‘Be a Blessing’. A company name designed to inspire confidence which it achieve and failed to achieve in equal measure. This was our transport and comfort blanket for our weeklong adventure exploring the SW of Uganda and visiting Kiziizi hospital isolated in the hills. As ever these long journeys, which would be desperate in the UK, somehow are manageable out here not least because of the adrenalin released throughout the body by simply being in a car on Ugandan roads.
Our first leg was in search of zebras on the road running towards the borders with Tanzania and Rwanda. Staying in ‘luxury tents’ was a new experience – a bit like having a tent in a large shed but in this case in the middle of a game park. Luxury it certainly was not and although the only restaurant couldn’t get beyond goat stew for a huge price it was perched, wall-less on edge of Lake M’buro and on our buzz around the park we did see those wonderful monochrome beasts in all their glory dazzling us with their psychedelic stripes as they peacefully grazed.
Next on the list was Lake Bunyonyi set in the midst of misty peaks at about 2000 meters. The journey to it was like travelling through Switzerland but with no snow. Amazing valleys and mountains soaring to about 2500m often terraced to produce as much food for the community as possible. Needless to say it was on one of these high passed that our car tyre exploded, taken in his stride by our highly experienced driver, Cosmas. The boys were very excited by the sight of the jack lifting the car with little effort.
At Lake Bunyonyi we were faced with a free boat trip or having to pay. The choice seemed straightforward: what could be more romantic than a ride in a long dugout canoe? Two canoes, aching arms and 50 minutes later we realized our error – too late! Our oarsmen had made it clear that we were most welcome to help paddle, girls v boys, which we did past various small islands until we found our own beyond most others. Lucy developed the great ability to appear to paddle without really helping in any real sense.
Life on our island was rather idyllic if you don’t mind eco-loos and solar-showers (bags of water heated by the sun which you release over you). Our canteen was high up and open sided as ever, with a panoramic view of the other tiny islands shrouded in a romantic haze most of the time. The lake itself is home to wonderful birds but no hippos, crocs or bilharzia so diving off the pontoon was a favourite occupation for Lucy and Alastair whilst the rest of us read and spotted birds. Meals were a little erratic arriving up to an hour and a half after the promise time but what a glorious place to be waiting→
Off to Kiziizi via Kabale and the most difficult driving yet with narrow and gravelly mountain roads winding in and out, up and down through some breath-taking scenery. Our goal was to deliver some school fees to a boarding school near Kiziizi and visit the hospital that our church has supported. Driving through Kiziizi itself was quite a challenge for our driver as part of the main thoroughfare is a stream bed running downhill steeply with deep channels and ruts with chickens, goats and people thrown in for good measure. The school located in a wilderness, was bare and strangely quiet. The new head teacher, 30, greeted us warmly and informed us that the fees for our friends sponsored child had increased overnight by 2/3rds and were hugely overdue. The child in question was very quiet and though 13 was in the equivalent of year 6 and the same height as Alastair.
We were allowed to see his dorm, a windowless barn with accompanying smell crammed with 3-tier bunks only 1-2 ft apart. Clothes hung like wild raggety bunting from the rafters. A child lay on one bed in the gloom not moving. Quite a Dickensian scene, confirmed by the visit to a bleak classroom of 4-5 year olds sitting in rows on wooden benches one already sound asleep but as yet unbeaten...
The hospital site is a collection of higglety-pigglety buildings with clumps of people sitting around on the grass or walls waiting to be seen or go home or to feed a relative inside. Washing is hung on any bush or fence as relatives do their best. Some stay in hostels; the poor are provided with large rooms where they can put their mats and have shelter for free. The backdrop to this excellent hospital in deep rural Uganda is the unlikely sight of Friesian cows in green pasture and behind them in a semi-obscurred nook, a dramatic waterfall. You could easily be in mid-Wales save the sight of men tugging and pushing from the ground and from a platform, a giant w-man saw about 6ft long making planks. It was lovely to meet some of the staff and particularly Esther the matron who knew Diana Reakes-Williams/Juckes well and had even travelled to the UK for her wedding.
From here we headed through the hills and many remote settlements to Ishasha in search of Tree-climbing lions. Each place passed through the excited shouts of “m’zungu!” echoed in our wake. The last stretch was the main road to the Congo and probably the worst road seen in our 3 months here. The ruts were so deep that at times they loomed as wide craters, deep and filled with mud. Huge lorries pass this way, particularly petrol tankers and often they can be found helpless and still blocking the highway for hours at a time if the road has banks and not flat verges. We were lucky. The gates to the Ishasha bit of Q E national park soon came into sight and we arrived to find a couple of neat round brick thatched bandas made ready for us. The usual loo there too but swept out and clean and a ‘shower block’ that had 2 empty cubicles where one took a bowl/can of water and jug and showered the old fashioned way. Somehow this basic campsite and Ugandan style canteen with paraffin lamps, seemed completely fine and we spent a rather magical time around the camp fire especially lit for us, hearing a story from Peter’s book and hearing the Hippos bellowing furiously nearby. This was a game-park and during the night there were plenty of gamey noises just to remind you of the fact: hippos again, hyenas and the clip-clop of water buck around our bandas. It almost seemed as if someone had put on a recording to create the right atmosphere. Thankfully the children took it in their stride confident that the embers of the bonfire and the little paraffin lamp outside their door would keep the beasties at bay.
Our early game drive gave us the usual view of elephant, antelope and warthog. We got to see 4 tree-climbing lions very close but not in a tree. Unfortunately it was at this point that both Tom and Alastair realised too late that they had chronic diarrhoea. Off we set regardless, with strict instructions to ‘take no chances” etc. As I was musing on the ease with which we move from delight to discontentment with the failure to sight the lions in their rare habitat, we came to halt beneath a large tree in which lay 3 lions, shortly joined by a 4th who lazily strolled in front of our vehicle to reach his brothers. How staggering to watch him climb up to the others, find no room and move higher to his own spot, legs and arms dangling like a care-free prep school boy either side of the fat branch. More staggering still that this should be the moment that Tom obediently informed us of his urgent need. Imagine allowing a 7yr old boy out of a vehicle that is at the foot of a tree containing 4 lions....This was not the last emergency exit on our journey but certainly the most dramatic. Alastair tried a similar stunt in the main part of QE park where we later were to invariably find elephants each time we passed.
Our stay at Mweya was to be our longest – 3 nights without moving on. The hostel was a tantalizing distance from the luxury Mweya Lodge – far beyond the price range of tourists like us though little more that the cost of a middle of the road hotel in the UK. Our place was an ex-research station and we had been given an odd but strangely comforting suite of rooms: 2 bedrooms, a scullery and a bathroom. All very bare and concrete but with sockets and lights and even electric wall mounted fans! No beasties unless you count the ghecko that decided to share the bath with Peter, blissfully oblivious until he was drying himself and the creature decided to exit too. Of course, the outside was a different kettle of fish. Before many minutes had passed, a particularly large and ugly warthog stood outside our door to see if we were up to scratch and a tribe of mongooses were regularly too-ing and fro-ing past our rooms with a wary water buck looking on.
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