The Sandele birthday (re)treat

Posted on January 11, 2012 by Matt Smith

We have a guest post from Jonathan Tullett for you today. Jonathan recently visited The Gambia with his partner Rae, and they had a great experience at the eco-retreat at Sandele. I shall leave you in Jonathan’s capable hands…

I haven’t properly celebrated my birthday since 2000. This year, as far as I was concerned, wasn’t to be any different. Rae, however, had other plans.

Having raised the idea of being in Miami for the weekend after my birthday, we quickly settled on spending an entire week in The Gambia, at an eco-resort called Sandele (which roughly translated means, ‘now be still’).

Months passed, and I found myself getting more and more excited about actually doing something on the month-day of my birth. I’d trained myself for such a long time not to feel that kind of excitement that it was unnerving to experience feelings like this. Coupled with the trip, Rae had also planned a few activities for us for the occasion.

Landing in The Gambia to 30 degrees heat in November was nothing short of amazing. Unzipping the legs on my trousers, we quickly found the private taxi which was to take us to the retreat. The journey, though told would take about an hour, seemed far shorter; twenty minutes, if that. This is one country where air-con is a must for transport!

The retreat itself is beautiful. Run by a husband and wife team, Maurice and Geri, it’s been built in conjunction with the local village of Kartong and over 90% of the staff are from the village itself. Leasing the land for 25 years, once the time is up, the couple will hand over the retreat and the running of it to the locals; quite a legacy!

After being greeted with a local drink made from the crushed fruits of an indigenous tree, we were taken to the hut which would be our home for the following eight days.

Sandele Bay Eco Retreat. Image by Jonathan Tullett

The picture, right, doesn’t do it justice; the magnitude of the building isn’t apparent. The bedroom, which has the domed ceiling reaching thirty feet up, held a sofa, table and chairs, and a huge four-poster bed. With windows all around, and a short hallway leading to the bathroom (complete with their famous composting toilets!), it was beautiful; far more so than we’d expected. Just outside the back door, shared with the neighbouring lodge, was a plunge pool; refreshingly cool, and just the right distance from the sun loungers and shade umbrella.

Giving me prior warning – knowing that sometimes surprises don’t work well with me – Rae said that there was an excursion planned on the Thursday – my birthday – and another activity which would be done the following day. I was intrigued. Despite the offer, I decided against being told exactly what was planned; I appreciated the thought behind the offer though, Rae knows me well…

Thursday morning I awoke, bleary eyed, and was promptly presented with three gifts, and a card. The card said she hoped the experiences would remain with me for a long time. Curious…

The first gift was a box of my all-time favourite Turkish delight. A small square box of cubes of loveliness. The common problem with your run-of-the-mill Turkish Delight is it’s cut into cubes far too big. This results in an inconsistent texture, firmness and varying flavour; it really can be a bit hit and miss whether you’ll get a good batch. These ones, however, are cut to perfection: exactly right, in very way. The only improvement they could make would be to sell them by the kilo, but I think my dentist would have something to say about that…

The second gift was a card saying I was to be taken net fishing, by the local fisherman. For those who hadn’t had the joy of hearing me talk about the upcoming trip, net fishing was the thing I most wanted to do. Casting a net around and trying to catch dinner, is there anything more manly? I think not!

Lastly (well, what I thought was lastly) was another small envelope. Within it tickets to see Conversations with Penn & Teller!! When I’d seen the show announced at the O2 back in May, I immediately tried to get tickets but without any joy. Rae had also been trying to get tickets, but also without any joy. But somehow, on my birthday, I was presented with two tickets to go and see two of my idols, in conversation, at the O2. Not just demonstrating magic, but talking about their 35 (37 now, actually) years in magic. Blimey, I was ecstatic! Quite literally the best birthday I have ever had in my life, and it wasn’t even 8am!

Walking to breakfast, everyone we met greeting me with a cheery, ‘Happy birthday!’. After eating a brief three course breakfast – cereal, fruit and then boiled eggs and beans – Rae shared the main plans for the day: a trip in a dug-out canoe down the Gambia River to south Senegal, where we’d stop for lunch, visit a local village and then make the journey back mid-afternoon.

The river Gambia. Image by Jonathan Tullett

The canoes are hand made over the course of a month by one man from mahogany. When treated with sealant and paint, they can last fifteen years or more. With less care, it would maybe last just ten. Either way, considering the near daily use, that’s some hard-wearing wood!

