Berberati is the nearest substantial town to the Dzanga-Sangha Special Reserve, one of the most biodiverse and least-visited protected areas in Africa. The reserve covers 3,359 square kilometres of dense equatorial rainforest in the southwestern corner of the CAR, where the country meets Cameroon and the Republic of Congo. It is home to forest elephants, western lowland gorillas, bongo antelope, and an extraordinary variety of primates and birds.
Most visitors enter the reserve through Bayanga, a small town about 200 kilometres south of Berberati on a rough forest road. Bayanga has a research station affiliated with the World Wildlife Fund and a small ecolodge. Getting there from Berberati requires either a hired vehicle with driver or, occasionally, trucks making the supply run south. The Bayaka (Ba'Aka) people, indigenous hunter-gatherers of the forest, live throughout this area and are known for their extraordinary polyphonic singing — one of the world's great musical traditions. Any visit that doesn't involve hearing Bayaka music in the forest is missing the most remarkable thing about the place.