Nyungwe National Park: Ancient rainforest alive with primates – the next best thing to time travel
April 20, 2008
Truth be told, when we arrived in Rwanda, we hadn’t even heard of Nyungwe National Park. Fortunately, thanks to a lead from the folks at Rwanda Tourism (ORTPN), we learned about the little-publicized but grand-scaled gem in southern Rwanda and knew that our trip wouldn’t be complete without a visit.
At 1,000 square kilometers, Nyungwe is the largest mountain rainforest in Africa and one of the most ancient… Continue reading
Rwandan Coffee: When time is money, custom coffee cargo bikes are a farmer’s best friend
April 19, 2008
Once a coffee cherry is harvested, the bean inside the cherry swiftly begins to degrade. Within 7 hours, fermentation substantially decreases the value of the farmer’s crop, effectively melting it from premium product to c-list dregs as minutes pass. It’s an agricultural version of “24″ without the standoffs and screaming into cell phones - instead there are big bags loaded with coffee cherries and 5 miles of dicey roads between the… Continue reading
SPREAD, Rwanda: Coffee awakens a national economy
April 19, 2008
In a world of large scale coffee production, coffee farming in Rwanda has always been a very personal endeavor.
Introduced by the Germans in the 1900s, coffee in Rwanda is cultivated on small, family run farms where coffee plant counts average in the low hundreds, but for decades, the Rwandan coffee market had been state run and coffee was sent into local markets with very little in the way of quality… Continue reading
Shyorongi, Rwanda: Environmental education off the grid
April 18, 2008
The following day, Francoise took us up into the mountains north of Kigali, to Stella in the community of Shyorongi, Matutina Secondary School,
Walking the school property, practicality blended with beauty… rows of bright green cabbages, carefully crafted gravel pathways, prolific groves of banana trees, healthy cows… and students who were benefiting from exposure to simple, common sense technologies that would be considered edgy in the western world.
There’s no education like… Continue reading
Kigali, Rwanda: Urban sustainability projects 101
April 18, 2008
We step out into a bright morning in Rwanda’s capital city of Kigali to meet Francoise Kayigamba, national coordinator of the GEF Small Grants Program that focuses on community based projects, managed by the UNDP (United Nations Development Program). Francoise takes us to Nyakabanda, a low income suburb of Kigali where city garbage is the proverbial straw spun… Continue reading
Gorilla Tracking in the Virungas: Even cooler than it sounds
April 16, 2008
It’s a short journey from Sabyinyo Silverback Lodge to Parc National des Volcans where we’re met by Francois, a buoyant, convivial 25-year gorilla tracking veteran and former porter to Dian Fossey who established the formal organization of Rwanda’s Parc National des Volcans gorilla trackers.
I won’t soft sell it… gorilla tracking ain’t cheap. 500 bucks for a one day, one hour gorilla permit, but it’s an exclusive show - 8 people maximum… Continue reading
Rwanda, Sabyinyo Silverback Lodge: Community ownership benefits all
April 16, 2008
Sabyinyo Silverback Lodge: So many great things to tell you about, just not sure which to start with… the superlatively scenic luxury lodge…or the thrilling strides that were made with the lodge’s unique community-ownership model that financially benefits from every guests’ visit…or visiting the critically endangered mountain gorillas. So, having properly baited you, I do believe that I will lay it all out… Continue reading
Rwandan indigenous communities: The path from forest to farm
April 16, 2008
Thus far, the GO projects that we’d visited were designed to support communities on the edge of gorilla habitat. Then we were introduced to another community, the Batwa, indigenous forest people who had shared their ancestral homes with the gorillas.
When Rwandan national parks were created, including Parc National des Volcans
The survive/thrive conservation strategy becomes a challenging twist when a critical habitat has been not just been a source of food… Continue reading
Ruhengeri, Rwanda: Back to school for water catchment education: Cisterns 101
April 16, 2008
Traveling the roads of the communities around Ruhengeri, Rwanda, one cannot miss the ubiquitous yellow water jug - strapped to bicycles, toted atop heads, waddled down roadways by children scarcely bigger than the containers themselves. One of the cruel ironies of life in this portion of the world is “water, water everywhere but nary a drop to drink”. Despite 300+ days of rain here in the shadow of the Virungas… Continue reading
Arrival in Rwanda: Illuminations from a dark past and learning about a new path
April 16, 2008
At the Ugandan border with Rwanda, we entered a tidy, simple structure where serious men thoughtfully review our documents and carefully write our details in ledger books with sharpened pencils. Outside, a guard raises a simple wooden gate and we leave Uganda, walking 200 yards of netherworld between nations before arriving at another hand raised gate, passing into Rwanda. Once through, we proceeded directly to the visa office