Uganda Day 1

I was up and on the road by 0730am. I was on my way to trek and see the Mountain Gorillas of Uganda. I had thought that it was about a 3 hour drive. Turns out I was WAY off. The drive took 11 hours!!!! We traveled along the main highway which consisted of broken asphalt, pot holes and no real speed limit. I have made a promise to myself that I will NEVER NEVER drive in Uganda!!! They have right hand drives and they have no real road laws. I thought we were going to die or at least kill a few pedestrians along the way.

The drive consisted of travelling through many villages and towns. I was amazed at the drivig skills of my guide. I must admit I was nervous a few times and that’s coming from a guy who has driven with many paramedics at full speed in downtown Toronto. I snapped a few photos along the way (see the blog with the photo album). I was shocked at what these people carried on bikes. The weirest one was a guy carrying 12 foot re-bar across the back seat of the bike. That caused his bike to be 12 feet wide. This country the pedistrians and the bikes share the shoulder while the cars and trucks (with no speed limit and very little asphault share the road. I have no idea how this guy didn’t clip a vehcle or a pedestrian during his ride.

After about 9.5 hours we entered the Queen Elizabeth National Park. We have to travel through this park in order to get to the Bwindi Impenetrable National Park where the gorrillias live. We picked up two hitchhikers (Africa style) who had offered some information about a bridge being washed out in exchange for a short lift to the next outpost. One of the people was a park warden for the Queen Elizabeth National Park

As we dropped them off they had mentioned that about 20min up the road elephants were spotted about an hour ago. They had heard this from some other travelers. As we carried on our way we spotted 2 elephants in the distance. I took a couple of photos. Then I realized I was in Africa as we also spotted Monkeys on the road, then about 20 Baboons ( I took some picks and if you zoom on to the one where they are on the guard rail of the road you will find a mother baboon with her infant on her back and he is looking at the camera), a herd of River Buck (Basiclly a deer but all with antlers), another large group of Baboons, 3 more elephants that were very close to us, various birds with awesome colours and then one more group of about 10 elephants in the distance. All of this occurred within 1 hours of driving!

Uganda was ruled as a British Colony for years. This is still evident today as I arrived in Entebbe located on Lake Victoria, entered Queen Elizabeth National Park which hosts Lake Albert and Lake George.

As we travelled through several towns located in both national parks many kids came running out to wave and they kept yelling “MUZUNGU” which means White Man. It is used as a common term and not meant to be mean or racial. I noticed that one main difference between here and Sudan is that they try to use hard standing structures for their villages and even the Tukuls that they have are made of metal. I also noticed that the buildings their villages had were exactly like the ones you would find in old Mexico and even in outlaying Mexico villages…..Wonder how that happened…

We arrive at our destination which was called the BUHOMA COMMUNITY REST CAMP. I was quite interesting and cool. They used very little electricity and believed in preserving the environment. We had diner by oil lamp in the restaurant/Bar – see the pics. From there I was shown my tent/living area. It was quite cool. It was a large tent set up inside of a shelter. Out the back end of the tent was an open air bathroom with toilet, shower and table. All was good as I set up my things and prepared my clothes for the next day. Then I looked up…. It was then that I realized that I was not alone! I was sharing my tent with a jungle spider. This guy was about 3” long!!! MASSIVE!!! I had spotted it when I strapped on my head lamp and was looking around the tent. The spider’s eyes lit up from my light and were so large and bright. I looked around and realized that I was in the middle of nowhere with no help and it was just me and this spider and one of us had to go. Now the question was HOW to get rid of it. It was big enough that if I had knocked it to the floor and stepped on it there would be guts all over the place. So I finally used the wash basin I was provided and knocked it into it and then escorted it back to the jungle from which it came.

After that traumatizing moment I decided to head back up to the bar to meet some of the other travelers. I had met a few new friends including the bartender Aggrey. Aggrey is 25 years old and lives in the local community. He got married a year ago and now has a 1 month old son. He walks 30-40 minutes to work at the camp. He was so friendly and shared his 3 years of experiences with the gorillas and the local community with me. I had a NILE SPECIAL beer served in a 500ml bottle. This beer has been gaining momentum on the international beer market and has won several awards. It was a very good beer. So I enjoyed my beer and the conversation with Aggrey. I headed off to bed as I had an early morning of gorilla trekking planned.

I got back in my tent cleaned up and jumped into my bed and set up my mosquito netting all with the use of my head lamp. As I laid back and looked up two brightly glowing eyes caught my attention! There was another visitor and he was on the ceiling of the tent right above me. This one was the exact same type of spider as the last one just a little smaller. Well there was no way I could sleep with the knowledge that this guy was sitting above me. So up I got and escorted him out of MY tent. LOL

Night