Border crossing Kenya/Uganda in Malaba.

Arriving at the Malaba border post was quite an experience: in less time than it takes to write about it we were surrounded by a crowd of people, shouting to us not to speak to anyone, showing us badges and telling us to follow them… We eventually realised that these guys were “facilitating agents” and were there to guide us through the border’s formalities. It was rather amusing/annoying: we had been crossing borders for the past 5 months without any help. Eventually we realised that we wouldn’t have peace less we chose one of them to be our guide. And so, Moses became our “agent”. We weren’t to regret his help in parting the sea.

Exiting Kenya went quite easily, except that we almost got heavily fined for not having paid road tax (20 USD) when we entered the country. It took us some time to explain that we had come from Lake Turkana, where there is no border post, and that no-one had told us about road tax in Nairobi when we went to Times Tower to have our Carnet de Passage stamped. We were quite happy to pay the road tax but felt we shouldn’t pay the fine. Fortunately we remembered the name of the customs boss we had dealt with in Nairobi, and fortunately the border officials were nice to us and ended up letting us go. No doubt Moses’s polite patience in dealing with them helped a lot.

Knowing that we would have to pay the Ugandan road tax in Ugandan shillings, we changed the Kenyan shillings we still had. The exchange rate offered t us by the agents was fair . We got USh26 for KSh1.

Moses then took us to the Ugandan side of the border, where we easily got a 2 month visa for USD50 each.

Getting the carne stamped was another story: First we had to get to a copy machine to get a copy of an official form. Moses paid for the copy. Then we had to fill the form and take it to some official who was to confirm the amount entered on the form. The official wasn’t in his office, but Moses had his phone number and managed to find him at the front gate. With that we then had to go to the bank (there is one at the border) to pay the tax and get a receipt. It was a whole complex process, probably to prevent corruption. Without Moses we would have been lost. Eventually we went through Customs, passed the queue (again with Moses help) and had our CDP stamped. We were finally and officially in Uganda.

Moses had made it clear that he was working as an independent agent. We gave him USh10,000 for his help. He seemed happy with that.

First impressions of Uganda.

We were impressed by the quality of the roads. They are excellent, and where there is roadwork the diversions are clear and good.

What struck us when we arrived was how green, hilly, and productive the countryside looks.
But, what will stay with us the most is the people’s kindness, helpfulness, and their smiles. Uganda is diverse and beautiful: stunning National Parks, thrilling rapids, unique birds, mysterious Chimpanzees and Gorillas, snowy mountains (the Rwenzoris), and active volcanos, tree-climbing lions, crater lakes and Lake Victoria. It is no wonder that this is where Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip chose to spend their honeymoon 60 years ago.

There are a few cell phone networks available, but Zain, which we used in Kenya and Tanzania is also present in Uganda. We are thus still using the sim card we bought a few months ago.

On 05 May 2009, the exchange rate was more or less:
- Ksh 1 (one Kenyan shilling) to Ush 26 (26 Ugandan shilling)
- USD 1 to Ush 2000
- ZAR 1 to Ush 200

And here are some prices:
- Ush 1700 to 4000 for a beer (supermarket to bar)
- Ush 700 to 1500 for a bottle of Coca Cola (local to Mzungu)
- Ush 1000 for a mango (Mzungu price?)
- Ush 1500 for a dozen bananas
- Ush 2100 to 2400 for 1l of petrol depending on dist from Kampala.

The Source of the White Nile

Jinja, where the White Nile leaves Lake Victoria, was to be our first stop in Uganda. It sells itself as the “Adventure Capital of Africa” and apart from offering probably the best commercial white water rafting in the world, it also offers: quad biking, bungee jumping, horse riding and kayaking. But, we didn’t do any of that - we chilled in the shade and went bird watching instead… Man, am I kicking myself now!

The Source of the Nile

Bird watching is better than white-water (Murchison Falls)

From Jinja we went to Murchison Falls National Park, lower down on the White Nile. The park is a vibrant mix of forest, bush and grassland. Of course we visited the falls and then we spent a day chimpanzee tracking in the Budongo forest.

Murchison Falls

It was magical to experience these creatures in their own environment. We were amazed how they can disappear – we smelled them first when they were only 5m from us and all around us. Our guide, Cypriano, was very knowledgeable and has been working with this particular group of 87 individuals for the last seventeen years. We learned that they only pick fruit from the trees as it becomes ripe (whereas baboons pick everything and throw the unripe fruit down) and can feed off the same few trees for a few weeks. They also hunt monkeys and small antelope closing in on them from all sides. They also strip grass and use it to fish termites out of their nests; and they retreat to the wardens’ village when there is a lion/leopard threatening them.

Deep Thought

The good news is that this particular forest habitat and its chimp population have been expanding over the last few years.

Chimp Tracking in Budongo Forest

Scarlet's Anatomy

The Kitchen and Diningroom

Steve's side

Caro's side

The Recovery Compartment

What to pack?

Two lists of things we:

1. Should have left in the garage:

Surfboards – a good starting point for many conversations, but not worth the hassle of off-loading every time we stopped for the night, loading them on again the next morning and then having to stop every so often to re-tie them. Maybe it would have been different if we had found some waves…

Cooler box – we used it for storage where another black box would have been better.

Egg holder – doesn’t work unless eggs are hard boiled!

2. Found really useful:

Snatch-strap – the best thing since the hi-lift jack (if you are travelling as two vehicles).

Awning – lovely in the rain.

Vacuum cleaner – some sanity when the dust becomes too much!

Tools – often the know-how is there but the tools aren’t. Spares for Toyota seem to be available everywhere. Fortunately we haven’t had to replace anything other than a wheel bearing thus far.

Fridge – what a pleasure! To think that we had even discussed whether it was worth the money...

Fan - hanging in our tent as a ceiling fan. It saved our lives on many hot nights! (Thanks for the idea, Gideon)

Fire lighters – Good old, Blitz. Charcoal is more easily available that firewood in most places.

Wash basins – Two big plastic basins for washing food, clothes, dishes and bodies.

Potjie – Our cast iron cooking pot.

Bleach – we took 1 litre of 12% Sodium Hypochlorite (NaHOCL) which we used to clean all our drinking water and fruit & veg. We use 3 drops for 10 litres of drinking water.

Spot light and binoculars – for checking out all the creatures hanging around our camp,day and night (Thanks, Pat & B).