3 Weeks In Africa: July 2010

My apologies to the reader(s) of this blog but we have been without Internet access for the past week. So here’s the batch. Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll be able to add pictures unless I can’t sleep again tonight. We will again be incommunicado for a long time in the Serengeti which starts tomorrow.

Friday, July 23

My task to purchase school supplies with Charity was successful but even the bookstore searched us when we entered. Afterwards, Spencer and I met up with the rest of the party at the wildlife organization where John had a morning meeting. There we loaded up the safari vehicle that Natalie dubbed “Big Red”, a stretch Land Cruiser. This required bailing several suitcases to the roof after wrapping them in plastic bags to keep off the dust that was to come. After a delicious Ugandan meal, we set off at around 2 p.m. on a drive to our hotel. We expected to reach it about sunset but, alas, that was not to be the case.

Although we were tired from residual jetlag, Mel and I couldn’t sleep on the drive because there was just too much to see including bikes piled high with bananas and firewood, trucks with flatbeds loaded with more people than anyone could imagine possible, many goats, tall bags of charcoal, sheets covered with millet drying, and women sitting on the ground with a few oranges or tomatoes in small piles for sale. The road is the center of activity in this part of Africa and is crowded with people seemingly oblivious to the racing cars and trucks passing them by with only inches to spare. The road was under construction for long stretches of dust and potholes. Our driver, Jacob, was very skilled and calm as he maneuvered Big Red over and through all kinds of very challenging terrain. His ultimate test came at about 7 p.m., hours from our destination. Along a stretch of torn up road, in the dark, we came to a standstill behind a long line of unmoving vehicles. After a while, along with some others, we set out into the brush alongside the road to circumvent the obstacle, a truck lying on its side. Eventually we got stuck and it appeared to many of us that we were going to spend the night in the bush. The whole situation was very chaotic and several in our party could have used some Xanax. Jacob was eventually able put the car into 4-wheel drive and find a way back onto the road that had cleared out while we were stuck offroad. The next 10 miles were harrowing due to the dark, lack of pavement, clouds of dust that reduced visibility to only a few feet, and traffic barreling at us from the other direction. We came upon a town, still 2 hours short of the hotel we had reserved, and stopped for gas and a bathroom break. Luckily there was a hotel there and we decided that it was much too dangerous to proceed to our destination, After the womenfolk checked out the hotel’s plumbing, we decided that it would do in a pinch. It took us a while to wind down over dinner and Nile beer. John told us there is an expression for the road experience, TIA, “this is Africa”, and refers to the regularity that the native folk have to deal with frequent, unexpected and difficult situations for which there will be no official help. They are resourceful people indeed.

July 24

More travel today in Big Red through green valleys and up winding mountain roads where the steep hillsides are terraced for farming. The staple crop is bananas which is the major starch for the locals. We spotted a variety of birds, some quite large, from the car. We expected to reach our destination, the Gorilla Mountain Lodge, at about 6 p.m. but were pleasantly surprised at 2:30 to see a sign indicating that it was only 20 km away, That was one hell of a bumpy 20 km, especially the last kilometer which again taxed Jacob’s driving skills. But it was worth it. It’s a beautiful cluster of buildings on a hillside directly across from the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, our destination tomorrow to see the mountain gorillas. One of the staff took all of us, except Melinda who wanted to chill, on a local hike for almost 2 hours. The purpose was to meet the locals. We were swarmed by kids who were especially intrigued by Lily, perhaps the first white child they had ever seen in person. This region is incredibly impoverished. The clothes are literally rags and caked with dirt, as is their skin. We bought some handicrafts from the village ladies. We hiked down to a cave, being careful not to twist our ankles in the elephant tracks, where we were met by a pigmy family. I don’t think they live there now but their recent ancestors certainly did. Back at the pigmy “house”, 8 X 10 feet with a dirt floor, we watched a family bang drums and dance, then joined in ourselves. We were told that 30 people live there but that only the children sleep inside. The reason? So the elephants don’t carry them off in the night.

July 25

Today was the gorilla trek for John, Andrea, Natalie, Spencer, and me in the aptly-named Bwindi Impenetrable Forest. Mel and Lily stayed behind because the age limit for the trek is 15, though Natalie, 13, received a waver because of John’s connections. The walk started out relatively easily on trails, though there were some steep climbs. We were accompanied by a guide and some porters. The trackers had set off to find the gorillas about 2 hours earlier. After about 1 1/2 hours, we stopped and our guide John informed us that the gorillas, a troupe of about 23, were headed our way and we stayed put for awhile. They didn’t arrive. Soon we were off trail bushwacking straight uphill through incredibly dense foliage in the heat. Then it was down an equally steep incline into a valley. Finally, after about 4-5 hours of some of the most demanding hiking any of us had ever done, we rendezvoused with the trackers and spotted a small gorilla climbing a tree. We saw a couple more on the ground after that but they quickly moved on. The chase was on. We followed the troupe further into the valley for about an hour of arduous hiking and finally settled in a spot near a large silverback and I started snapping pictures while Spencer videoed. Within 15 minutes we were surrounded by the troupe. They munched on leaves, climbed trees, and did a little grooming over the next hour. They were mostly oblivious to our presence but a couple of them made brief lunges towards us. It was a sublime experience. The hike out was even more difficult and featured fire ants stinging us and rain. 10 hours after we set out, we came to a road and thankfully an SUV to take us the last 2 km to the lodge.

We ended the day with single malt scotch and a tasty dinner.

