Bat Migration

The Friday after thanksgiving we were up and on the road by 5 am so we could get to Kasanka National park for the  bat migration. I love a good road trip and the ten hour drive North hasn’t let me down yet. The time seems to go by quickly.

On this trip we went with Ty, Francis and TianTian. We got to camp, set up and we were off to the first bat sighting of the trip. right before sunset the bats start to wake up and spread there wings. We go to the look out tower that has been built in the trees looking just over the forest. On a good day I wouldn’t want to climb up the 15 meter  ladder made of cut branches with 10  people but what the hell, its safe right? Once on top my first sight of the bats was amazing and they were barely any in comparison till 45 minutes later. There are around ten to twelve million bats and they have been migrating to this area for hundreds of years. It is a dense rain forest that provides them protection from predators when they are sleeping during the day. It was quite the sight to see them all waking up and heading out to feed. The fact that they do not run into each other is amazing.

The next morning we are up at 4 am heading to another area to watch the bats come in from feeding. This was my favorite part, minus the 345 wake up time. It sure looks like a lot more bats when they are coming in! The sky was just covered as the sun rose. What an amazing site.We even had a hippo visit us right behind the camp site.