From the land of whole families being driven around on bicycles to one where they've added a motor. We started off with a few days in Kuala Lumpur revelling in being somewhere that felt like home (albeit a little bit more modern in parts). It helped that we were staying in Chinatown which probably feels the same everywhere... plus large numbers of tourists and a public transport system that works. Ok, that's not like Sydney but maybe one day. We spent one day to go up the twin towers and take in the view from the skybridge. We had expected this to be a 2 hour affair at most... but after queueing foran hour and a half we secured tickets for the 12:45pm visit. The skybridge is free as they bombard you with advertising for Petronas. We spent the time we had to wait exploring a shopping mall... with shops we recognised!!! Oh, the things we find exciting now, it's quite sad. The view from the bridge was spectacular and I spent a long time watching the fountain display from on high. We also indulged in our first cinema viewing experience in months!!
From there a quick flight to Cambodia brought us to the hottest place we have ever been!! Walking for 2 minutes leaves you dripping with sweat from places you didn't know sweated, and few places have air con so there's not much relief. We did decide to splurge on a room with a/c for that reason (a whole $13 for a double). Although we are now somewhere where they drive on the right again, it's not so noticeable here as you have to look every whichway when crossing the street including on the pavement.
Saturday, August 30, 2008
Monday, August 25, 2008
Africa - conclusions
I hope to do this for every continent, but we'll see. Africa has been a fascinating place to travel. We have met travellers who have come here 10 times, without wanting to go to Asia or South America or Australia, we have met people who have been here 10 months when they planned on 2... we on the other hand did not fall in love with this continent in that way. In fact it took us quite awhile to get into Africa. After being here 2 weeks, we thought the planned 4 months would be way too long. By the time we had been here a month we thought it would be about right but that we wouldn't return. By the end, we were sad to leave and have planned at least the next 2 trips to Africa.... but I doubt they'll happen for five years or so.
Now, for some facts:
Surprises: Mobile phones are more common than electricity or running water (hence a roaring trade in mobile phone charging shops).
Things seen on a bicycle: A family of six, a man holding trays with over one hundred eggs in one hand whilst steering with the other. 100s of kg of rice/coal etc. Trees stacked vertically about 4m tall.
Items lost: 4
Items returned: 3 ( money belt fell off on a bus in Botswana was returned by locals; daypack with all valuables was left in a restaurant in Dar Es Salaam and returned intact when we went back 2 hours later; contact lenses left in Stonetown were returned one week later - luckily one of the few times we backtracked). One t-shirt never got returned.
Sunglasses broken: 3 (generally from getting sat on during safaris)
Illnesses: 2 (food poisoning twice in Ethiopia - both Ellen)
Number of breakdowns/flat tyres: 6
Marriage proposals: 4 (all to Ellen)
Declarations of love: 32 (all to Ellen)
So now we're off to South East Asia for 6 weeks.... should be fun!
Now, for some facts:
Surprises: Mobile phones are more common than electricity or running water (hence a roaring trade in mobile phone charging shops).
Things seen on a bicycle: A family of six, a man holding trays with over one hundred eggs in one hand whilst steering with the other. 100s of kg of rice/coal etc. Trees stacked vertically about 4m tall.
Items lost: 4
Items returned: 3 ( money belt fell off on a bus in Botswana was returned by locals; daypack with all valuables was left in a restaurant in Dar Es Salaam and returned intact when we went back 2 hours later; contact lenses left in Stonetown were returned one week later - luckily one of the few times we backtracked). One t-shirt never got returned.
Sunglasses broken: 3 (generally from getting sat on during safaris)
Illnesses: 2 (food poisoning twice in Ethiopia - both Ellen)
Number of breakdowns/flat tyres: 6
Marriage proposals: 4 (all to Ellen)
Declarations of love: 32 (all to Ellen)
So now we're off to South East Asia for 6 weeks.... should be fun!