July 26

We woke up sore from yesterday’s trek and piled into Big Red for what proved to be the longest drive so far. The scenery consisted of rolling hills covered in tea plantations and banana farms and the usual slice of humanity. The roads were even worse than we’d been on before so the constant bouncing provided what is called here an “African massage”. Mid-afternoon we arrived at the orphanage where we were warmly greeted by the staff and given a tour. We then entered a large room with 230 children and staff who entertained us with drumming and dancing for almost half an hour. This was followed by us presenting them with the books purchased in Kampala, the clothes and school supplies we brought, and mosquito nets for all the boarders that we bought from the local hospital when we arrived at the orphanage. Although the nets had been stored at the hospital for months, they were unavailable to the kids until we bought them for $2 apiece. Such a shame. A representative from the hospital delivered them in person to make sure that they would not be resold at a profit since the cost is subsidized and they can fetch a higher price. Everyone was so grateful and excited. Clearly, it was a really big deal to them that we came and we felt like celebrities. Via a poem written especially for the occasion, 3 children praised John for his donations and assistance over the years. The great white father. I wish we could have stayed longer but we had to continue on to the Katara lodge. That took 4 hours of driving across the savanna, much of it in the dark. We saw impala, a water buck, and quite a few cape buffalo along the road. Some of us were convinced that we were lost but Jacob again came through for us and found the lodge at about 9:30. We were very relieved to arrive. The lodge is perched atop a ridge overlooking Queen Elizabeth Park which stretches out for many miles. Tomorrow, safari.

July 27

We awoke to an unparalleled view of the park from our room. After breakfast, we drove into the park to meet our friends, the Colliers: Martin and Theresa, their son, Stephan, and Theresa’s mother, Thelma, age 74, from Bainbridge. They had already been in Africa for 2 weeks and their adventures in the Congo and Rwanda made ours seem safe and mundane by comparison. Martin heads a foundation that is very involved in providing health care in these two countries and thus this was a working vacation for him. Thelma endured being in a war zone and going on a gorilla trek. That afternoon we took a 2 hour cruise on Lake Edwards and were treated with up close and personal encounters with elephants, hippos, cape buffalo, crocodiles, monkeys, and myriad species of birds. Even the Adams, who have been on several previous Africa wildlife trips, remarked that they had never seen so many animals in such a short time. On the drive home in dark, we were delayed by a hippo parked in the middle of the road.

July 28

Some of our party awoke early and went on a car safari in the park. We hired a seasoned guide who knew just where to take us and sure enough we came upon a group of female lions and a few cubs. We were the first vehicle to arrive but soon several others, seeing a stopped land cruiser, hurried over to see the animals. After spending about half an hour there, we moved on and eventually found 2 juvenile male lions. The lion sightings were interspersed with sightings of various antelope, cape buffalo, and warthogs. We departed the lovely Katara Lodge midday and had a 5-hour drive, much of it on a well-maintained (as opposed to the usual kidney-thumper) dirt road through some of the most beautiful countryside of the trip and again just barely avoiding the many pedestrians, some of them very small children, and bicyclists. Our destination was the Chimps’ Nest Lodge in a forest that contains the densest and largest population of chimpanzees in Africa. While the concept of this place is interesting, a cabin on a stream down a long jungle path (with an armed escort to fend off the elephants that sometimes show up here) with monkeys and baboons checking us out, the cabin itself was quite scuzzy. Mel was, to say the least, out of her comfort zone. The management was made aware of her aversion to nature at its rawest and posted another armed guard outside our door during the night. We did survive, though sleep was lacking.

We arrived in Amsterdam at about 8 a.m. (11 p.m. PST, no sleep), went to our hotel (very charming), dropped off our luggage, and kept going. After breakfast we took a tour of the city via boat through the canals, of which there are many and which cross Amsterdam in a semi-grid manner. Lily fell asleep on the boat so missed quite a bit. We returned to the hotel for a 2-hour nap (in name only) and shower, then we were on our way to a wonderful Indonesian dinner. Mel and Andrea stepped into, for observational purposes only, a "Coffee Shop", not to be confused with a Koffee Shop where coffee is served. At the former, the fare is smokable rather than drinkable. There are many of these scattered throughout the city. The ladies did not inhale as the kids were waiting outside. After dinner, we toured the house where Anne Frank hid out for a few years before she was taken to the camp. It is a museum now with artifacts from the Frank family's time there and commentary. Quite moving. The evening ended with a fruitless search for an ice cream parlor. Surprisingly, there were none to be found in close proximity to the Coffee Shops.

Yesterday was spent in travel to Kampala. After a pleasant 8-hour flight to Entebbe, we were taken in a van 1 1/2 hours to Kampala, a large and relatively prosperous for Africa, city which is now hosting a meeting of the African Union. That, and the recent terrorist bombing here that killed over 70 people, has caused there to be very tight security. To get into our hotel, we had all our luggage inspected by several people, item by item, and went through metal detectors at the front gate. Then we went through the process all over again at the front door. This took quite a while and delayed our eventual cocktail hour (11 p.m.), where gin and tonics (the latter to ward off malaria) were imbibed, and dinner. It is now 5:30 a.m. and, thanks to jet lag, I am fully awake and writing this.

This morning, Spencer and I will go with Charity, a woman who runs an orphanage near the gorilla park where we are going, to purchase textbooks and writing supplies for her orphans. As things stand now, there is one textbook for the whole school of 100+ kids and they write in the dirt with sticks. John, one of our traveling companions and trip-organizer, who has already been here for a week on business, bought (or brought, I'm not sure) mosquito nets for the entire orphanage. Charity will take all this stuff back to the orphanage today. We will stop by later this week to tour it and drop off a duffle-bag full of clothes we brought from Bainbridge.

I am going to attempt to sleep again so will sign off. I hope the muslim call to prayer I am now hearing doesn't prevent my doing so. I don't know when we will next have Internet access so it could be awhile before I post again.

3 Weeks In Africa

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Amsterdam to Kampala

Amsterdam

Saturday, July 17, 2010