Setting off, it was quickly apparent why the area is famed for its bird watching. Being paddled up river by Amdul, past the mangrove plants, every few minutes a new species was pointed out; sometimes large herons, other times small kingfishers. Every short while we’d hear a slapping of water and a shoal of jumping fish would be leaping from the water, travelling some distance before gracefully diving back in and continuing their journey through the salty waters.

A couple of hours after we departed, we spotted in the distance a small jetty; we’d arrived at our destination in south Senegal. Next to the jetty is a small restaurant, run by a man and his wife. A short distance away, through some rice fields, was the local village. We were to have our lunch at the restaurant, having had a tour of the surrounding area.

Having been surrounded by English speaking Gambians or by Gambians speaking any one of the (thirteen is the number I recall being mentioned) local tribal languages, being greeted in French was a surprise. I last spoke French during my G.C.S.E back in 1996, but both Rae and I were pleased to discover I had remembered enough to a) order the food we wanted, and b) compliment the cook on the quality of the meal; both of which were appreciated by our hosts.

While lunch was being cooked (everything seems to be freshly prepared there), we were taken around the village. There were a couple of Dutch guys who were out for their second visit building a new school, and the children were finished for the day and kicking a ball around the common area. A single well served the whole village, and while there we saw a couple of girls who must only have been seven or eight, lifting large, heavy buckets of water up the 15 metre hole. Having finished filling the super-large bucket, they emptied it all back into the well again, to start repeating the game.

The school in Senegal. Image by Jonathan Tullett.

The school was a single class room, with maps around the walls and rows of small desks for the children to sit in. In Senegal, they’re taught in French, as opposed to The Gambia where it’s a requirement for every child to only speak English in the school grounds.

We walked back through the rice fields to enjoy the feast which had been prepared. After sipping the last of our drinks, we commenced the journey back to The Gambia.

Inspired by Amdul, or maybe just from the caffeine I’d imbibed during lunch, I decided that I’d ‘help’ paddle on the way back. And try I did; for about half an hour (Rae swears it was only ten minutes, but I’m sure I did better than that!), at which point my stomach muscles pleaded with me to stop, and then gave up in a protest at the effort. Finally I understood the work required to get a six-pack. I’ll never have a six-pack.

At around 3pm we arrived back where we’d started our journey, with the sun still shining brightly in the sky. And there I thought we were at the end of my birthday treats. But no, there was more to come, just when I was least expecting it!

We were eating dinner, as usual on our own table but with other guests and Maurice and Geri on neighbouring tables, and the waiter came to collect the plates from the main course. I started talking to Rae about the day’s events – still very excited by what we’d done – and the place went quiet. The next thing I knew everyone was singing, ‘Happy Birthday!’, and out came a specially prepared chocolate and beetroot (don’t knock it until you try it!) cake, complete with candles and everything! Alas, with age comes feebleness (that’s my excuse, anyway), and I failed miserably at blowing out the candles in on go. But I did successfully cut enough slices for us to have a large portion of the cake while also giving a slice to everyone else there.

The story you’ve just read is my recounting of the day. It doesn’t capture in anyway, however, how special I felt, and just how much it meant to me.

Birthdays are for celebrating!

Chris Packham Diary – Day 2

Posted on July 16, 2010 by Matt Smith

Dawn on the River Gambia. Image by {link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/girlietash/394526349/}Girlietash{/link}

Thanks to the efforts of marketing fuds like our good selves, you’d be forgiven for thinking the dominating feature of The Gambia is its plentiful beaches. It isnt. Not by a long chalk. People aside, the pulsing heart of The Gambia is its mighty river. It is the river which provides food and sustenance, the river that provides the fertile lands that ensure Gambians will never grow hungry, and it’s the river – labyrinthine and endlessly divergent – which makes The Gambia many times the size it appears on maps. There are worlds in these tributaries.

Thus it was that we found ourselves once more in the morning murk, boarding a creaking vessel sailing for the open ocean… The rumour of the day’s heat was already upon us as we departed on our two-tier craft, and though it was way before breakfast, Sandwich Terns and even a Yellow-billed Kite were abroad, speculating, seeking out hunting grounds. Sunrise is an odd thing in The Gambia, at least compared to what I’m used to in Northern Europe. There is none of the soft blues and roses, followed by the advent of sharp light; instead, as the sun rises, the sky takes on a beige, grainy quality, and the sun takes the eyes, muffled, like a muted glowing coin. As we chugged along a now widening tributaries, various herons and egrets flew across in glorious silhouettes.

