Gloria's Excellent Adventure

Fantasy? No. Where? Gabon. Africa. Western Africa, on the equator, nine hours by four-wheel drive from the coast into Lope Wildlife Reserve. Was I there for fungi?No. The gorillas, reclusive lowland gorillas.

To see them you hike the thick hilly rainforest: never-see-the-sun thick forest, all tree trunks and green bushes and vines and leafy, muddy trail with the occasional bright flower or fruit or flutter of a brilliant butterfly.

Groups of three go with two Baku tribesmen trackers. They are the "pygmies" and know every organism in the forest and what to use it for. We hike steadily, slowly, watching feet, quiet, listening, pausing for sightings of animals with whispered names and plants with uses. We walk about ten hours a day. It's total immersion in the forest to see the animals: eights pecies of monkeys, dozens of gorgeous birds, forest elephants (to be avoided), red river hogs (furry with silly white tufts on their ears and tails), duikers (like little deer), and the main attraction, the gorillas. My group saw them high up in trees above us watching with their ever-so-wise brown eyes. And were terrified by the roaring and chest-pounding display of the silverback behind the bushes. Impressive.

But to the chanterelles. The day was getting late and I was dripping, and days of hiking were taking their toll on my legs and feet, and it had been a couple hours since we had seen so much as a monkey, and I just wanted a cold shower and bed. We finally headed back a direct route. That meant straight over the ridges: huff and puff and slog up and then slippy and slidy down.

An hour of that and then across a flattened dip in the land and there they were. Gold amongst the green - for hundreds of feet and ever so perfect. The most incredible patch of chanterelles I ever dreamed of finding. Out came the cameras, exhaustion forgotten. The Baku started picking and piling them in huge leaves to wrap up. I wandered about, incredulous - "I don't believe it. I don't believe it." Ten minutes of mushroom heaven in a place I never imagined they could exist. Fungal serendipity. The stuff dreams are made of. A nature encounter of the surreal kind. A highlight of a trip never to be forgotten.

- Gloria Woodside, Minister of Archives