The Day I Met a 1,500-pound Gorilla in Uganda

They say you shouldn't show fear. But I couldn't help it--this was terrifying. The gorilla was six feet away, and coming straight for me…

At the airport in Entebbe we picked up my brother (who was joining us after completing a climb of Mt. Kilimanjaro), then drove a short distance to a private airfield. We adapted the small plane on the spot to allow us to put the dune buggy wheelchair aboard. (Adding motors to the chair has made it easier to use, but more difficult to transport, as it is no longer collapsible.)

Taking off on the grass strip, we flew at low altitude over lush countryside, noting few roads below us. After perhaps two hours, we landed on an airstrip (well, a flat, cleared field in the middle of nowhere). Here the pilot first flew low to the ground to scare off any grazing animals before he landed.

The entire village had gathered around the field, some to help us unload, but most simply to welcome us and also to satisfy their curiosity.

The pilot told us that this was the first time the villagers had seen a wheelchair, and the crowd grew as word spread about a woman in this strange thing with wheels. Children leaned in for a closer examination, as children everywhere are prone to do, and one or two actually touched the chair--a feat of great courage, I think!

From here, an hour in a Land Rover brought us to a place straight out of the opening shots in the movie King Kong. We had arrived at the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, Uganda, where we had come to see the famous "Gorillas in the Mist."

We discovered that Nancy is the first person in a wheelchair to visit this magical place (as was the case when we visited in Antarctica/Wilde Point.) The guest lodge manager, the director of the park, the governor of the province, and the Minister of Information for Uganda decided to use this opportunity to expand public knowledge of this valuable resource (the gorillas), electing to use Nancy as a "poster child" for their country.

No expense was spared to ensure our visit was unforgettable. They built a special sedan chair to transport Nan through the jungle…and the park director himself led each of the two treks we made into the jungle to see the gorillas.

We were accompanied by a team of at least 16 porters, armed protectors, and assorted other personnel.

There is no way we could have used the wheelchair (motorized or not) to go more than 10 feet in any direction in that jungle. But the sedan chair was up to the job.

On the second day, we hiked a few hours to a spot where silverback gorillas (the largest of the species) had been seen. A short distance, but those few miles felt like a thousand; it was the most difficult terrain I have ever trekked. Porters had whisked Nancy ahead, cutting trails by machete as they went. So strong and speedy were these young men, that five minutes into my trek I was already 20 minutes behind them.

My brother and I (with four guards in tow) were the last to arrive on the scene, almost an hour behind Nancy and the other trekkers. As we came to within a few yards of where everyone else was gathered, I heard a rustling of leaves slightly behind and to my right. I turned, and faced a head four times the size of mine--a HUGE gorilla. The guides estimated he weighed 1,500 pounds. He wasn't more than six feet away from where I was standing.

They say you shouldn't show fear. But I couldn't help it--this was terrifying. Then he started to move toward me.

I suddenly remembered what the guides had told us earlier about not confronting male gorillas, and I looked down at the ground and bowed slightly forward in as submissive a way as possible.

He halted, probably thought about swatting me aside, decided I wasn't worth it, then turned and headed away.

I was a mess, unable to calm down until much later when someone reminded me that gorillas are vegetarian. I got a picture much closer than the one above (from about four feet), but I was shaking so much it's too badly blurred.

Nate Berger
For International Living

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Editor's note: Nate and Nancy have put gathered everything they've learned in their 20+ years of traveling as a disabled couple…and put it all online for you to download free. See http://www.disabledtravelersguide.com for a full list of their adventures (and some great photos).