"Get your hand out of my pants" or "Tree Climbing Lions" or "I didn't see the Internally Displaced Person Camps"

The girl has her hand up the back of my shirt. I ask her to remove it, and she does, but then she starts trying to stick her hand down the front of my trousers. I’m gob smacked, not embarrassed, shy, or even particularly uncomfortable, just gob smacked. “What the fuck are you doing?” I ask. I don’t say it in anger, just in amazement. Somehow she has managed to get her hand down the front of my trousers and is fumbling around for my dick. “Get your fucking hand out of my pants” I say as I pull her arm out. “Let’s see if you’re circumcised”. She’s resisting my efforts to pull her hand out. “That is something you will never know”. Her hand is out from my trousers but now up the back of my shirt. “Please take your hand out of the back of my shirt, I will not take you home, so please don’t waste your time with me and go and find someone else”. She ignores this and keeps stroking my back.

I’m in Kampala, in Al’s Bar, it’s at least 5am and I’ve had my fair share of Nile beer and Kenyan Scotch. We chat some more and she eventually takes her hand from out
of the back of my shirt. I tell her several times I won’t be taking her home and I don’t want her to waste her time with me. I tell her that there’s plenty of mzungu’s who’d be more then happy with her company, but she stays and talks, flirts and showers me with attention. Kari comes over to see if I need rescuing, but I tell her I’m okay. We chat and I say openly, that we’re not going home so to go and get another man. She is by far the most forward prostitute I have ever met. I tell her again to go get someone else but after a while she sits down on the bar stool next to mine. Her composure changes, she goes from the overly confident, flirty prostitute to a normal women sitting in a bar. Her entire persona is different, and even through my glazed vision she looks different. We start to chat like normal people and she stops touching me. I find out her name’s Audrey, she’s not actually Uganda but a Kenya from Mombassa. I ask her what she’s doing in Al’s Bar at 5am, sticking her hand down mzungu men’s trousers. She chooses not to answer this. Kari comes over to see if I need rescuing again. I’d specifically asked her not to leave me alone in Al’s due to harassment from all the whores, but I tell her I am still fine and she looks surprised.

Al’s Bar is a late late night drinking spot. The place to go when everywhere else is shut. A mixture of about thirty percent prostitutes, middle aged mzungu men, local rich kid Indians and the odd drunken backpacker like myself. I buy Audrey a beer; tell her again I’m not taking her home so I don’t want to waste her time, but she stays and we chat. We then end up chatting for the next couple of hours, until we notice that the bar actually has no roof and the sun has come up - the bar is suddenly light. She tells me she’s just finished her degree as a high school teacher which she came to Uganda to study. She tells me she split up with her Irish boyfriend one month ago, and up until then she hadn’t been to Al’s Bar. She says she not really sure if she loves him, but she misses him badly. She tells me on several occasions she’s not a prostitute, and I ask her on several occasion what she doing in Al’s Bar putting her hand down mzungu men’s trousers at 5am. She never answers this question. But she doesn’t count herself as a prostitute, just a girl who wants a western man. Just someone who wants a man who’s wealthy and will look after her. The same things a lot of western women look for. Kari comes over several more times to see if I’m okay and every time I say I am. Kari goes back to smooching with her Scottish man who has "The most amazing accent ever”. With the sun now up I decide to head home. I wish Audrey all the best and give her a hug. She thanks me for my advice, which to be honest I can’t remember what it was. We’ve been talking for a couple of hours having a quite a heart to heart, like we were best friends, it’s exactly not what I do everyday. I stagger outside, negotiate with a boda boda driver and sit on the back of the motor bike as I drive through the quiet morning streets of Kampala.

I’m back in Kampala. Not a place I really want to be. After too many troubles with my rear wheel I bite the bullet and decide to buy a new one. After two days of wondering all the bike shops in Kampala I find nothing so look at having one shipped in. The postage from the UK is insane so I go for a cheaper option and deal with possibly the slowest company on earth - from South Africa. Staying in Kampala does have its advantages as I meet some great people. In fact some of the nicest people I’ve met on the entire trip. Like the romances you have when away the friendships also follow the same sort of lines. There’s no history, no preconceived ideas, no judgements. People seem optimistic - they have not the stresses and strains which easily turns people pessimistic at home. I think the optimism rubs off, people seem supportive and encouraging. There’s a feeling of all being in the same boat: All away from home, all away from friends and family, all needing friends and company. As your meeting people who are themselves overseas, you’re most likely to have a lot in common. I met Jacob, Emily and Kari. They were cool and we had many shenanigans together. Sometimes I think the people you meet traveling are having your own personal shrinks around. They’re different from friends at home; somehow you often feel that you can be more open with them.

The four of us go on a road trip together with William, a Uganda residing in sunny Wallasey, his lady friend Lara and another Ugandan called Paul. Its fun seeing the world from the front seat of a 4X4, but not the same as from the bike. The car breaks down each day and leaves us stranded in remote places. It’s nice to be with others as entire villages come out to stare at us all day. We play football with the kids and watch as William sorts out all the problems.

