Hippos
13 places to see and hear hippos in the wild, in 12 countries from Senegal to Gabon: when each one peaks, where to go on your own, what it costs and what you will hear. Wild animals only, no zoos.
Best time, place by place
Where to go, north to south
Niokolo-Koba — hippos, lions and the Gambia river in the dry seasonHippo pods bellowing on the Gambia river below the Simenti terrace, lions roaring across the dry savanna, hyenas, and at dawn the booming of ground hornbills and the calls of spur-winged geese and Egyptian plovers on the sandbars.
Hippos and the chimpanzee islands of the River Gambia National ParkHippo pods grunting and blowing on the river bends below Janjanbureh, chimpanzee pant-hoots carrying across the water from the Baboon Islands, baboon troops on the banks and fish eagles at every bend.
Saltwater hippos of OrangoHippo grunts and blows from a lagoon inside island forest, then the same animals walking past the village beach at night and surfacing in the sea in the morning — the world's only regularly marine hippos.
Outamba-Kilimi — hippos, chimps and the northern savanna at nightHippo pods on the Little Scarcies river, chimps and colobus in the gallery forests at dawn, ground hornbills booming, and savanna nights with nightjars and hyenas — Sierra Leone's oldest park and its emptiest.
Gola Forest National Park (Liberia) — hornbills, picathartes and pygmy hippo countryHornbill wingbeats like distant trains, the whooping of yellow-casqued hornbills, chimps and colobus, and the near-silence of a picathartes colony arriving under a boulder at dusk.
Sapo National Park — pygmy hippo, elephants and the deepest forest in West AfricaPrimary Upper Guinea rainforest with nothing man-made within a day's walk: casqued hornbills, chimps, Diana monkeys, the whistles of duikers, elephants rumbling at night, tree hyrax, and the full insect and frog layer of a forest that has never been logged.
Comoé: elephants, hippos and the savanna-forest mosaicHippos bellowing on the Comoé at dusk, elephants at the river pools, lions are not to be expected but spotted hyena whoop; the ground hornbill's booming duet at dawn and the harmattan wind in the gallery forest.
Wechiau: hippos on the Black Volta at duskThe Black Volta's hippo pools: the stacked laughing grunt of a bull answered down the river, blows and splashes as the pod surfaces, then at dusk the heavy walk of hippos leaving the water to graze a few hundred metres from the Talawona camp. Egyptian plovers piping on the sandbars, fish eagles, carmine bee-eaters in the dry-season colonies on the banks.
Hippos on the Mono riverHippo laughing-grunts and blows from the river pools at dusk, carrying up the gallery forest, with nightjars and the fishing villages beyond.
Pendjari: lions, elephants and hippos at the dry-season poolsLions roaring across the Pendjari plain in the small hours — one of the few places in West Africa where this is still likely — hippos bellowing at Mare Bali, elephants at the pools, hyena whoops and a savanna dawn of francolins, ground hornbills and doves.
Kainji Lake: hippos and savanna nights on the Oli riverHippo choruses on the Oli river pools at dusk, hyena and nightjars around the camp, baboon barks, and the wide Guinea-savanna dawn of francolins, hornbills and doves.
Bénoué: hippos on the river at Buffle Noir and the Guinea-savanna dry seasonThe Bénoué at the dry-season low: hippo pods grunting and blowing a hundred metres below the camp terrace, the splash and heavy tread as they come out after dark, lion at a distance on still nights, the hoot of ground hornbills and the piping of Egyptian plovers on the sandbars at dawn; carmine bee-eaters in their thousands at the river-bank colonies.
Loango: forest elephants, buffalo and hippos on the ocean beachSurf behind everything. Elephants are near-silent on sand, but the rumbles and the crack of branches at the forest edge carry at dawn; hippo grunts from the lagoons at dusk; red river hog groups snuffling through the leaf litter; the chatter of river-martin flocks over the water in August–October and chimpanzee pant-hoots from the forest behind Akaka in the wet season.