Pelicans - lots of them. Image by Jane Allen

As we made lazy progress along the river, we could hear the soft clicks of the freshwater oysters that clung to the exposed roots of the mangrove reefs. These are superabundant in this part of the river and are regularly harvested by women who sidle up to the root systems at low tide in brightly painted skiffs. We began to see Pink-backed Pelicans – in ones and twos and more – and as we came closer to open water, Caspian Terns became boatside companions. All along the exposed mudflats were basking crabs and gangs of whimbrel, filling the air with their soft babbling song. Occasionally these would take flight, and peep their three-note call as if in mild annoyance at being disturbed. As breakfast was served (immense tubes of bread filled with fresh-cooked bacon and egg) we saw Common Greenshank, and a single Ruddy Turnstone.

Caspian Tern. Image by Chris Packham.

Post-breakfast is something of a haze as we retired to the roof and became a little sun-drunk and lazy. In truth the intense heat was keeping much of the bird life away – sensibly they sought shade, preferring to hunt later in the day. Two surprises did present themselves however: an Arctic Skua and a Cape Gull, a relatively new species to the Senegambia region and quite a find, especially for Chris and Malick, who of course live for this stuff. The pilot must have been in awe as well, as we somehow got ourselves stuck atop a rogue sandbar. No matter, one of the breakfast chefs merely lowered himself overboard and after a deal of levering with a wooden pole we were safely on our way once more.

The masters consult...

Birdwatching in style

Once we were afloat again, we approached a bulky mudflat that was home to a few Eurasian Oystercatchers escaping the dread of winter, and a solitary African Spoonbill. A European Storm-Petrel was also spotted, skimming low across the water. It was here that we also came face to face with a large Yellow-billed Stork, picking through the mudflats for shellfish. It was quite a sight in repose, but in flight it was something else, impossibly scissored against the blue of the sky.

The stork takes flight... Image by Jane Allen

It was here, on our turn for home that we also finally saw a raptor – a beautiful Osprey. Simon King had been in Senegal in recent weeks looking for Scottish Ospreys that are known to travel to West Africa for the winter months. Part of reason for the richness of The Gambia’s bird life is that on top of the country’s own perfect climate for so many species is that it’s also in the migration zone – both for birds looking to overwinter, and those who are stopping off, before continuing their treks south, south to yet warmer climes… It was hard not to wonder if this bird might soon be seen high in the Douglas Firs surrounding Loch Lomond. As we approached the rickety port of Denton Bridge, we saw many Little Swifts, hoovering up flies above the surface of the water, and the by now ubiquitous mobs of Hooded Vultures.

A magnificent Osprey. Image by Chris Packham.

That evening was all about, initially at least, setting eyes on the Painted Snipe. We headed back down to the rice paddies behind Badala Park, and with new information that there was a male with three chicks somewhere in the vicinity we waited whilst Malick and Chris stalked like brave tigers… That mention of the ‘male with three chicks’ isn’t a typo – the Painted Snipe is one of a few species where the male and female swap roles, so the fella is at home with the nippers whilst the female is out creating merry hell. It’s also true that against convention, the female is the more brightly coloured of the pair (in almost all cases it is the male who bears the burden of attraction).

It should be mentioned here just how elusive the Painted Snipe is – this is one tough bird to see. You could step over one and not notice it beneath you. So all credit to Malick that he eventually spotted the male, and managed to ‘flush it’ so most of us could get a look at the sainted beast. I don’t mind admitting that to me it was little more than a mildly attractive brown-to-grey wader, but this is an important bird to many and there was a good deal of buzz once we’d seen the creature. Imagine if we’d seen a female!

Male Greater Painted-Snipe. Image by {link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/snarfel/3236665706/}f_snarfel{/link}

After finally finding our quarry, an evening on Fajara Golf Course was going to be a breeze. We were immediately assailed by a beautiful Abyssinian Roller (a quite beautiful bird that utterly failed to impress Chris who thought it something of a tart and awarded it a paltry 3.4 out of 10), and a glamourous, if raucous, band of Ring-necked Parakeets. We also saw numerous Wood Hoopoes, nesting in the swaying palms, and a sweet Yellow-fronted Tinkerbird, hiding in an Acacia tree. Then came the grand finale. Malick has a habit of making owlet calls when he thinks he might be in the right place to spot one. Well on this occasion he got an immediate response. You might think that from there it’d be easy to seek out the call and observe the owl in situ, but you’d be wrong. Aside from the skill of mimicry, the greater part of the talent of spotting is being able to locate the call, and in the case of the Pearl-spotted Owlet, seeing the damn thing at all. It’s tiny – not much bigger than say, a large hand. But let it be said – once Malick had indulged his near preternatural ability to locate the smallest of foes, this wee beastie is a tiny and utterly captivating one. Stood there in the soft evening light, all taking it in turns to zero in through the various scopes that had been trained on the owlet, one had to wonder at the nature of all this: the effortless beauty, the abundance of life and how much of it we miss with our blundering clatter through the world, and yes, a little of the absurdity of being on the other side of the world, staring through a magnifying lens at something of quite such perfect proportions.