Jacobs leaves, then Emily, and me and Kari are left to ourselves. I’m not really sure how to explain what I did everyday for a month in Kampala. I think a lot of time was spent sitting under the trees at the campsite, talking and watching the monkey’s playing in the branches. After many a night spent in Bubbles (Kampala’s one and only Irish bar - and I normally hate those kind of places) my wheel finally arrives. It time to leave, I make some more excuses and hang around till the end of the weekend. Someone described bubbles as "Like High School”. I guess they had a point. Its clientele being the twenty-five to thirty-five year old NGO worker, volunteer type. I meet everyone, from land mind clearance folk to abortion specialists. It’s a friendly bar, at which every week someone comes up to me and says “Are you still here?”

Then on Monday morning I finally leave. I pass through the dusty busy streets of Kampala, have one near miss with a mini bus, head past a rubbish dump containing at least fifty Marabou Storks and am out of the city traveling west on the main road. I knew the first day would be hard, so decide just to stop as soon as I am tired. I make twenty-five miles and am exhausted, the roads never flat but a constant straight line going up and down. At thirty five miles I’ve still found nowhere to stay and I’m seriously tired. I keep thinking why am I doing this? Over and over, why am I doing this?

I come to a small town, more truck stop than town really. I dumpy place full of boys in bibs running to the buses and cars that stop to sell them cold drinks and chicken on sticks. I find a place to stay. It says Entertainment Centre on the outside and painted on the peeling wall is “Health Centre”, “Sauna” and “DJ for hire”. The reality is an old run down building, with a few cell like rooms on the outside. I venture in, and find a dilapidated hall, full of dust and a few broken chairs. A girl comes out and shows me a room. Its 5000 shillings (one pound fifty) I point to the sign which says “Rooms 3000”. She tells me this has on suite and all the cheap rooms are taken. The room is dark and dirty. The on suite consists of an area in the corner a few inch’s higher than the rest of the room with a concrete partition and a drain in the corner. The girl gives me a bucket of water and I switch on the light. The rooms still dark as the light bulb is green; I guess that’s supposed to be erotic. This place is so blatantly only rented by the hours to truck drivers but I can’t understand how anybody could feel even remotely horny in such a shit hole. I shine my torch into the “Bathroom” there are two big cockroaches on the wall. I turn the torch off step in and attempt to pour water over myself. I miss the showers at the campsite in Kampala, they were the best in all of Africa.

I go for a walk into town to get something to eat. There’s lots of roasted meat and chicken on sticks being sold to the passing traffic but little else. I find a couple of places which tell me “food finished”. I find a place with some food left and eat a bowl of rice and G-nut sauce. G-Nut sauce is like satay sauce but instead of being really nice, its really quite horrible. I walk back to my erotic room thinking of sitting in the Italian restaurant in Kampala with Jacob, Emily and Kari. Washing our incredibly amazing pizza’s down with beer and laugher.

The next day seems slightly easier but the road stays the same, never flat, never any decent descents just the same straight up and straight down, straight up and straight down. Its boring scenery, shabby villages and mediocre people. I pass through a small town, there's a huge USAID (United States Agency for International Development) billboard stating that abstinence is the best way to avoid AIDS. I see Mr Bush's ridiculous ideas are showing in his foreign policy. I wonder when George does his whistle stop tours of Africa to teach about free and fair democratic elections (his 2000 victory), human rights (Guantanamo bay), and free market economics (sweat shops) he has a five year old child pulling at his trousers begging for money because his parents have both died from AIDS.

I struggle on for another couple of days until I reach Fort Portal. I’d stayed here while on my road trip, we’d driven here in an afternoon from Kampala - how the world of cycling really is different. I’m glad to be in a familiar town. Even a town I’d visited for less then 24 hours seems familiar. I know a cheap place to stay and after a cold shower I head for a drink and a decent meal.

I’ve had a shit day. The week had been tough, my lack of fitness after such a big break, mixed with the loneliness of not having my friends around to take my mind off not having my girl around, and then to just really piss me off Harvey had decided to break down. The bottom bracket had gone, not gently and slowly as always but suddenly and seriously. I wonder if I can replace it in this town, or even in this country. I’d waited one month for my wheel, now I have other problems. I just want my bike to work, to work properly with out problems; each little piece of stress seems to pushing me too far. All week I’d wondered why I was still cycling. My enthusiasm for the trip was at an all time low. I felt that I’d experienced everything I was going to experience, seen everything I was going to see and felt everything I was going to feel. Everything just feels the same. It’s the same from country to country. The same anglicised countries, the same bullshit, the same poverty, the same friendly but not hospitable people, the same give me money, the same mzungu shouted at me everyday, the same dumpy towns, the same shit food, the same over priced tourist sites, the same “Do you have Jesus Christ in your heart?” (Do I look like I've got Jesus Christ in my heart?), the same lies from me when I answer as too not offend, the same problems with the bike, the same problems in my mind as when I left home. I drink another beer and head to bed.

