The Western Circuit
is the bird watchers paradise.
It
is heavily forested with mountainous terrain making it
an unsuitable habitat for carnivores and safe for walking safaris. The sites we are looking at are:
Í
Gombe Stream National Park
Í
Mahale Mountains National Park
Í
Rubondo National Park
Í
Katavi National Park
Gombe Stream
National Park
A
mountainous strip that borders the shores of Lake
Tanganyika, about 16 km from Kigoma. Tanzania's smallest
park covers only 52sq km. It can only be reached by boat
from Kigoma.
Gombe stream offers visitors the rare chance to observe
the chimpanzee communities made famous by the British
explorer Jane Goodhall. A number of monkey species
can only be seen including the red colubus,
red tail and blue monkeys.
The area is heavily forested making it an unsuitable
habitat for carnivores and safe for walking safaris.
Bird watchers will be richly rewarded.
Mahale
Mountains National Park
The other sanctuary of the chimpanzee, is also reched by
boat from Kigoma.
Covering an area of approximately 1,000 sq km, the
park's western boundary is the shore of lake Tanganyika.
The chimpanzee population is estimated at around
1,000 and they may be observed in their natural habitat
in groups of up-to 30. Baboons and colubus monkeys also
live in the park while other animals found there include
buffalo, bush pig, elephant, giraffe, leopard, lion,
porcupine and various types of antelope. Lake
tanganyika is home to more than 250 species of
fish.
Rubondo National Park
A
water wonderland comprising Rubondo Island
and nine smaller islands tucked into a corner of lake
Victoria north west of Mwanza. The park provides a
variety of habitats ranging from savannah to
open woodland, dense forest, papyrus,
swamps and sandy beaches.
There is also a variety of animals including bushbuck,
crocodile, elephant, genet, giraffe, hippo, mongoose,
velvet monkey and the reclusive sitatunga - a shaggy
aquatic antelope.
The bird-life is unique with birds from the east,
central and southern Africa flocking to 'Bird Island'
to breed. Bee-eates, fish eagle, ibis, kingfisher and
saddle-billed stork will be seen with tilapia and Nile
pearch abound in the lake.
Katavi National Park
Katavi National Park is sometimes described as ‘near’
Mahale, but this must be recognised as a purely relative
term with reference to Tanzanian distances!
Deceptively accessible on maps, the ‘main’ road through
Western Tanzania that runs merrily through the middle of
Katavi is by no means a smooth ride.
Despite its great size - 4471 sq km/ 2780 miles square -
and its inherent variety of animal and birdlife, it is
perhaps one of the most underestimated of all the
Tanzanian National Parks, (although those who do set up
camp on its plains are quite content to leave it that
way!)
The landscape of Katavi, together with Rukwa National
Park, was created as a result of a minor fault in the
Western Albertine Rift which formed a wide alluvial
plain.
The park has a central, very flat valley floor which
forms spectacular flood plains after the rains, and
attracts huge herds to its bounty from the surrounding
hills.
