A LAMB, A PUPPY, A NEW PET

We met Cinde Jeheber, aka, the Ocelot Whisperer, in Costa Rica last year. Cinde volunteered with us at at the Monkey Park Foundation, where we prepped food for various animals, such as monkeys, marmosets, and one sultry female ocelot. 

Last week, we heard from Cinde in Nicaragua, where she traveled to build houses for the homeless. Between hammering nails and digging holes, she found a scared little puppy so shaggy it looked more like a little lamb than a dog.

She asked Carmen, one of the women her team was building a house for, if she could use her water to wash the puppy. They scrubbed it clean and dried it, and from then on, the little dog kept going into Carmen's new house and laying down, as if he lived there.

After a while, Cinde decided to ask the new home owner if she would like a puppy. Immediately, Carmen started crying, saying “I've been loving outside for 15 years all alone, now I have a house and a dog!"

And that's how Cinde's Random Act of Kindness to a lamb-looking puppy helped a lady get her first dog. 

Thanks for continuing to give back, Cinde! You inspire us!

WALKING THE PIG

We came to western Panama in hopes of seeing whales and mantas. Before we could get in the water, however, we watched this local man walking his pet pig. 

Not exactly undersea exploration, but it certainly was entertaining. 

PHOTO FRIDAY: KIP'S OCELOT IN NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC

A female ocelot looks for her lunch at an animal rescue center in Costa Rica.

Actually, what National Geographic published was Kip's photo of an ocelot, together with a story he wrote about the issues Costa Rica is having caring for some of its most vulnerable animals. 

Read the full NatGeo story here, or check out the preview below. 

More next week on our time prepping lunch for an ocelot, toucan, tamarind, and spider monkey while volunteering at Costa Rica's animal-rehab centers. 
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Costa Rica Closes Zoos--Where Will the Animals Go?
Influx of captive animals has wildlife-rescue centers strapped.

By: Kip Patrick in Tamarindo, Costa Rica

for National Geographic
Published August 5, 2013

At the Monkey Park wildlife-rehab center near Tamarindo, Costa Rica, volunteers clean animal cages, wash dirty dishes, and even prepare the animals' meals.

"It's a labor of love," said Cinde Jeheber, a California native and frequent volunteer at the park. One of her duties might be cutting up fruit for the white-faced monkeys or slicing beef parts to feed to the resident ocelot.

"To be surrounded by all these amazing animals that might someday be released back into the wild—I wouldn't miss it for the world," she said. "Plus, I get to feed an ocelot!"

Yet Monkey Park and other such facilities are facing an unprecedented crunch as Costa Rica struggles with how to care for its captive wildlife, most of which will soon be without a home.

In July, the government announced controversial plans to close the country's two public zoos...

Read more here...

HOW TO ESCAPE A CHARGING SILVERBACK GORILLA

Liz got a little too close to this seemingly docile silverback. Then they made eye contact. Then Liz ran. Quickly.

Liz can run. Fast. 

For some of us...that was the biggest shock of our trek into the Mgahinga Gorilla National Park in southwestern Uganda, where we'd come in hopes of getting within spitting distance of a troop of the biggest primates on the planet.

Liz, moments before her "escape."

In truth, there were more amazing moments, like crouching, completely terrified within a few feet of an animal that could use your head as a soccer ball if he felt the need.

But seeing Liz at mach speed -- knocking aside an armed guard, toppling over small trees, running like she was being chased by a wild animal...that's a natural wonder even the world's largest primate might stop and take notice of.

Two hours before Liz's speed test, we had arrived at base camp in Mgahinga with our travel buddies Dougie and Amanda (top-quality Aussies we'd met in Zanzibar weeks before). Former wild animal volunteers in South America, they were even more pumped to get started on the gorilla hunt than we were. 

But first, a friendly, camo-clad park ranger in his early thirties sat us all down for a safety briefing.