I’m looking for a mechanic the next morning, preferably an old guy - the young guys seem to have no patience or respect for anything. I find a guy; he’s friendly and eager, which is a good sign. He diagnosed the problem straight away which increases my faith in him ten fold. He still banging about with a hammer, but at least it’s a copper one. The sealing threads around the bottom bracket are plastic and won’t unscrew. So he starts to gouge them out with a screw driver. It pains me to look. I just think he’s going to destroy the thread inside the frame, and once that is done the frame is fucked. I start to think of all the frames I’d seen in Kampala, some had been ok. I’m wondering which the best would be and where I’d seen it. He’s hitting a screw driver with the hammer to gouge it out and I’m thinking that if he destroys the bike at least I could go back to Kampala and see Kari and we could out to Bubbles. All these thoughts just to cover up the reality of how I’d feel if I lost Harvey. I tell him I’ll be back in a bit as I can’t stand to watch. I go for walk around the block trying to reassure myself all will be ok. I arrive back ten minutes later and the mechanic has fitting a new bottom bracket! I’m gob smacked. I can’t believe it. It’s perfectly okay. My spirits rise about twenty thousand per cent. He’s fitted a bog standard, completely adjustable Chinese made steel one which has cost me two quid. I shake his hand vigorously and try to convey really how unbelievably grateful I am. He asks for ten thousand shillings, but I tell him I’ll give him five, he accepts straight away. Something’s never change. Why couldn’t I just of over paid him for once after doing such a good job?

I walk back to hotel happy about my bike but feeling a little shitty about the money. I’m doing some washing when one of the hotel girls comes over to me. She’s filling a bucket from a tap and turns and says “I am thirsty, you buy me soda?” I just smile and shake my
head. I venture out to go to the bank. I take a boda boda (motor bike taxi) I ask him if there is a Barclays bank in town, he tells me there is and I ask him to take me there. He then drives to a completely different bank, which is literally across the street, I tell him my card won’t work at this bank and I could of walked there, and ask again for Barclays. He agrees and drives me to yet another bank just around the corner, but still not Barclays. I tell him my card won’t work here either and again I could of walked, I ask again if there is a Barclay’s bank in Town. “No” he reply’s. Are there any other banks in town “No” he says. He drives me back home I pay him half the agreed amount, which he accepts. I somehow resist giving him a lecture about telling the truth and for once don’t swear at him. My initial good mood has gone.

The good scenery and national parks starts from here so I’m trying to be optimistic about the cycling. Luckily the next morning the roads good, and although the Rwenzori mountains are covered in cloud I’m enjoying the lack of traffic and cool weather. It’s a hilly road but seems easier than the four days from Kampala. There no sight all day of the numerous five thousand metre peaks of the Rwanzori’s, but the scenery is still beautiful and my fitness greatly improved. I arrive in Kassese I town which seems to be hampered by wind. Plastic bags hang from the trees like fruit and dust seems to layer everything. I find a hotel but it’s quite up market and too pricey so I ask the girl to recommend a cheap place. She tells me there all dirty and not safe and I will be robbed, and I just about resist the urge to tell to stop being a stupid fucking lying bitch. I wonder down the road and find a place which is clean, safe and cheap.

The kid who works there is friendly and chatty. He tells me about how he used to work in the mines but it was very very hard work and he didn’t like. He then went to work in another hotel, but they were nasty to him and didn’t always pay him or the other members of staff. Later that night I read a report in the paper about working in the west. It says that one of the good aspects about working overseas, apart from the money, is that employers always pay you when they say they will. I think about the kid’s comments and how in the previous hotel they failed to pay him sometimes, it seems insane that your employer would refuse to pay you, but judging from this article its fairly common. Another article in the paper is about how Kabila (the president of the DR Congo) has sent Museveni (the Uganda president) a bill for eight billion dollars for raping the Congo of resources during the 98-03 war - I guess many things in Africa are completely insane.

After dinner I’m trying to fix my stove. I small rubber washer has fallen down inside it. I’m trying to hook it out but failing miserably. The hotel kid comes over and asks what I’m doing. He offers to help but I refuse. I’d actually like him to go away as there's
nothing worse than someone watching you as you’re trying to fix something. I’m having no luck so I give him a go. He takes the piece of metal I’m using to try and hook the washer out and turns it the other way around so the fatter end is head first, he then pushes this down the plastic tube and straight into the rubber washer. The washer then sticks to it and he pulls it up producing the washer. Wow, I’m amazed. I thank him greatly and he asks me to but him a soda. I feel guilty about not trusting him to fix it. Just like I didn’t trust the bike mechanic to fix my bike. Why am I judging Africans to be hopeless? Sometimes I just think they have created a hopeless society. When I see everything broken and no longer working, when people lie and don’t even pay they employees. But to think of Africans as hopeless is racist and quite untrue. To think like this represents everything I hate. I feel guilty about my thoughts and walk across the street and buy him a soda. I head back to bed and finish reading the report about working overseas. One paragraph states that the US has more opportunities than the UK for work as people are more open to new ideas and generally more positive, about life in general and certainly employment. It goes onto to say that Britain is a very restrictive society. Something’s never change I think.