Pearl-spotted Owlet. Image by {link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/anymotion/2089741738/}Anymotion{/link}

A big thanks to Dave Allen for letting me have access to his superbly detailed bird diary for this day.

Chris Packham Diary – Day 1

Posted on June 3, 2010 by Matt Smith

What follows is a 3-part account of the Chris Packham Gambia bird tour, that ran from 5th-8th Feb of this year (some of the party continued on for three more days at Makasutu, I escaped to Senegal). Needless to say it was a cracking few days, and for so many reasons: for the sheer number of different bird species we saw (147 at the last count); for enabling us to see so many different, odd corners of The Gambia; for getting to know a bunch of cool people; and, of course, getting to (figuratively) stand on the shoulders of two people with such a depth of knowledge of the Gambian bird life, and wildlife in general. Though they might not get mentioned that much, Chris and Malick are implicit in everything that happened, and everything I learned. I just wish someone had told me the birds got up so damn early…

6.30am found us huddled beneath a huge mahogany tree, squinting into the milky light of pre-dawn. We were at the entrance to the Abuko nature reserve, a vast tract of forest and open scrub and home to a renowned natural pool, excellent for spotting a good number of species. The night before the group of 18 had had a brief meeting with Chris at Bakotu where we’d sized one another up and been introduced to the inimitable Malick – prince of bird watchers and, as it turned out, a purveyor of heroic local knowledge. Thus it was that this straggly party entered the reserve, heavy with binoculars, heavy with anticipation.

Malick, Chris and the team at Abuko

The first thing we see is a dense line of nomadic ants, clustered into a fibrous cylinder across the pathway. They group together in this fashion to keep themselves warm, and to protect their queen, who is safe somewhere in the centre of the gathering. At first glance the ragged pile looks like leaf or vegetable matter, or even hair – which I guess is the point. The ants reportedly have a fearsome bite, so we leave well alone and continue along the path to the pool.

Along the route we stop in our own ragged cluster to seek out a violet turaco, hiding somewhere in the canopy. The thickening air is pierced occasionally by the bird’s gutteral call, and as it hops from branch to liana we try to fix on its movements. The profusion of growth around us is extraordinary – the sheer abundance of life, the riot of things, filling every available space. The canopy is one thing, but it’s down here at eye level and beneath that’s the most boggling: a labyrinth of entwined lianas and branches with huge buttressed hardwood trees rising from the meshed swarm of roots. There are breaks in this debauch of life, pockets of colder air where the massive concrete bunkers of termite mounds stand like centuries old sentinels. Yet even these conceal a frenzy of hyperactivity, worker termites at the coalface, keeping the place cool enough for her – lying at the refrigerated heart of things, sometimes up to 50 years old…

African Darter, Abuko pond (image by Chris Packham).

The pool when we get there, is quite a prospect – compact and surrounded on three sides by lush greenery; and perfect for watching birds – partly because of the natural stage set up, and partly thanks to the presence of a rickety two-storey hide from where you can observe the higher reaches of the distant palms. And so many birds, and so quickly… We see egrets, night herons, hornbills, wood hoopoes with young in the palms, a spectacular chestnut-breasted giant kingfisher (perched they are something, but in flight, oh my) barbets, a hammerkop, jacanas picking their way across the massive lily pads, just feet away from us, plus a dozen or so african darters, distant relatives of the cormorant, wings outstretched in the early morning sun. It’s an amazing sight, and so much to take in that you have to turn away occasionally to get some perspective. The group are scrabbling for their guide books (this extraordinary bible) (as an aside here, if Dave Allen ever offers you his guidebook, say no, probably best not to ask why – it’s to do with where he keeps it.), training their scopes or zoom lenses, off to my right someone is sketching the whole dazzling enterprise.