Sunday, August 24, 2008
The underbelly of an elephant
After farewelling Andrew we flew back to J'berg (with a slight detour via Uganda). We only had one week before our flight to Malaysia, so decided to do one last safari in Kruger. The thing we really wanted to do was attempt a self drive safari. So we hired a little Honda Jazz (brand new.... great for going around a national park) and headed off for 5 last days in the African bush. Natually without a guide and not really knowing where to drive we weren't expecting too much in the way of wildlife sightings, so we were pretty impressed when after the first 33minutes we had seen 4 of the big 5. (It took until the next day to see a leopard).
We loved it!! If we come back to Africa we would definitely choose to do a self-drive safari over a tour. There is something extraordinary about viewing the underbelly of an elephant. One day as we were driving along one of the narrower roads in Kruger with dense bush on either side we saw a huge bull elephant walking along the road towards us. The last turn off was 10km behind us, so we decided to pull as far to the side as possible and wait with the car in reverse ready to run at the first sign of trouble. As he got closer our heart rates increased and we really wished we knew exactly how you tell if an elephant is about to charge. About 2m from us he flapped his ears and gave us a look and as he came in line with the car he gave his head a little shake and gave just a little trumpet. Our hearts were in our throats, but he just continued past the car as we looked out our window directly in line with the underside of his belly.... just amazing!!! Another highlight was the leopard that we and only we saw.
This is the only safari that we have kept a list of the animals we saw so in 5 days we saw: lions, leopards, cheetahs, rhino, nile crocodiles, zebra, giraffe, spotted hyena, chacma baboons, vervet monkeys, buffalo, warthog, elephant, hippos, common duiker, sable, bushbuck, klipspringer, mountain reedbuck, common reedbuck, impala, grey rhebok, Sharpe's grysbok, waterbuck, blue wilderbeest, steenbok, nyala, kudu, tree squirrel, orbi, dwarf mongoose, slender mongoose, honey badger, white-headed vulture, secretary bird, martial eagle, wahlberg's eagle, african fish-eagle,barn owl and a 38 further species of birds.
We hadn't however realised quite how lucky we had been until we returned to the hostel and spoke to other people who had also done 5 day safaris (the same days of us). One group saw no big cats at all, and the other person who was on an organised tour saw leopard eyes a long way away at night and two lions about 200m away in the day and that was it. So, I'm not sure whether our love of Kruger is biased by how much we saw.
We loved it!! If we come back to Africa we would definitely choose to do a self-drive safari over a tour. There is something extraordinary about viewing the underbelly of an elephant. One day as we were driving along one of the narrower roads in Kruger with dense bush on either side we saw a huge bull elephant walking along the road towards us. The last turn off was 10km behind us, so we decided to pull as far to the side as possible and wait with the car in reverse ready to run at the first sign of trouble. As he got closer our heart rates increased and we really wished we knew exactly how you tell if an elephant is about to charge. About 2m from us he flapped his ears and gave us a look and as he came in line with the car he gave his head a little shake and gave just a little trumpet. Our hearts were in our throats, but he just continued past the car as we looked out our window directly in line with the underside of his belly.... just amazing!!! Another highlight was the leopard that we and only we saw.
This is the only safari that we have kept a list of the animals we saw so in 5 days we saw: lions, leopards, cheetahs, rhino, nile crocodiles, zebra, giraffe, spotted hyena, chacma baboons, vervet monkeys, buffalo, warthog, elephant, hippos, common duiker, sable, bushbuck, klipspringer, mountain reedbuck, common reedbuck, impala, grey rhebok, Sharpe's grysbok, waterbuck, blue wilderbeest, steenbok, nyala, kudu, tree squirrel, orbi, dwarf mongoose, slender mongoose, honey badger, white-headed vulture, secretary bird, martial eagle, wahlberg's eagle, african fish-eagle,barn owl and a 38 further species of birds.
We hadn't however realised quite how lucky we had been until we returned to the hostel and spoke to other people who had also done 5 day safaris (the same days of us). One group saw no big cats at all, and the other person who was on an organised tour saw leopard eyes a long way away at night and two lions about 200m away in the day and that was it. So, I'm not sure whether our love of Kruger is biased by how much we saw.