I’m cruising through the Queen Elizabeth National Park the next day a long way from the dusty towns. I pass the Equator sign and finally get the obligatory photo of me and Harvey under the sign, taken by a passer by - whom of course demanded money for his shoddy photographical skills. The sky's grey but its still beautiful, the yellow grasses stretch for miles and various breeds of deer stare on as I fly by on probably the best road in all of Uganda. The Queen Elizabeth National Park is where the grasslands of east Africa meet the rainforest of West Africa. The forest would at one time have stretched all the way to the Atlantic, I wonder if it still does today. I see what I think is a monkey in a tree and stop underneath to take a look. It not a monkey at all but a bird of prey. It’s at least two foot high and possible the largest bird of prey I’ve ever seen. It doesn’t like my presence and takes off showing its wing span which must be at least three meters wide. It’s a magnificent sight as the huge bird thrusts itself into the sky and fly’s away. I ask a couple of Uganda twitches a few days later what it was, but neither have any idea what I saw.

I take a turn off into the national park proper and head down a dirt track. I was expecting a gate and a park entrance fee but there’s nothing. It’s a flat road full of puddles. Thousands and thousands of small butterflies sit by the edge of puddles and as I pass they swarm into the air. I keep my mouth shut and cycle through the butterflies, its quite an extraordinary feeling. The roads getting wetter and wetter and huge areas of thick mud are appearing. I try going around the outside but it getting harder and harder as the road becomes more and more muddy. The mud on the road is sticky and quickly blocks up my brakes as it sticks to the wheels. I’m not cycling anymore but pushing through. The mud is so thick and heavy it’s blocked my wheels and I’m actually dragging the bike more than wheeling it. Every time I clean the mud off it gets stuck back on with in seconds. I can’t leave the road as thick bushes line each sign of the track. I push and drag Harvey along. I come across a Congelese truck stuck in the mud, the driver sitting patiently. Other drivers have decided its better to leave the road and drive twenty meters from it. If I could get to it I would. The road clears up a bit and I try to clean Harvey up the best I can. I decide on a new tactic. To ride in the tyre tracks made by the trucks. Often they are full of water but I conclude if water has settled on the surface, underneath must be solid. It’s a good plan and seems to be working. It’s seriously slippery but I keep my balance and manage relatively well. I’m waiting for the puddle which is five feet deep but luckily half a foot is all I have to deal with. The road clears up a lot and as my speed picks up the mud from the wheels sprays everything in its sight.

I turn around a corner and then I see it, a truly breathtakingly, magnificent sign. I’m nervous but so amazed the feeling is suppressed as the elephant swings its large tusks and truck about. He’s about a hundred meters further up the road but I’m not sure how close I should get. I’d seen plenty of elephants on the two game drives I’d taken and although you get very close to the animals it’s too detached. From the car there’s no connection, no reality. From my position now it’s real. I wonder how close I can get and cycle a little further. He’s standing around in the road looking at me and I’m standing around in the road looking at him. I stand there for five minutes as he plods about. I wonder when he will leave so I can pass, but I see a truck coming and so does he and slowly as the truck gets closer and closer he moves off the road. I wait till he’s a reasonable distance away and cycle along. I am now a bit more stared though, as I'm much closer to him than I had been and even though the he’s walking away from the road my hearts beating ten to the dozen as I pass him thirty meters away.

The elephant, the butterflies the yellow grass and all the deer create an over whelming feeling of happiness. I’m glad that after so long on the road these feelings still exist. I’m glad that even in my often cynical out look on Africa it can still make me feel small, alive, real and thankful to be there.

I finish the day up at the lake, I didn’t know what to expect but had been told there was a fishing village where I’d be able to find somewhere to stay. I push down a turn off from the main track and come out in the village. I’m greeted by the sight of a marabou stork fighting with a baboon in a huge pile of rubbish. They both ignore me unlike everybody else in the village who are looking in my direction. I stop and am instantly surround by thirty or more kids. The village is a selection of mud huts, all pretty dilapidated and the place itself just feels a little bit lawless. I’m looking about as the kids scream mzungu at me. I’d expected a national park office and campsite, now naive I was. I spot a small hut that says police station breath a sign of relief, some order must exist. A man comes over and asks if I’m okay, I ask him about lodging and he points up the road. I walk up with the kids still surrounding me, another guy comes over “Lodging, yes yes, follow me”. We walk through to a small mud compound. He makes the kids stay at the gate and only their eyes can now be seen staring through the wooden fence. He show’s me a small mud room. It contains a small single bed and no window. I can barely see as its so dark but under the circumstances I don’t exactly have a choice. My friend is fussing over me too much, he keeps trying to help but I don’t really like him. He gets me water to wash with and helps push Harvey into the room. I take a big chunk out of the doorway with Harvey’s pedal and as we maneuver him in. He doesn’t seem to notice and I figure mud huts are easily repaired. He requests money for his help, and I willing hand over one thousand shillings. In this kind of place I think it pays to have a friend, even if you do actually have to pay to have one.