We do eventually tear ourselves away, and spend the next half hour or so on a weary walk to the rescue centre at the heart of Abuko. It’s HOT now, getting towards 35 degrees, and the heat lays across everything, puddling around your feet if you stand still for too long. We spot bee eaters in the tops of acacia trees, and the distant song of the bulbul, the only bird daft enough to still be active in this heat. We arrive at the rescue centre blistered and parched, to find an oasis selling cold drinks and small tubs of nuts to feed the resident vervet monkeys. Chris seems particularly adept at befriending them, getting a couple to leap for nuts held in an outstretched hand. The animals here are kept in good conditions, and there’s a true menagerie, ranging from red patas monkeys, through hyenas to a MASSIVE tortoise, that had dug herself an impressively deep hole to escape the heat. Something we could all have done with. Alas, we instead had to walk through the heat of the day back to the bus, air which seemed to congeal around us like a broiling active barrier. The stall holders at the entrance, when we finally arrived, seemed to regard us with sympathy and desultorily waved the odd carved owl at us and then, mercifully, left us alone.

Blue-cheeked bee eater at Abuko (image by Chris Packham).

That evening we went for the first of several walks across the fields that surround the Kotu stream. The area is legendary for the diversity of the bird life it supports, from a raft of kingfishers, to waders and even – on the more distant sewage ponds – a healthy number of whistling ducks. It is said (by Chris amongst others) that if you gave yourself a good run at it (say dawn till dusk) you might get to see 100 species from the bridge above the stream. One day, one day…

As we wound our way on the narrow paths that lace the fields around the stream, as well as looking at the numerous wood hoopoes and glossy starlings that graced the palms around us, and looking skywards for the kites and hooded vultures that rode the rolling levels, the first obstacle we had to negotiate was a herd of cows that very much wanted to get past us. Or rather we were the obstacle they had to tackle. As five became 10 became 40 or more, it was clear that this was no small herd either – mildly panicked laughter soon became shrieking alarm as the huge-horned beasts strove to get round us by any means possible. There was no malice, but that’s a ton of animal. With big bloody horns! Thankfully we managed to let them by without much more than the odd blush and booty from stepping into the sunken rice pits.

Belligerent companions on the path...

The sewage ponds, when we arrived were alive with activity. Now this may sound like a disgusting place to be spotting birds, but remarkably there is no evidence of sewage at all (save the odd brightly painted sewage truck), and the insect life is of such a density that it’s a natural spot for birds to congregate. There were squadrons of swifts flying low over the ponds, peeping patrols of stilts, plus massed ranks of creeping cattle egrets. I shall never think of sewage farms in quite the same way after seeing this fount of life.

A black-winged stilt prowls the pools... (image by Chris Packham).

Our final assignation was with the elusive painted snipe, a bird I was reliably informed was a ‘lifer’, the kind a true birder dreams of spotting. We’d crossed the road by now, and were on a ridge between the flats behind the Badala Park hotel. Malick had gone ahead to see if he could hear the muted call of the snipe, or spot its legendarily skulky lope as it picked for insects and grubs in the hard tufts of grass. See, the painted snipe, despite it’s name, isn’t exactly a colourful beastie, and has the perfect markings for hiding amidst grass and burnt soil; and it simply doesn’t want to be seen. So there we are, once again in our traditional (and by now exhausted) shabby column, all peeking through tired eyes, looking for a creature that has no wish to be spotted. Ocassionaly a faint cry of ‘there!’ would go up, only for the damp disappointed follow up of ‘no, it’s a coucal. Again’ to filter out. Malick was knee deep in grass by now, straining eyes and ears for the evasive wee creature but to no avail. We called off the search, promising to return another day, better armed and less exhausted.

Gambia Chris Packham tour – 2010

Posted on February 24, 2010 by Matt Smith

Chris spies a small bird in the middle distance

Well, I’ve recently returned from four fantastic days on the Chris Packham birding tour in The Gambia. We dragged ourselves through thorny acacias in forty degree heat – heat even the local owls avoided, skipped around marauding cattle in the lessening light of evening, and ran the gauntlet in the noisome charm of the fishing village at Tanji, and all this to get a look at some birds! But such birds: painted snipe, long-tailed nightjars, blue-bellied rollers, white-faced scops owls, splendid sunbirds… 148 species in total. 148. One might search for a lifetime in the UK and not get to that total; we managed it in four days.

I’ll publish some more detailed accounts of the trip over the next couple of weeks, for now here are just a couple of images to whet the appetite.