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Genocide
As our trip to Rwanda started with a visit to the genocide memorial of Kigali, so our last day in Rwanda included visits to two of the outlying genocide memorials. Both memorials were catholic churches prior to the genocide. As is generally the case churches were viewed as places of safety and thousands of people sought sanctuary at the various churches around Rwanda. For the perpetrators of the genocide this was seen only as a convenient way of getting people together so they could be killed. Each of the churches we went to had seen the massacre of over 5,000people and the mass graves out the back were the resting place for over 41,000. The exact number was not known as bodies are still being found as the trials continue. It is impossible to describe the emotion of being there and all three of us found our cheeks damp with tears. The saddest part is that the murderers and the victims were often neighbours and friends. The scale of the massare is difficult to fathom and the numbers are truly disturbing, but it is the individual stories that really tell the story. What follows is the story of our guide, Paul, I hope that I have done it justice.
Paul was 14 years old during the genocide. He had been brought up in a very religious household and was taught that he was a child of God and not a Hutu or a Tutsi. Indeed when he was taking his end of primary school exam and had to fill in on the form whether he was Hutu or Tutsi he didn't know so copied off his friend. Of course his friend was Hutu, whilst he was Tutsi so his page was ripped up and he had to fill it in again. Children that pass this exam were sent to government high schools, considered very good schools and paid for by the government. Despite being near the top of his class in primary school he was not accepted into the government run schools. One way of limiting the educational opportunities for Tutsi children. Luckily for him his uncle was headmaster at a Catholic school so he was able to continue to high school. In the years prior to the genocide there were killings going on and he recalled going out to the funerals of relatives but not really understanding what was happening.
Paul recalled on April 6th 1994 listening to the radio with his family when the announcement came that the presidents plane had been shot down and he was dead. He had a typical teenagers reaction of thinking it was good news as the school holidays were nearly ended and it would undoubtedly mean an extra week off school. His parents however did not share his excitement, knowing that this would not be good news, but obviously not aware of exactly what would happen. The next day a group came to their house on the pretext of looking for guns and lined the family up outside. A very close friend and neighbour (a Hutu) heard what was happening and came round to talk to the leader of the group. After the talks Pauls father was instructed to give them money, which luckily they had... so on day 1 money saved their lives. There was a meeting that night in which the list of people to be killed was read through. The neighbour came back and told them they had to leave. 5 of the children went with their mother to seek sanctuary in the church, his mother and 2 of the children were killed there. Paul went with his father and 2 other siblings into the forest to try and get out of Kigali that way. They hadn't understood that the genocide was country wide thinking it was confined to the cities. All the roads were blocked and identity cards (which identified ethnicity) were checked before you were allowed to pass. They were lucky though and managed to survive in the forest for 5 days, before being found by the RPF. It was four years later in 1998 that they were finally able to bury his mother and the two children who were killed. He is considered one of the lucky ones, he still has a father and brothers and sisters, many people don't.
Paul was 14 years old during the genocide. He had been brought up in a very religious household and was taught that he was a child of God and not a Hutu or a Tutsi. Indeed when he was taking his end of primary school exam and had to fill in on the form whether he was Hutu or Tutsi he didn't know so copied off his friend. Of course his friend was Hutu, whilst he was Tutsi so his page was ripped up and he had to fill it in again. Children that pass this exam were sent to government high schools, considered very good schools and paid for by the government. Despite being near the top of his class in primary school he was not accepted into the government run schools. One way of limiting the educational opportunities for Tutsi children. Luckily for him his uncle was headmaster at a Catholic school so he was able to continue to high school. In the years prior to the genocide there were killings going on and he recalled going out to the funerals of relatives but not really understanding what was happening.