I have a quick wash I wonder outside, the kids have mostly disappeared and the adults may stare but aren’t quite as intimidated as I’d first thought. I walk down the road to the lake. It’s a beautiful lake, the blue waters stretch to the mountains of the Congo on the other side. I sit down on the shore and stare across; a group of kids come and join me. There not annoying me and don’t ask for a thing. I see black dots in the lake not far from the shoreline and I think there hippo’s. I ask the kids, yep they are hippos. The kids aren’t interested, but to me they’re another reality check. Sitting by a lake, staring at the mountains in the Congo, whilst hippo’s meander in the water. The filthy snotty nose kids complete the picture. It’s all very African.

I walk back past more disheveled Marabou storks and baboons. I meet my friend again and ask him where I can eat. He takes me to two huts but they’re out of food. He makes some more inquires and tells me I can have rice and fish in one hour. I thank him and sit with a warm soda and watch as village life comes to a close with the sun going down. I get my food nearly two hours later and eat with my eyes barley open. I buy some mosey coils and head to bed. On closer inspection of my room, using my torch, I see that it's heavily laden with cobwebs, I decide not to look any more, light my mosey coil right next to the head of my bed and climb in. I decide inhaling large amounts of toxic smoke is preferable to getting eaten alive my possibly malaria carrying mosquito’s. I pull the sheet right up so only my head is sticking out and fall instantly to sleep on the thin uncomfortable mattress.

I wake up with only one thought in my head, “Tree climbing lions”. I head out to see if anywhere sells tea and over my chai and chappti think, "Tree climbing lions”. The southern part of the national park is home to a rare phoneme of tree climbing lions. I’ve been told they are not dangerous and the national park authorities allow cyclists to pass through. I’d met some Belgium cyclists who said they’d cycled through the park and seen lions in the trees. It sounded exciting then, but now it just sounds scary. I hesitate about asking local opinion. Normally its too extreme. Like the Sudanese immigration officer who told me I’d be eaten by wild animals, or the Jordanian who told me it would be impossible to cycle to the Dead Sea (Its thirty miles of pure descent). Its sometimes hard to make constructive decisions based on such sensationalist information. I ask anyhow and get a mixed report. The lions I’m told are I the far south and I should be safe, but on the other hand I might get trampled to death by elephants. I take my chance and head off.

The sun shines and the road continues. The butterflies have gone but I see plenty of elephant dung on the road, but unfortunately no elephants. There’s a few locals cycling through the park which makes me feel a little more at ease. I’m looking in all the trees and can’t get tree climbing lions out of my mind. I see a sign to a national park office and police station and head up the track to ask advice. The rangers there tell me that the lions are only in the very far south and I will know when I’m there because there’s a big gate and national park office. They’d reassured me I wouldn’t be eaten along the way so I pass through the beautiful scenery without the fear I previously had.

I’m sitting under a tree having lunch when two deer shoot past at high speed. I suddenly wonder if they’re being chased by a lion but as I see them twist and turn I realize is just a female obviously shunning the males advances. Five minutes later they bolt back across the road and I watch them until they disappear in the distance. He still hadn’t charmed her and she still hadn’t given up. I cycle on under the blue sky and through the grasslands, whole herds of deer stare at me until one would turn and run and the rest would follow.

I arrive at the national park gate. The ranger asks if I've paid for the park. I tell him I haven't as I haven't seen an office. He asks where I slept last night and I tell him about the fishing village. "You sleep with the fishermen?" He looks very surprised. "You must be tough, very tough" he says. I’m nervous and ask about the lions. The ranger tells me they are not dangerous and many people like me have cycled through. Its only four miles to the campsite, but it seems like I long four miles if its going to be full of lions. I ask if they are ever on the ground but he tells me not at this time of day. I'm still nervous and debating the whole idea.
“If you see one in the tree, don’t turn away just keep staring at it” The ranger tells me.
“Will it be staring at me?”
“Yes of course but not to worry, and if you see one in the road, don’t turn around just cycle straight past it”. Just cycle straight past it! I don’t reply as I can’t think of anything to say.
“You will be fine” he says.

