I still haven’t had a full night’s sleep but we talked Ben into going with Emma so I stayed in bed until after 9:00am. Then we began to repack our food and load our gear into the Land Cruiser. The new motorcycle takes up a lot of room and we have to bring supplies for the program and it’s quite crowded. But I think everything will fit.
I tried to register with the Embassy but the computers are off-line, something to do with the ISP, “Bush net”. So we’re sitting here watching a black-headed weaver make his nest while chasing off the masked weavers that dominate the palm he has selected. Boring you say? But better than T.V.
After lunch we wandered down to the zoo. There is free admission for JGI staff. It’s an open wooded area with the usual assortment of African wildlife, at least those that can be secured by moats and fences. Birds fly free as do several groups of vervet monkeys. The highlight is the chimp island with a troop of nine that we could see. The dominant male and a younger competitor acted out from time to time. There is at least one adult female with twins and four others of various ages. The rest of the crew at JGI are watching a Star Wars video on their laptop while Debbie takes Carol to the airport for her trip to Congo Brazzaville where she will help the JGI crew there get up to speed with the accounting software. She travels from site to site, seven in all, with two trips back to D.C. headquarters each year.