Paul recalled on April 6th 1994 listening to the radio with his family when the announcement came that the presidents plane had been shot down and he was dead. He had a typical teenagers reaction of thinking it was good news as the school holidays were nearly ended and it would undoubtedly mean an extra week off school. His parents however did not share his excitement, knowing that this would not be good news, but obviously not aware of exactly what would happen. The next day a group came to their house on the pretext of looking for guns and lined the family up outside. A very close friend and neighbour (a Hutu) heard what was happening and came round to talk to the leader of the group. After the talks Pauls father was instructed to give them money, which luckily they had... so on day 1 money saved their lives. There was a meeting that night in which the list of people to be killed was read through. The neighbour came back and told them they had to leave. 5 of the children went with their mother to seek sanctuary in the church, his mother and 2 of the children were killed there. Paul went with his father and 2 other siblings into the forest to try and get out of Kigali that way. They hadn't understood that the genocide was country wide thinking it was confined to the cities. All the roads were blocked and identity cards (which identified ethnicity) were checked before you were allowed to pass. They were lucky though and managed to survive in the forest for 5 days, before being found by the RPF. It was four years later in 1998 that they were finally able to bury his mother and the two children who were killed. He is considered one of the lucky ones, he still has a father and brothers and sisters, many people don't.
Saturday, August 9, 2008
News from home
We've been having a lovely time relaxing at Lake Kivu in Rwanda, seeing the hot springs, swimming (avoiding the patches of lake which can asphixiate you) and peering over the border into the DRC. However, last night our sleep was interrupted by a phone call at 12:30am from my brother to announce the arrival of his daughter Elizabeth Honour Northcott (Beth). We are now auntie Ellen and uncle Jason!! Full of excitement I didn't get back to sleep until 4am... I can't wait to get home for a cuddle.... of course that has to wait a few more months. So, many congratulations to Geoff and Rachel and we want lots of photos!!
Friday, August 8, 2008
Trekking through mud
We had one more day in Kigali exploring the different areas of town and visiting a natural history museum which is housed in Richard Kant's house, before heading to the Volcanoes National Park. One thing that was very striking is how clean Rwanda is. The other pleasant surprise is that the police do not carry around guns (of any size) compared with the machine guns seen in many other countries we've been to. We spent three days at the Volcanoes National Park with treks planned each day, so we expected to get very tired.
The first day was a trek to see the Golden Monkeys, supposed to be quite an easy walk. After our guide (Patience) informed us that the monkeys had moved and it would be a four hour hike there, we reached the monkeys before even entering the park proper observing them from the fields just outside. (Supposedly Patience was testing us to mae sure we really wanted to go). The monkeys were quite entertaining to watch jumping around in the bamboo... and at one point jumping on each other (although the female didn't seem to notice as she just kept eating before, during and after).
Day two was the much anticipated gorilla trek for Jason and I. There are only 750 mountain gorillas left in the world and we were very excited to have the opportunity of seeing them in the wild. In the morning of the trek you are assigned to groups based upon the difficulty of the trek the guides think you can manage. Jason and I were assigned to one of the intermediate groups (Umubano) that is supposed to be about a 1 and a half to 2 hour hike in the park. After walking through the fields towards the boundary of the park for about 20 minutes we met the trackers for the group. All the rain had encouraged the group down the mountain meaning we had a 10 minute hike through the forest before being able to spend 1 hour with the gorillas. Before you go you are informed that you should stay at least 7m from the gorillas at all times (although the gorillas are not aware of this rule)... in reality it was nearly impossible to get that far away from the gorillas. Generally we were about 2-3m away and at times closer. One of the babies seemed to think making the tourists move was great fun. The 8 of us were all standing in a group when the baby starting walking directly towards us, so the guides quickly moved us out of the way... and the baby changed direction heading towards the group, we moved, he followed. He didn't seem to want to touch us, just make us scramble out of the way. Once he tired of this game he started climbing on a tree, hanging upside down and fighting with his brother. We were also able to get incredibly close to the silverback. He hadn't moved from his nest that he slept in and went back to sleep whilst we were there after greeting the guides with some grunts. It was an incredible experience and we could happily have spent many more hours with the family getting to know them, but alas that's not allowed and so we headed back down the mountain.
