Jinja

From last Thursday until Tuesday, all the team members had some time off. Wanting to make the most of the break, the young engineers and I decided to go to Jinja – ‘the adventure capital of Uganda,’ or so the guidebook said. Jinja is an hour and a half away from Kampala, which is quite far from camp. On the way there, our car broke down, so it took us twelve hours to get there. On the way back, however, because our driver was speeding, the drive took less than seven hours total. Anyway, we had two full days in Jinja. The first day, we walked around town, admiring the lavender-coloured Jacaranda trees along the banks of the Nile. I didn’t know this before hand, but the source of the Nile is actually in Uganda (it’s called ‘Rippon Falls’ and was discovered/named in 1862 by John Hanning Speke). Later on in the day, we went on a sunset cruise on the river, and we had fun spotting monkeys in the trees. There were grey monkeys, and small little brown ones with white moustaches and red tails. I asked the guide what types of monkeys they were, but he said he didn’t know. 

Other animals we saw near the river included an otter and a fishing eagle, which looks a lot like a bald eagle (it has the white head and everything), although it was perhaps a bit smaller. There were also giant lizards and Melanie thought she spotted a toucan. All the big game – leopards, rhinos, elephants, etc. – are in parks now, so we didn’t see any of them.

            During our second day in Jinja, we went on a river-rafting trip on the Nile. It was wonderful. We all managed to get inside the same raft, and by chance we met another Canadian from Vancouver so, except for the guides, we had a fully Canadian boat. We spent a few minutes practising paddling in a calm section before we went down the first rapid. Boy, was it ever fun. The guides steered us between two rocks, and then yelled for us to squat down in the boat so we wouldn’t fall out. Then the water sort of snatched us away. The waves were huge, and we got completely soaked, but we didn’t tip over on the first rapid like some of the other teams did. The nice thing about rafting the Nile is that the water levels are very high, so even if you fall out (everyone did at least twice), it’s very unlikely that you’ll hit a rock. We flipped over during the second set of rapids, and I got pulled under for a few seconds before my lifejacket bounced me back up. It wasn’t any scarier than getting buffeted by waves in the ocean when you’re surfing. I thought it was great. And, in the calm sections in between the rapids, the guides let us jump out of the raft and bob along in the current, which was absolutely lovely.

            Another interesting thing about being in Jinja was meeting all the other muzungu travellers in the area – Swiss, British, German, American, Dutch, South African – you name it, they were there. And most of them weren’t tourists, which surprised me. Most were, like us, working for non-profit organizations, although I did meet a couple university students who were doing research for their political science doctorates. One of the more interesting people I met was a young woman who worked in rural Sudan. We were all very impressed – ‘isn’t it dangerous?’ we asked. She shrugged and said that getting killed in a motor accident was much more probable than getting killed by gunmen. She works all on her own, isolated from all of her team members, in a rural village trying to eradicate Guiney worm. We also met some American Peace Corps workers, and boy are they intense – they all committed to two years of work in Uganda. And they don’t live in a nice compound like we do – they live right with the Ugandan people in mud huts and everything. 

            So, basically, Jinja was great. The food (Western – a nice change) was awesome, and the guides were all very well organized and fun. We did get robbed at the campsite (they didn’t get any money, though, but they did get my nice new hiking backpack and my ipod, which was a real shame. Also, they sliced through Matt’s tent with a knife, but he thinks he might be able to fix it). Apart from that, the trip went really well. We had a lot of fun rafting, and the engineers are all planning to go back later on. Now we are all back at camp. It’s a bit weird not having the Americans around. I am now the only non-engineer (besides Nancy and David) here. As a result, I think I will be tagging around with the engineers a lot more, but that’s O.K. 

            Anyway, that’s all for now – until next week!