L to R: Kip, Liz, Ranger, Dougie and Amanda

First rule: "Don't make eye contact with the gorillas. They will see that as a sign of aggression and could charge." Spoiler: Yes, sadly, if you saw the lovely lady gorilla from Photo Friday last week, you know we didn't do so well with this rule.

Rule two: "If a gorilla charges or makes an aggressive move toward you, DO NOT RUN." The ranger repeated this last bit again, stressing, "Do NOT run. Never run. This may anger the gorillas. Crouch down, and the gorilla will run past you."

"Wait, are you serious, Mr. Ranger?" Yes, he was.

OK, got it. No eye contact. No running. Check. 

Satisfied that we were going to be good rule followers, the ranger radios his trackers, who are somewhere in the mountains above. Good news. They have located the gorilla troop (birds fly in flocks, gorillas roll in troops) only an hour away through dense forest. 

Off we go. The trek started on a fairly well maintained dirt and rock path, dropping briefly below treeline into acres of potato fields (lots of sweet potato production in Uganda) and finally back up underneath the shadows of the jungle canopy, where the trail quickly disappeared. 

Liz, Dougie and Amanda cross sweet potato fields en route to find the gorillas. 

Some 30 minutes later, all of us sweating from following our bushwacking guide up a mountain, we heard what sounded like a large tree falling not far ahead. We stopped short. 

"The gorillas are close," our guide said. "Come, follow me."

Wait, that falling tree was a gorilla? Insert expletive here. 

The gorillas of Mgahinga roam freely, spending part of their year across the border in the Congo and part of it here in Uganda. There are no cages. No feeding times. No schedules.  They are wild, although thanks to years of deliberate and tightly-regulated exposure to humans, they aren't supposed to charge or flee when camera-toting tourists approach.

Liz takes photos of a female from a safe distance.

Tell that to Liz. 

As we near our 60-minute limit with the gorillas (troops receive one tourist group per day for one hour, no exceptions), one of the guards motions us up toward his position, where a silverback is eating at the base of a tree just below. 

Dougie and Amanda go first, staring wide eyed at what has to be one of the most awesome wildlife experiences on the planet. The gorilla ignores them, as he rips off piles of young leaves and shoves them in his mouth. 

Then it's our turn. We ease up cautiously, not wanting to interrupt the breakfast of a 400+ pound primate. Liz leans in to get a closer look, even taking a chance to snap a closeup photo. 

A sudden rustle of bushes. A guttural growl from the gorilla below as he lunges forward. And Liz is gone. Way gone. 

In a twig's snap, she's already passed the machine gun-toting guard, far behind Dougie and Amanda, not even looking back to see if she's being pursued. 

Meanwhile, the guard crouches slowly, putting out his arms palms down, alerting those of us who remain that we should follow his lead. We watch the silverback. We're all short of breath and trying not to urinate. No one moves. 

After a second, the guard stands up slowly, looks at us and then he smiles. 

"Hey, haha, where did your friend go? She run fast! The gorilla is only making a joke. No danger. He's just having fun with the tourist, no charging. Not to worry!"

So funny. Head faked by a gorilla. The most shocking moment of the trek. Liz is fast. 

The big silverback of the group and Liz's new best friend.

PHOTO FRIDAY: POSING GORILLA IN UGANDA

Glam shots, anyone? 

While the machine-gun toting guard we were with on a gorilla trek in Uganda had ordered us not to make eye contact with the massive primates we'd encounter along the way (apparently gorillas don't like that), it was all we could do not to stare back at the gaze of the female above. 

We managed to follow orders until she rested her chin on her closed hand, a la 1990, and stared longingly into our eyes. What's a person to do but snap a few photos. If only she would've let us brush some of the twigs from her fur and put some powder on her nose, this would've been so much better. 

More on the trek next week.

PHOTO FRIDAY: CHAMELEON ROAD CROSSING

Why did the Flap Necked Chameleon cross the road? 