On day three we were excited to finally get into the park!! We were pretty sure that Dian Fossey's grave would not have moved down the mountain. Initially we expected a 15minute walk to the park, then 2 hours in the park to the grave... however, because it had rained so much the guide decided to take us a different route walking for nearly an hour before making it to the park. We then scrambled over the wall and started up the volcano. Luckily for us it was only the three of us in the group, so we could go at our own pace without upsetting anyone. There was another group heading to the crater lakes, but 3 of those turned back before making it to the park and another 2 turned back shortly after overtaking us. There is really only one work to adequately describe this hike - mudddy!!! The 2 hour hike took us about 4 hours as even on flat sections we were incredibly slow trying to avoid sinking into the mud - we failed. By the end we were all caked in mud up to our knees and the inside of our shoes had filled with it. The walk was great fun and the gorilla graveyard although sad was interesting to see. By the end though we were all tired and hungry (having forgotten to take any snacks with us) and were looking forward to a few days of r and r on Lake Kivu.
The first day was a trek to see the Golden Monkeys, supposed to be quite an easy walk. After our guide (Patience) informed us that the monkeys had moved and it would be a four hour hike there, we reached the monkeys before even entering the park proper observing them from the fields just outside. (Supposedly Patience was testing us to mae sure we really wanted to go). The monkeys were quite entertaining to watch jumping around in the bamboo... and at one point jumping on each other (although the female didn't seem to notice as she just kept eating before, during and after).
Day two was the much anticipated gorilla trek for Jason and I. There are only 750 mountain gorillas left in the world and we were very excited to have the opportunity of seeing them in the wild. In the morning of the trek you are assigned to groups based upon the difficulty of the trek the guides think you can manage. Jason and I were assigned to one of the intermediate groups (Umubano) that is supposed to be about a 1 and a half to 2 hour hike in the park. After walking through the fields towards the boundary of the park for about 20 minutes we met the trackers for the group. All the rain had encouraged the group down the mountain meaning we had a 10 minute hike through the forest before being able to spend 1 hour with the gorillas. Before you go you are informed that you should stay at least 7m from the gorillas at all times (although the gorillas are not aware of this rule)... in reality it was nearly impossible to get that far away from the gorillas. Generally we were about 2-3m away and at times closer. One of the babies seemed to think making the tourists move was great fun. The 8 of us were all standing in a group when the baby starting walking directly towards us, so the guides quickly moved us out of the way... and the baby changed direction heading towards the group, we moved, he followed. He didn't seem to want to touch us, just make us scramble out of the way. Once he tired of this game he started climbing on a tree, hanging upside down and fighting with his brother. We were also able to get incredibly close to the silverback. He hadn't moved from his nest that he slept in and went back to sleep whilst we were there after greeting the guides with some grunts. It was an incredible experience and we could happily have spent many more hours with the family getting to know them, but alas that's not allowed and so we headed back down the mountain.
On day three we were excited to finally get into the park!! We were pretty sure that Dian Fossey's grave would not have moved down the mountain. Initially we expected a 15minute walk to the park, then 2 hours in the park to the grave... however, because it had rained so much the guide decided to take us a different route walking for nearly an hour before making it to the park. We then scrambled over the wall and started up the volcano. Luckily for us it was only the three of us in the group, so we could go at our own pace without upsetting anyone. There was another group heading to the crater lakes, but 3 of those turned back before making it to the park and another 2 turned back shortly after overtaking us. There is really only one work to adequately describe this hike - mudddy!!! The 2 hour hike took us about 4 hours as even on flat sections we were incredibly slow trying to avoid sinking into the mud - we failed. By the end we were all caked in mud up to our knees and the inside of our shoes had filled with it. The walk was great fun and the gorilla graveyard although sad was interesting to see. By the end though we were all tired and hungry (having forgotten to take any snacks with us) and were looking forward to a few days of r and r on Lake Kivu.
