Our destination was a site known as the Moba Bai complex, a group of natural clearings near the east bank of the upper Mambili, not far from the Lossi sanctuary. A bai in Francophone Africa is a marshy meadow, often featuring a salt lick, and surrounded by forest like a secret garden. In addition to Moba Bai, the namesake of this complex, there were three or four others nearby. Gorillas (and other wildlife) frequent such bais, which are waterlogged and sunny, because of the sodium-rich sedges and asters that grow beneath the open sky.
