Gabon has one of the highest proportions of intact rainforest cover of any country in Africa — approximately 88 percent of the country is forested — and that forest holds a significant population of western lowland gorillas. Gabon is one of the most important countries for gorilla conservation in Central Africa, with populations in multiple national parks and protected areas. The country established a network of 13 national parks in 2002 and has positioned itself as one of Africa’s most ambitious conservation states. For visitors, the most accessible gorilla trekking destination in Gabon is Moukalaba-Doudou National Park in the southwest.
Moukalaba-Doudou National Park
Moukalaba-Doudou National Park in southwestern Gabon has an established gorilla habituation programme with several groups accustomed to human presence. The habituated groups at Moukalaba-Doudou are referred to by the rangers as “The Gentils” — a collective name for the groups of western lowland gorillas that have been habituated around the research and tourism programme. The forest here is lowland equatorial rainforest, structurally different from the montane habitats of Uganda and Rwanda, and the gorilla encounter reflects that difference: the animals move through the understory with a fluidity that mountain gorillas, adapted to steeper terrain, do not display in the same way.
Lopé National Park
Lopé National Park in central Gabon, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, holds gorilla populations but the habituation programme there is primarily oriented toward research rather than tourism. The landscape at Lopé is unusual — a mosaic of forest and ancient savanna relics left by climate changes thousands of years ago, which means gorilla habitat is patchy rather than continuous. Gorilla sightings at Lopé are possible on guided walks but are not the guaranteed encounter that a habituated trekking programme provides.
Langoué Bai — Ivindo National Park
Langoué Bai in Ivindo National Park is one of the most extraordinary wildlife viewing sites in Africa — a forest clearing (bai) where elephants, gorillas, buffalo, and other large mammals gather to access mineral-rich soils and water. Gorilla viewing at a bai is fundamentally different from gorilla trekking: you observe from a platform at the edge of the clearing as animals come and go, rather than following a habituated family through the forest. The experience depends on animals choosing to appear, but bai viewings at Langoué have produced some of the most remarkable gorilla photography in existence. Access involves a long walk through Ivindo forest.