So I set off. I’m constantly counting the distance on my speedometer and my heart is going ten to the dozen. Its hillier than the area I’d cycled through and offers beautiful views over the park. There’s hundred’s of deer staring and I see a group of buffalo sprint, luckily in the opposite direction, as I approach. The speed and size of the buffalo is astonishing and I can easily understand how dangerous they can be. I’m looking in the tree’s half wanting to see a lion half thinking that that is the last thing I’d like to see. I pass a tree and a wart hog bolts at high speed across the open ground. It startles me and I sing out loud “When I was a young wart hog”. I push on and almost as soon as it had started I’m finished as I arrive at the national park office. I pay for my camping and tell the guy I didn’t see any lions. I’m kind of disappointed. Another ranger walks up,
“Aren’t you scared of lions”
“Yes, but I didn’t see any”
“When I over took you in the car, there was a lion right in that tree overhanging the road”
“What I didn’t see it”
“Maybe tomorrow”
I can’t believe it, if it was there and didn’t eat me at least I could of seen it. I’m disappointed and wonder how I actually would of felt it I’d seen it and had to cycle right underneath the tree it was in.

I head to campsite which I’d been told has excellent views of hippos. It’s a couple of km’s from the office in a lion free area but when I arrive I’m a little disappointed. Its beautiful but its not on a lake like I’d thought, just a small river, and I can’t imagine hippos to be in this. I walk up to the bank and look to my left. I just start laughing. On a sand bank only twenty meters away are at least twenty hippos basking in the sun. It’s the first time I’d seen hippo’s out of the water at such close range. I make myself a coffee and sit watching them. I realize from my map that the other side of the river is the Congo. It’s just as I imagined, a dark brown river and a dense forest, Columbus monkeys playing in the trees. That’s my new version of the Congo, not what I saw at Goma but the romanticised version which fills imaginations and creates wonder. As the evening draws in the hippo’s start to move about and swim right past where I’m camping. I stand only a matter of meters away watching them.

I’m sitting in a café two days later trying to get some breakfast. I ask for the waitress for a menu but she tells me they don’t have one. I know they have one as I’d been in there last night for dinner and they’d given me one. Ok, I’m not going to argue over it so I ask for a Spanish omelet and some black tea. It won’t be a real Spanish omelet but more an omelet with some veggies in it. Fifteen minutes later she brings back a plain omelet and some tea which although looks black has been poured into a flash which hasn’t been properly washed out, and has previously been used for milk tea. The tea now tastes of off milk. I thank the girl and eat my breakfast. The waitress has a t-shirt on which says “1 Cross + 3 Nails = Forgiven”. I wonder whether I could forgive her for my crappy breakfast or whether her crucifixion would be a better option. I walk across the street into another café and have a similar experience but slightly better second breakfast.

I’d left the nation park without being attacked by a lion or even seeing one. Something more deadly had got me though. Africans like to tell stories of dangerous animals and crazed robbers, but the thing that actually kills Africans are not big and scary with lots of teeth they are small and microscopic and are the world biggest killers. Malaria, AIDS, sleeping sickness, TB the list goes on and on. People don’t talk about these things though. They say silly things about elephants, and all the people in the next village being evil knife welding psychopaths. I had neither TB nor sleeping sickness, but something in my stomach wasn’t good. I suddenly felt weak and had stopped in the next available place to spend most the day in the bathroom. There was something a bit mysterious about the place I’d stopped. As I’d cycled along getting weaker and weaker I’d search the map for the nearest town. There was nothing, I was getting worried how far I go on so little energy and although nothing had decided to exit my body as yet I knew it wouldn’t be long. But then, just as I realized I needed to sort something out a town appeared. It wasn’t on the map, but was fairly big and amazing modern. It almost looked brand new. The streets were still dirt but all the building were made from concrete and not mud. Shops sold, clothes, bicycles, TV and DVD’s. The town had two very clean half decent restaurants. This wasn’t the sort of thing you except in the middle of nowhere in south western Uganda and I'm still not sure if it wasn't just a figment of my imagination.

My illness was short lived and the next morning I’m heading out of town through the dirt tracks and green fields of this beautiful country. I headed uphill to the Bwindi Impenetrable National Park, the home of the worlds last remaining Mountain Gorillas. The forest crosses three borders expanding itself through Rwanda, Congo and Uganda. It’s balancing a very delicate eco system. The human impact on the forest must be huge. The countryside around this area is incredibly densely packed. Every inch of land is cultivated. There’s no terraces like in Asia just patchwork fields, often incredibly steep expanding from the valley floors to the mountains peaks. I think this would surely create landslides and problems with water drainage. Where all the firewood comes from to cook food I’m not sure. It all seems like a very fine balance. These factors and the shear lack of Mountain Gorillas (only about 700 left in the wild and none in captivity) means the park authorities charge a whopping US$375 for a one hours viewing of the beasts. It’s too much for me but I guess if it was $10 too many people would visit and the gorillas, the forest and people living around here just couldn’t cope with it.

