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Hey everyone! Sorry for not updating for so long! Have been pretty busy with everything at the orphanage.. finishing off there and getting everrything organised for the next leg of travelling!
So James arrived at the beggining of November, we had a few nights in Mwanza so I could show him around and he could meet everyone! We went over to the orphanage and the kids were pretty fascinated with his leg hair and arm muscles.. it was very funny! I think he really enjoyed it, especially as the kids were in high spirits as we took them a slice of pizza each and gave them stickers! It was my official goodbye which was really sad for me but as it was chucking it down with rain the kids were pretty preoccupied (probably a good thing!) so managed to leave fairly quietly without too much of a fuss! Was hard to think I won't see them for a long time but will definitely be going back to visit one day so it's not goodbye forever at least!
On Tuesday we managed to get a free flight over to Entebbe in Uganda on a cargo plane which I thought would be really scary but was actually a really good flight.. very smooth and only took just over an hour! We were sat right behind the pilots and could see them pressing all the buttons and steering.. pretty cool! Even got our pictures taken pretending to drive the plane! Haha! So we stayed over in Entebbe as we arrived quite late and the next morning got a matatu (minibus) over to kampala... As we arrived into Kampala the traffic was so bad, there were people, cars, lorries, buses... everything everywhere! We were pretty scared to get off in the middle of it all with our big rucksacks on but we actually didn't get any hassle at all! We stayed the night in a backpackers and went out for dinner to an Italian restaurant (the joys of the big city!) we even had italian ice cream which was soooo good!
The next morning we left Kampala really early to head out to Jinja which is about 80km away.. we got a ride to the main bus station on Boda Boda's which are mopeds that you sit on the back of whilst they weave in and out of the traffic! A very scary experience.. especially when you're clinging onto your backpack and trying to hold onto the moped at the same time.. and the roads aren't exactly snooth out here!! Anyway it was actually really exhilerating and we ended up using them quite alot as they are so cheap and easier to catch than taxis! We then got a 2 hour bus from kampala to Jinja, it was really cool to see the changing landscape from the smoggy city to the beautiful lush, green countryside (Jinja is pretty much on the Nile very close to lake Victoria).
We made our way (by Boda Boda) out to Bujagali Falls which is a village just outside of Jinja.. i think it is named that because of the rapid of the Nile that it is close too. For the first two days we went quad biking through the small villages on the banks of the Nile.. at first i felt really bad tearing through all these tiny villages on a quad but we were given a fantastic reception with elders smiling and waving madly and children screaming 'jambo!' and chasing after us! We later found out that the company actually donates money to all the villages it passes through to help with community projects, so i stopped feeling so guilty! The scenery we saw over the two days was incredible.. i really think we saw a side to uganda that most tourists would never get the chance to see as it is not accessible by road and is so far off the beaten track! The people are so friendly.. even more so than Tanzania! And they don't mind you taking their picture which is an added bonus! We stayed the night on an island in the middle of the Nile called the hairy lemon (apparently named after a pub in Oz) it's basically just a camp site with a few huts and dorm rooms.. it had one of those bush showers and the toilets were just long drops with pieces of wood on top in a big hut like room with no door.. needless to say I was pretty intimidated by them! Haha! But the setting was so beautiful and the atmosphere very chilled! Most of the other people staying on the island were kayakers practising their skills on the nile.
After the quad biking we went for a day white water rafting on the nile which was AMAZING!! We went down grade 5 rapids (the worst you can get is grade 6!) I was so scared you wouldn't believe! Luckily neither of us got any injuries and we were on a raft with some really cool people and had a great guide who claimed he'd never been on the Nile before...?! Haha! Got a DVD of our day which they showed in the bar that night whilst everyone was celebrating having survived!
We headed back to Kampala and stayed in a really nice backpackers with a swimming pool and a great restaurant, then the next morning boda boded and matatuted back to Entebbe airport where we flew back to mwanza!
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