Sunday, August 3, 2008
Meeting with Andrew
After settling into the luxury of the hotel, we then attempted to meet up with Andrew. We couldn't remember exactly what time his flight got in so we called down to reception a few times to see if he had arrived. At 8:30pm we finally found out he was there and tried to call his room from reception. Whilst we were waiting for him to pick up he arrived at reception in person. It turned out he hadn't looked for us as the tour company he had booked the trip with thought we were arriving at the airport and had driven there to pick us up. They even had an arrival time for us of 9:30pm which is quite impressive as we were coming overland.
After a sumptuous dinner, we headed off for bed (which had been turned down for us!).The next day we visited the genocide memorial, which was incredibly moving and deeply disturbing. There were very moving stories, skulls, bones, pictures and videos. They also had a very good exhibit detailing a few of the other genocides that have occured to drive home the point that this is not a one of occurance in one country but something human beings repeatedly do to each other and we need to learn how to prevent. The genocide has definitely not been forgotten here with motorcycle taxi drivers jackets bearing messages regarding it, and frequent messages seen along roadsides and in country towns. There is a definite feeling of Rwanda defined before the genocide and post the genocide.
After a sumptuous dinner, we headed off for bed (which had been turned down for us!).The next day we visited the genocide memorial, which was incredibly moving and deeply disturbing. There were very moving stories, skulls, bones, pictures and videos. They also had a very good exhibit detailing a few of the other genocides that have occured to drive home the point that this is not a one of occurance in one country but something human beings repeatedly do to each other and we need to learn how to prevent. The genocide has definitely not been forgotten here with motorcycle taxi drivers jackets bearing messages regarding it, and frequent messages seen along roadsides and in country towns. There is a definite feeling of Rwanda defined before the genocide and post the genocide.
Saturday, August 2, 2008
The journey towards luxury
Unfortunately the journey wasn't particularly luxurious at all. In anticipation of meeting up with my uncle Andrew and travelling with him in Rwanda for two weeks staying in his choice of hotel rather than our normal what's the cheapest we can find approach, we had camped basically every night in Uganda. Unlike in southern Africa where camping was usually accompanied by excellent toilets and showers in Uganda they were generally smelly pit toilets and cold showers. To put it bluntly we smelt... and were covered with dust as well. It probably didn't help that the minibus from the border to Kigali was an over crowded minibus with a whole bunch of other smelly people, requiring open windows ensuring a final layer of dust over everything. Our bags were strapped to the top of the bus and so had both achieved a brown coating by the time we disembarked. Not wanting to be total slobs we did opt for a taxi from the bus station to the hotel, rather than the cheaper boda-boda (motorbike taxi). Still, when we got out at the Kigali Serena where we were staying with Andrew noone rushed to help us with our bags, instead we got some rather strange looks.
The reception was however able to be convinced that we were actually staying there and replacing our backpacks we headed up to see our room..... and WOW!!!! Amazing. We weren't even willing to touch anything in our state of disrepair. After showers... with a shower door!! and a bathmat!! we dressed in the fluffy bathrobes whilst we set about doing a load of washing in the bath.... just to give us something clean to change into. After that we had another shower. In fact from being in a state of 'No, can't face a cold shower today'.... we are having 3 showers and a bath a day. Never has it felt so good to be clean.
The reception was however able to be convinced that we were actually staying there and replacing our backpacks we headed up to see our room..... and WOW!!!! Amazing. We weren't even willing to touch anything in our state of disrepair. After showers... with a shower door!! and a bathmat!! we dressed in the fluffy bathrobes whilst we set about doing a load of washing in the bath.... just to give us something clean to change into. After that we had another shower. In fact from being in a state of 'No, can't face a cold shower today'.... we are having 3 showers and a bath a day. Never has it felt so good to be clean.