Things change from village to village, but as I get closer to the Bwindi (the base for gorilla treks) there’s a lot more give me give me coming from peoples mouths. Its weird that one village can be full of smiley, happy, waving people and next all “Mzungi give me money”. In some villages the kids are quite aggressive. Its annoying and stressing me out. I haven’t had to put up with this much in Uganda. I pass through one village and stop. The kids are all approaching me and shouting their demands for money and pens. One girl walks straight up to me and goes to grab one of my front panniers. I go to push her away but I hit her arm, albeit with a lot more force than I meant to. She pulls back, her mouth wide open in shock and she’s grabbing her arm in pain. I feel a bit guilty as I didn’t really mean to hit her. The other kids are still shouting there demands at me and although they’ve seen my violent out burst it doesn’t seem to of put them off. I feel a bit bad, kind of like a bit naughty but then I cycle off chuckling and saying “I just hit a small child, that is so wrong, he he”. Thirty meters later a girl says to me “Mzungu give me my pens” I haven’t got your bloody pens I shout back. She needs to improve her grammar. More kids say “Give me my money”. But then one child just says all she knows in English, “hello how are you mzungu give me money have a nice journey” all in one breath.

I arrive in the village of Bwindi, the main base for gorilla viewing. The whole village has embraced gorilla tourism with a gusto unseen in any Africa village I’d been before. There are plenty of souvenir stores selling all manner of gorilla related goods. There are restaurants and even a bakery advertising delicious pastries. It all very entrepreneurial for an African village - tourists or not. I venture to one of the "tourist" restaurants. But the only food is matoke and beans. I try the bakery but the pastries don’t seem to exist and they offer maktote and beans as well. I try one of the up market restaurants, they’re still unsure what food they actually have but quote me ridiculous prices. Oh well, it looked good. I head back to my place and have lunch.

I’d had my usual cynical thoughts about visiting the gorillas. Everybody I’d met had told me it was a wonderfully breathtaking, life changing experience. It seemed to me you had to say that as you’d just spent nearly four hundred dollars on it. There’s approximately 40,000 gorillas still living in the wild. There are three species of Gorilla: Western Lowland Gorilla, Eastern Lowland Gorilla and the Mountain Gorilla. There are also several subspecies of these. These Gorillas are found in The Congo (DRC), Uganda and Rwanda as well as Nigeria, Cameroon, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Congo, Central African Republic and Angola. The Western Lowland and Eastern Lowland gorilla are practically unidentifiable from their highland cousins with only primatologists really being able to tell the difference. Although these gorillas are still on the endanger list their numbers way outshine the highland gorilla and no one seems to think these gorillas are worth even a mention. I’d seen Orangutans in Sumatra years previous and nobody had said that was a life changing experience, but hey it costs $3 so you wouldn’t. Charge $300 and people may come back saying it was one of the most amazing things they’d ever seen. Instead of the normal response, “Yeah, they’re really cool”. The Komodo dragons, endangered and endemic to their own private island, had also been “really cool” at $2 a visit. Those Pandas in China - “Totally cool” at $5. But as conversation over dinner that night with other guests at the hostel turns to tomorrow’s gorilla trek I’m absolutely incredibly insanely jealous, and wondering whether I could afford it.

I’m pushing through dense forest, weaving out into tea plantations, down steep rocky tracks before smooth mud takes me back inside the dark forest. The road is pure adrenaline. It winds in and out of the forest through the country side past the villages, schools and waving kids, up steep inclines where I’m off and pushing before steep descents down rocky tracks keep my wits about me. I’m hoping on the (incredibly) rare possibility that I might turn a corner on the track and see a gorilla sitting in the road. I’d stop and we’d have a few minutes staring at each other where a “Connection” would be made between man and beast. It doesn’t happen but the forest and mountains are enough for me. The road starts to climb and climb. Its steep and I’m mainly walking and pushing Harvey. It seems to go forever. The days flown by and its already approaching four o’clock. I realize as I’m pushing Harvey that it’s taken me nearly three hours to do just less than ten miles. Its taking all my energy to push Harvey up the steep track and I’ve now exhausted all my food rations for the day. I finally manage to reach what I think is the top of the track. Its too hard to say as the thick forest leaves no views of where the summit may be. I’m on about the same par as the other mountains so I’m hoping for the top. It flattens out and I start to cycle again. I turn the corner, decline for a while but then after another corner the road heads up again, I stand up on the bike and try attacking the climb. I’m up a few meters before it’s too steep and man and bike come to a stand still. I collapse on the road and lay my head in the dirt. I love this place, it’s so unbelievably beautiful, but so unbelievably hard. I have so little energy left in my body and think I could actually just sleep right now in the road, in the dirt. I get up and walk on. A truck drives by, its only the 3rd vehicle I’ve seen all day. It stops and the driver asks if I want a lift. I don’t know. I’m really undecided. I really want to continue cycling because I must be near the top and after that it will all be down hill. But maybe its not, maybe it’s another ten miles of climbing? I ask the driver. He tells me it’s “Very far, very hard”. I agree I price and climb into the back. The tracks winds on a few more kilometers through the forest. It seems to of leveled out and looks like it’ll be easy riding. The track starts to then decline, beautiful views look over the mountains all covered in forest. I’m trying not to be pissed off. I’d spent all day pushing Harvey up stupidly steep tracks and now I sit on the back of a pick-up truck for the descent! It seems insane. I’m annoyed at the driver’s misinformation, but really can’t blame him. I guess to him it is very hard and very difficult. I’m bumping along in the back, in the open air, hanging on for dear life as we wind down the mountain. I let my annoyance pass. I have the wind in my hair and dust in my face. We wind down and down and down the forest eventually coming to an end as we pass villages and more patchwork fields. The truck bounces all over the road trying to swerve each and every pot hole. “See how we blacks have to suffer” my fellow passenger shouts over to me, as we just about hang on after hitting a huge pothole. I smile, he has a point, this is almost and demanding as cycling.

