Sunday was a very exciting day for all of us!! After spending a couple fun-filled days in Kampala we woke up early and caught a shuttle bus to Jinja for a day of white water rafting on the NILE RIVER!!!! We arrived at Nile River Explorers just as everyone was getting checked in for their big day. We had originally signed up to do the grade 3 rapids because I had been told before that grade 5 rapids are considered to be professional. However, when we got there Gen and some of the other girls decided to upgrade us to grade 4 and 5. I was so nervous, but I went along with it because I didn't want to hold anyone back. We had our safety meeting grabbed some breakfast on the way to the bus and then drove for about 45 minutes to our starting point on the River.

When we got there, we met our guides, Juma and Bim. They were both very nice and Juma was especially funny and I knew right from the start that we were going to have a fun day. The six of us plus our two guides were in our own boat which was really nice. Once everyone was ready to go all of the boats paddled out to some still water to do some practicing. I really wanted to stay dry as long as I possibly could, but right from the start Juma had us in the water. He wanted us to get a feel for the water and to practice swimming in the river so that in case (he meant when!) we flipped out we would know what to do and how to get back in the raft. After our brief rafting lesson we set off to begin our 9.3 mile journey down the Nile River.

We went throught the first couple rapids with no problems at all, but then I think by our third rapid we lost control and our raft completely flipped!!! Even though I was nervous of flipping, I never panicked when we actually did. I think it was because I paid so much attention in the safety lesson that I knew exactly what to do. There were a total of 8 rapids on our course and we only flipped 2 times that day, so I would say that for a boat filled with 6 young inexperienced girls a 25% flip rate was pretty good!! There was one particular rapid that was so much fun!!! I think just about every other boat besides our flipped. It was definitely on of the biggest rapids of the day and when we went in it, we were surrounded by water. The boat started leaning and I thought we were going to flip for sure, but we somehow managed to make it through it!

After being on the river all day it was nice to finally be done. In case you've never been white water rafting before, it's a lot of work! The company we rafted with had a nice buffet dinner for us right on the side of the Nile River and to go along with our dinner we all had a Nile Special. It's the most popular beer in Uganda and it was very good! I'm not sure if it was because we were right on the river, but regardless it was a great way to end a perfect day of rafting.

With our rafting package we had one free night of accomodations at the Nile River Explorers Backpackers location. We signed up to stay in the dorms instead of camping in tents, and it was a good thing we did because it rained that first night we were there. I thought we would at least have our own private room to the six of us, but boy was I wrong. We ended up being split up in two different rooms and we quickly realized that the rooms were coed!! Even though it wasn't what I was expecting, the dorms ended up beign a lot of fun!! There was a group of student nurses from Denmark staying in my room and they were very nice and I talked to them a lot. There were also some Irish students there too. It felt like we were back at college and I couldn't have asked for a better weekend trip!

On Sunday, we got up and walked to a nearby church for mass and then headed back to the Backpackers to hang out there until our sunset cruise in the evening. We left for the cruise on the Nile at 4:00 and it was so pretty. There were about 25 of us on the cruise and we had a total blast! We were served dinner and there was an open bar which made for an interesting evening to say the least.

On Monday morning we woke up and packed our bags because we were finally heading back to Kyarusozi! But before we left, we stopped at another nearby adventure company so that the nursing majors could go bungee jumping!! All three of them did it and it looked like a lot of fun, but I seriously don't think I could ever do it. Nora and I climbed up the platform with them so we could take pictures and that was enough of an adreniline rush for me! After a quick bite to eat, we made our way to the taxi park to catch a ride to Kampala before we continued on to our home away from home.

The ride from Jinja to Kampala was great and it only cost 5,000 Uganda shillings, which is like the equivalent to $2.00 in the States (and it was a 2 hour ride!). However, when we arrived in Kampala our luck took a turn for the worse. The heavens opened up on us right when we stepped off the shuttle, and we attempted to find a bus heading back to Fort Portal through a terrible rain storm. It took us a while, but we found a bus! The driver said that we would be leaving after the rain stopped.... However, this did not happen. We were all soaking wet and freezing on the bus and we waited and waited for it to leave. I kid you not, we sat on that bus for about 4 hours before it finally pulled out of the parking lot. And then, because the traffic was so bad in Kampala it took us two more hours to finally get outside the city!! Luckily though, the ride back after that went well and after being on that bus for about 10 hours we finally made it back to Kyarusozi!!

I definitely had a great time traveling across Uganda for the past couple weekends, but I'm really looking forward to spending my last couple weeks here so that I can really focus on my work at the school and bonding with all of the kids.