5.1.14 Sunday. National Park and Boat Trip.

We rose early, and went to the car park to go into the National Park on one of the large safari trucks.  Our guide met us and we set off to the Park, stopping on the way every time there was a bird of interest for us to look at. The Park is about a 15 kilometre drive until you enter into the actual game reserve.  Our guide was very knowledgeable and was able to find several birds of prey for us to observe as well as the usual small colourful birds that we see every day.  We saw baboons at a distance, and then on the river bank we saw a marsh mongoose, the first we have ever seen.  There are more than 650 species of birds here in The Gambia, and so we always see new ones on each trip.  We spent 4 hours driving around and then returned to the camp for breakfast.  A lazy day round the pool, and then we got ready for the evening boat trip across the river into the mangrove swamps on the other side.  This part of Gambia is surprising, because in amongst the very tall  mangroves are large areas of very green land which look like English meadows.  There are many birds here and we were able to see lots of herons, darters, an osprey (from Europe) and many small birds too.  We also saw 4 very large monitor lizards and 3 crocodiles, before crossing the river back to the camp.  An added bonus on the return journey we saw several dolphins playing in between the boats. we had sprayed ourselves with mosquito repellent, but we had all got bitten by something else, probably fire ants, very painful.

Back to camp and a buffet meal this evening, as there were many more guests today, then  an early night.