More bus rides, safaris, and adventures in East Africa

When I last wrote we were in Kigali, Rwanda. After I got off the computer we spent the next few hours walking around the city, trying to find a bar with satellite tv showing the Rugby World Cup, to no avail. Brian was disappointed and I was tired! Funny how we could find it in small towns in Rwanda, but not in the capital city.

The next day we had a long bus journey to Kampala, Uganda. After Kigali, Kampala was filthy, crowded and annoying, and we wanted out as quickly as possible. We eventually found a matatu (minibus) to Jinja - they were in the middle of working on the brake pads of the matatu, but we wanted to get out of the city so badly that we trusted their workmanship and got on when they were done. Right before we left another girl got on to the already packed bus, and crammed herself in between me and my neighbor. I without thinking moved to give her more room, and so spent the next 4 hours sharing my seat with her (since the other lady of course didn't move over). It was only supposed to be a 1-2 hour bus ride, but there was an accident on the road. Very, very, very uncomfortable. But because of my discomfort Brian was able to negotiate with the conductor and save us 2,000 shillings ($1.25). Yes, I took it for the team!

We spent two nights in Jinja, Uganda, so that we could see the very exciting Source of the Nile, at Lake Victoria. Being sarcastic. Not much to see, just one of those tourist things to check off. We then took boda bodas (motorbike taxis) to Bujagali falls, 10kms from Jinja, where we spent another couple of nights. The Nile River is very pretty, so it was a nice place to relax. Brian went white water rafting - I was cheap and a scaredy cat, so I sat by the pool all day instead. Will let Brian recount his adventures in the rapids in another blog.

While waiting for our bus back to Kenya we met a very nice preacher from Nigeria. He gave us his card and invited us to stay with him and his family in Lagos. Very nice!

In Kenya we spent a few nights at a very cheap hotel in Nakuru. Like saving the money, but it was incredibly noisy! Between the disco across the street which was in full gear until 2-3 am, and the mosque around the corner which started the chanting around 4am, not much sleep was happening - until the third night when we wore our ear plugs!

While we were there we went on safari in Lake Nakuru park. There are 2 million flamingos there, on the edge of the soda lake. Incredible! Other interesting sightings: lots of hyenas hunting the flamingos (no kills), and a few white and black rhinos. The black rhinos are extremely aggressive, so our driver tried to stay away from them. But they still started to run towards our jeep! Glad he had kept the engine running. We saw no cats, but saw the recent kill of a leopard - a dead gazelle with it's stomach and intestines hanging out. Yuck.

We had wanted to go up north to Lake Baringo for a couple of nights, but the rains were flooding the roads, and (probably luckily) the lodge there was full, no room for us. Over the last couple of weeks there has been a ton of flooding in Uganda, parts of Kenya, and Rwanda. (I forgot to mention in my last blog that when we left the town of Gisenyi in Rwanda we passed by villages under water, devastated by the flooding. We heard that 15 people in that region had been killed.)

So, we went instead to Lake Naivasha, which is right beside Hell's Gate park. We've been on a lot of safaris on this trip, but this was totally different. We rented bikes and road thru the park, with zebra, warthogs, giraffe, gazelle surrounding us. Thankfully we didn't bump into any buffalo or lions! The setting is also unique - it's a big gorge, with high cliff walls rising up. We went for a nice one hour hike down into a section of the gorge with a guide, where we could feel the hot water coming from deep underground. There are a couple of big geo thermal plants in the area which separate the steam from the hot water and convert the steam into electricity. Brian made us climb a huge hill so that he could see the plants and the big pipes which run around the countryside. He was pretty excited - I wasn't so thrilled with the ride, especially since my bike was horrible (the seat kept falling down as I rode) and I'm horribly out of shape. After the 30-35km ride and hike I collapsed at our lodge!

When we were at the gorge we bumped into a Japanese girl we had gone on safari with in Nakuru. She told us that after we dropped her off at the matatu stand, her matatu was in a bad accident. A car which had been hijacked by a gun toting idiot rammed head on with her minibus. She had scrapes/bruises on her forehead, and she said that her arms/legs had been scraped and covered in blood. She was very very lucky to escape with just that! A famous gospel singer was just killed in this area in a matatu crash. One of the guides at the gorge was also telling us about how he was in a crash where 14 people were killed (and he caught a cop stealing from the bodies). Insane.

After hearing all of these stories we decided to take a bigger bus into Nairobi! Instead of going downtown right away we went to Karen, a suburb, for a night first, and visited the Karen Blixen museum and the giraffe conservation center. The latter was amazing - you can feed the Rothschild giraffes there, they take the food out of your hand with their long tongues! We were very fortunate to get a ride to the conservation center with a Moroccan lady and her Kenyan and Congolese friends. We will definitely have to visit her in Morocco one day!

And now we're in Nairobi, we fly to Joburg tomorrow. Last night we went for dinner at Carnivore. Apparently it's twice been named one of the world's 50 best restaurants. Not sure how they did that. It's certainly an interesting experience - they have a massive barbeque where they cook all types of meat, including ostrich and crocodile. Guys come around with the meat pierced on a sword, and they slice it onto your plate continuously, until you admit defeat and take your flag down. Brian being competitive didn't want to take his flag down earlier than the other tables around us, so he kept eating. I wanted to save room for dessert, so I surrendered earlier on. The food was just ok - not world class - but still something you have to do as a tourist in Kenya.

And that's us all caught up. Next blog will be from Asia!

Anne.