Friday, August 1, 2008
Lake Bunyoni
From Kampala we decided to head for Lake Bunyoni, which is quite near the border of Rwanda. Perhaps stupidly we went to the bus station the day before to find out what time we needed to arrive the next day. For about 1km around the bus station the streets were packed and chaotic to say the least and the bus station appeared to be something made out of nightmares. We did find someone who was wearing a jacket proclaiming him to be a guide for the bus station who told us we needed to be there at 6am the next day. Little did we realise that in Uganda buses don't have a departure time, they just leave when full... so the 6am was just a suggestion not a compulsory time to come. So we organised at large expense a taxi to pick us up at 5:30am and set our alarm for 4:15am to give us time to pack up the tent and all our belongings in the dark. (We have discovered that by using all our clothing we can make quite a nice pillow - but packing up does take a bit longer).
We arrived at the bus station tired and mildly disorientated to find the entire area empty and really quite peaceful at that time of day. Our taxi driver handed us over to another person wearing one of those guide jackets and we were led to a bus (accompanied by a couple of other people)paid our money and were given tickets that read Kampala to Kabale. There was only one other person on the bus which wasn't promising, so we settled in for a long wait. After about 20 minutes I decided to go stand outside the bus and stretch my legs. As per normal I was immediately approached by about 5 guys who started talking to me and asking where I was going. When I told them Kabale I was promptly informed that we were on the wrong bus. After much talking to everyone I could find and just a hint of tears as I explained we had paid all our money for the bus fair and now wouldn't be able to afford the bus ticket for the right bus I was taken to the bus station bouncer. This was a big African dressed all in black who was slouched by the entrance to the bus station. The situation was explained by my 10 supporters to him, I handed over my tickets and the group of us went to find the ticket seller for the bus we were on. Whilst the 10 guys who were helping me yelled, abused and shouted at this guy the bouncer just held out our tickets and kept getting into his personal space. Within another couple of minutes we had our money and were seated on what everyone in the bus stop assured us was the bus to Kabale. (During all this palava Jason had remained hidden on the bus, figuring as a lone girl I would get more help than if he was with me... undoubtedly an accurate assessment).
The bus journey was long, but otherwise uneventful. At the other end we joined up with the other two tourists on the bus to get a taxi to the Lake. There we met up with 5 more and the 9 of us headed off in a motorboat to the island. This led to a very enjoyable few days camping by the lake, eating too much food and reading. There was also the memorable vodka and amarula night when we played 'This is how I bang my stick'.... but I guess the details of that aren't really necessary.
We arrived at the bus station tired and mildly disorientated to find the entire area empty and really quite peaceful at that time of day. Our taxi driver handed us over to another person wearing one of those guide jackets and we were led to a bus (accompanied by a couple of other people)paid our money and were given tickets that read Kampala to Kabale. There was only one other person on the bus which wasn't promising, so we settled in for a long wait. After about 20 minutes I decided to go stand outside the bus and stretch my legs. As per normal I was immediately approached by about 5 guys who started talking to me and asking where I was going. When I told them Kabale I was promptly informed that we were on the wrong bus. After much talking to everyone I could find and just a hint of tears as I explained we had paid all our money for the bus fair and now wouldn't be able to afford the bus ticket for the right bus I was taken to the bus station bouncer. This was a big African dressed all in black who was slouched by the entrance to the bus station. The situation was explained by my 10 supporters to him, I handed over my tickets and the group of us went to find the ticket seller for the bus we were on. Whilst the 10 guys who were helping me yelled, abused and shouted at this guy the bouncer just held out our tickets and kept getting into his personal space. Within another couple of minutes we had our money and were seated on what everyone in the bus stop assured us was the bus to Kabale. (During all this palava Jason had remained hidden on the bus, figuring as a lone girl I would get more help than if he was with me... undoubtedly an accurate assessment).
The bus journey was long, but otherwise uneventful. At the other end we joined up with the other two tourists on the bus to get a taxi to the Lake. There we met up with 5 more and the 9 of us headed off in a motorboat to the island. This led to a very enjoyable few days camping by the lake, eating too much food and reading. There was also the memorable vodka and amarula night when we played 'This is how I bang my stick'.... but I guess the details of that aren't really necessary.
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