This post comes slightly later than my last ones a little because I am procrastinating, a little because I am trying to figure out how to describe this weekend well and do it justice and a little because there are actually things for me to do at work- hurray!!
This weekend, my friends and I took a little vacation to Jinja. It is around 50 miles away from Kampala. Next to Kampala, it is the biggest city in terms of tourism since there is a great deal of outdoor activity done there. And since you all know me so well and know my LOVE of all things outdoors, you’d probably assume I would go my first free weekend. If you actually know me well and my distaste of camping ever since it rained EVERY single year when I went with Camp Yavneh, you will be pleased to know it was a delightful weekend! It was really gorgeous and I didn’t realize how nice it would be to get out of the city. I know people say this all the time about NYC but sometimes I just think they just need an excuse to take a vacation. Now, I see what they mean. It felt calmer, more relaxing, and so green! Not in the way that they were super economically friendly, but really lush and green as far as the eye could see.
We arrived at our destination, Adrift, around 10AM. How it is that we woke up at 6:30AM and got 50 miles away four hours later, I will probably never understand. Oh Africa time! Adrift was a really fun place and, if I did more of these kinds of things, I would want to stay there forever! There were some tents set up, some nicer equipped tents on a platform and some dorms with 9 bunk-beds in each room. There was then a lovely area overlooking the water with chairs, tables, a bar, a reception desk, some couches, and some monkeys just in case you forgot where you were! They were playing the rugby matches on the TV and beer was around 90 cents all weekend long- seriously, what could be bad? You also got a great shot of the bungee jumpers around 50 feet away when you sat in the bar area- don’t worry, although the thought did cross my mind, my cheap side won out over my adventure side and I declined the $100 bungee jumping into the base of the Nile River. I’m kind of regretting it, but only a little.
We instead decided to see the Bugagali falls and go ATVing. Because of recent construction in the area to create yet another dam in the Nile River (boo) to help with the electricity shortages (yay!), the falls were not as breathtaking as they once were described to us. Instead, there was a small walk down some mud steps to see some small falls and some rapid-type action. Of course, we took our classic pictures making sure to get the pretty scenery in the background but after the fifth guy asked us if we wanted a ride on his boat, we decided it was time to go. We walked to the ATV place (what Ugandans called Quad bikes) and got ready for our adventure. I’ll be honest, this has always been a secret dream of mine to do. Ever since I saw those four wheel small bikes for four-year-olds that actually dove up to 5mph with Barbie decoration on the side, I really really wanted to drive one. ATVing was like that except with a bigger bike, a bigger engine, and driving all around a village and through mud and rocks and hills. That’s a pretty good description- right?
The place we were using gave us overalls and helmets and made sure to inform us we WILL be getting dirty and not to race, which I honestly thought was the whole point of ATVing, but oh well!. I tried out the semi-automatic for about 10.5 seconds before I realized that just because I knew how to drive the manual transmission of our 2010 Toyota at home, that did not give me much of an upper hand with a semi-automatic bike in Uganda. I switched to the automatic and after a quick track around the parking lot and min-golf course next door, we were off! We got to go through some crops and some forest areas and since it had just rained, they did not lie about getting dirty. To me, though, charging through the mud puddles was half of the fun! It only started to get a little awkward when we started driving through villages. There we were: four American girls on big bikes and we were zooming through tiny mud roads with huts made of sticks and mud on the sides. All the while there were half naked (or some fully naked) children calling out to us and screaming after us. It was unclear to me if it was in fun or just yelling at us. Many of the adults did not seem too happy to see us and I can’t really blame them. I am sure many times a day some Muzungus come charging through their village, getting mud everywhere and making a ridiculous amount of noise while they are cooking, planting, and just plain trying to live. It was a weird juxtaposition and I definitely enjoyed the ATVing more when not in these parts of the tour.
That night we sat for close to seven hours just next to the water, drinking cheap beers, playing cards and, let’s be honest, waiting for close to two hours for food. But, we had nowhere to go, so it was fine. We were awakened the next morning by the banging of the monkey on our roof and by Erin, one in our party planning to go rafting, finding her eye swollen almost shut. We didn’t know the cause, but since she already had a metal rod in her ankle from an accident in the US before she left, she decided to stay back while we adventured on the Nile. We all put on some bathing suits, some loose clothing and piled into a bus with 4 other Norwegians, 11 French Engineers, 1 French woman, 1 English man, and 2 Canadians, although one had a suspicious Australian accent for some rafting at the source of the Nile!
We started off the day with a breakfast of sausage, a whole deep fried egg, and a piece of pepper on a stick. You also could take a banana and some tea with that breakfast if you liked. Good thing I don’t love breakfast! We got into our rafts, we had our 4 Americans with 3 Norwegian girls and an Iranian woman all studying Urban planning in Kampala, and our trusty Canadian/ ‘spent 6 months in Australia and now has a semi Australian-accent’ leader. We got some life jackets and helmets and practiced flipping, falling out, being rescued, and attempting to get back in the boat (only one Norwegian girl actually had the upper body strength to pull herself up) so we were ready for everything that could come our way. And then our guide said “our first rapid is a 16- foot waterfall.” Well, alrighty then! Taken back everything I just said about being prepared. Somehow Daniela and I had ended up in the front when he said he needed two strong girls in the front (basically I had nominated Daniela who had, in turn or in payback decided to nominate me) and he then gave us specific instruction to not look directly at the waterfall since the force of it could break your nose. I am not going to lie, my heart was beating so fast especially when we watched the first boat go and suddenly completely disappear from our line of vision .So Daniela and I and all our Norwegian friends ducked low in the boat and turned our heads as much to the side as they would go and thankfully, loved the 16 foot fall. It was like a roller coaster, only you had to hang on to your paddle and pray your boat didn’t overturn.
We did flip once on the second rapids. We got caught in a little whirl pool and pushed back enough that it turned our boat. At least this is what our guide said, although we all had the sneaking suspicion that he turned our boat over on purpose! Al though it was what we had practiced, I did not instinctively hold on to the rope, but instead do as I always do when I am about to go into the water- plug my nose. Since I was not holding onto the boat, I came up right on the side of the boat and my head hit it and would not go further. I had to go back down and find a way out. Once I could breathe again, I saw the rope a few feet ahead of me and thought that I could reach out for it if I really tried. However, in the other corner of my eye I saw one of my friends drifting towards me. So, boat that just flipped over or a live human being? I reached out for Erin and we kind of just held each other’s hands in the water and waited for the kayak to come and save us. This happened in all in around 20 seconds, but in my mind, it felt like a great deal longer!
We stopped for a delicious lunch along the way of chipati, salad, cheese and soup and I thankfully got transferred to the back of the boat where most of the afternoon was spent swimming, pushing people into the water and, of course, some rapids. You finish up around 3:30 where they have a tent set up with some beer, some more meat on a stick and great pictures that they took of you flipping that you could buy- thus adding to our theory that our guide flipped us over on purpose, if for nothing more than a photo op. But, we are suckers, so we bought the pictures anyways. If I can figure out how, I will try to post them on here. It was a delightful day full of rapids much bigger than I had ever encountered before and thankfully a hot day so getting completed drenched every 10 minutes was not a bad thing. I wore SPF 45- come on, whose proud? And still got some color on my back! By the time we got back to the campsite, it was time to head back to the city and I was definitely not the only one bummed about coming back to Kampala and leaving our little respite in Jinja.
If only I had more time here, or some of you were with me, I could go back and maybe even do the bungee jumping this time…
Love to all until next time
Shira ZK
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