to see if we were still watching. He was like any toddler, never daring to leave his mothers side for too long but clambering and climbing with the finesse of a bear! He still had a lot to learn.
We were lucky to have had such a wonderful close encounter with such stunning creatures and hope that these encounters will be possible for the generations to come.

African Safari

For Andy & Michelle there is nothing as fun as hiring a truck, stocking up on supplies and heading off into the wilderness in Africa. From being intimidated by mountain gorillas in Rwanda, charged by bull elephants in Namibia or silently stalked by a Leopard in Botswana, there is nothing as exciting as safari photography.

Here we see just some of their encounters along the way.