We have no idea, but it sure made for a cool photo, especially when he looked right at us with one of his beady little eyes. 

To learn more about these color-changing animals, check out this site. 

ANIMALS OF ANDASIBE NATIONAL PARK

Andasibe National Park has lots of lemurs, including the curious, cuddly common brown lemur above. 

If there's one thing visitors come to Madagascar to see, it's lemurs. The island is home to 101 species, all endemic. The cute little creatures range from the smallest primate on the planet--the mouse lemur, to the famous ring-tailed with its black and white-striped tail.

After the sailing drama of the west coast, we headed inland to check out the country's unique animals and insects. It's worth noting that almost all of Madagascar's reptiles and amphibian species, half of its birds and all of its lemurs are found nowhere else on earth, making the place a virtual Eden for animal lovers, of which we definitely are. 

Just three hours outside of the capital Antananarivo, lies Andasibe National Park, famous for its families of indris, the largest species of lemur and also one of the most endangered. 

On a three-hour hike and a night walk, we were able to check off just about all the critters on our 'must see' list, many of which you can peruse below. 

For what it's worth, we didn't get lost once, we only had a few bug bites, we could hear indris calling from our lodge near the park, and the bus we took left and arrived more or less on time. 

Pretty boring actually...and so long overdue.

Liz happy to arrive at the park, where we would soon meet our first lemurs.

The elusive indri, which sings somewhat like a humpback whale, jumps a little like a frog, and looks kind of like a kid in a skinny panda suit.

A colorful Parson's chameleon crawls through the leaves after a light morning rain. 

The tiny, curious-looking giraffe weevil above is a full-grown male.  

A Diadem Saifaka kicks back while checking out some nosy tourists.

The Blue Coua, which eats bugs, fruits and small reptiles.

A sleepy chameleon we met on our night walk.. He's about four inches long and could easily snooze in the palm of your hand.

If you're really interested in hearing an indri's call, feel free to check out this video we shot in the park. While you can definitely hear the indris, you won't see one in this shaky home movie, despite a lot of panning around the forest. 

THE WORLD'S LARGEST CAMEL FAIR

Trekking for miles across Rajasthan's arid landscape, sometimes for days at a time, countless residents of the region--often with their herds of livestock in tow--travel to what has become the world's largest place to buy, sell, and trade camels.

Liz gets a morning sniff from a resident camel.

It's called the Pushkar Camel Fair, and as seen previously on the site, it's an incredibly scenic and often hilarious event to behold.  We stopped by the festivities for a few days with our friend Alex from DC, who was as amazed as we were at the sight of so many camels (estimates put the number at around 50,000 animals) living, breathing, braying, sleeping, and racing in one place. 

Two traders, after trekking for three days, lead their herd into town at dawn at the start of the Fair.

Our Pushkar alarm clock, set for sunrise each day.

Trading takes place over the span of five days, and many of the men and women in the photos below have trekked for hundreds of kilometers to bring their camels to the fair.  Not wanting to miss anything, we got to the fairgrounds at sunrise each morning to take it all in. OK, we will admit, our early rising was also due to the fact that we had a group of vigorous, obnoxious, insomniac monkeys that frequently pounded on our windows at all hours, as well as the fact that our hotel was located next to one of the many temples in Pushkar, where pilgrims worship their gods quite vocally at all hours. Unfortunately (for Liz) the god of sleep does not have a temple in Pushkar.

But no matter. Thanks to the monkeys and noisy pilgrims, we were ready with cameras every morning to watch the camel camp come alive. More photos to come.

Camel herdsmen gather around the fire for a morning coffee and smoke.

Wake Up Kiss: A camel tries to give another a morning smack on the neck.

Mamma and baby wake up with the morning sun.

Mustachioed herdsman in Pushkar.

Taking in the view.

A camel trader who has not yet had his cup of coffee.

With so few women around, Liz quickly made some friends.