Two day later I’m swimming in the beautiful water of Lake Bunyonyi. I splash out for a dorm bed over my tent and eat some of the best food in Africa at Byoona Amagara Island Retreat. I love the lack of tourists in Africa, over say Asia, but sometimes you get somewhere beautiful and think, why can’t someone build somewhere really nice to stay here, as you then head back and stay in a dumpy town. Lake Bunyonyi camp is one place where this has actually happened. It was heaven munching down bruschetta and stuffed aubergine. Swimming in the lake and borrowing books from their library. With my visa expiring I was forced to leave after just a few days. Jason the owner has suggested a path. All I need to do is paddle a dug out canoe across the lake for half an hour and then follow a track the rest of the way to the main road. It sounds like fun and will cut off at least 40 km’s of the journey. He’d never done the journey himself but assures me that the locals guys all say its not too steep. I wonder though how many of these guys have cycled it. I take the advice and head off the following morning. I put my bike in the canoe and paddle across the lake in the early morning. I see an eagle dive into the glass like water to catch its early morning breakfast and a family of otter’s splash around near the banks of the lake. It’s a sublime place.

The track on the other side is fairly flat and with no serious climbs or descents I’m moving quickly through the countryside. Its a beautiful place, the tracks cut into the side of the hill. I head through the villages and pass through the fjord like scenery. I make it to the main road in less than two hours and at 16 miles it was a shorter distance than expected. I’d put so much emphases on the track that I’d pretty much ignored the fact that the main road would be in a bed state. It fact it was in a much worse state than the track. Rough and full and pot holes and heading steeply uphill. I start to climb, then push, then climb, then push. There’s an old guy pushing his bicycle up the hill, and I ask him how far the hill continues for, “Ten Km’s” he says. Deluded fool I think. Ten kilometers and over two hours later I arrive at the top. I’d walked, cycled and rested a lot. My map had let me down showing only twenty km’s to Kisoro and not the reality for forty. As for the climb, Jason had told me it was downhill to Kisoro. He was right it was downhill but only after you reach the top.

There’s a street of mud buildings at the top. There all advertising beer but one vaguely looks like it might sell food. I pull over and walk in. I ask for rice and beans but they only have rice and meat. I agree and sit down. Two bowls put in front of me. One contains congealed rice the other contains two large bones with little bits of meat hanging from them, some intestine which has been tastefully plated together and a lump of what I assume is fat with the skin on it. I try to rip some meat from the bone, force down the rice and drink a warm coke. The rest I don’t even touch.

The descent starts from here and its a relief to bump down the shitty road appose to walking up it. I pass through a baboon forest. Its straight out of “Crowing tiger, hidden dragon” and an unusual sight for Africa. The forest clears and gives expanding views of the patchwork scenery. I feel that I’m fairly high up but as I turn a corner there’s a suddenly a huge Volcano towering above everything. It dominates the landscape, standing majestically over all. The main road is still just a track cut into the edge of the hills. Its down hill, bumpy and slow going, but great fun. The surrounding countryside is stunning and I’m glad I took this over the asphalt road to the east. I’m making slow process and realise I won’t make it to the border today. My visa expires today and although I’m sure over staying by one day isn’t a problem I didn’t really want to risk it. The immigration officers could be very difficult if they want to be. I push on, its mainly downhill but still slow going because the roads in such a bad shape, and the odd climb is still thrown at me.

The afternoon is drawing to a close and I realise there’s absolutely no way I’ll get to the border today. The road flattens out and a lot more people appear, I realise I must becoming into kisoro. I hit a piece of tarmac, its perfectly smooth but then stops fifty meters later. I realise its actually the towns airstrip, the main road running directly across it.

The following morning over breakfast I’m talking to Michael. He’d clocked me sitting out the front of the guesthouse and has come over to sell me stuff. He’s got Gorilla permits at $360 instead of the normal $375 (What a saving!) along with all manor of other excursions. I tempted at the gorillas but decline. He then offers me a python trek.
“What like huge Python snakes in the trees” I say in total amazement.
“Yes and sometimes on the floor as well”
“What like, huge, giant, Python snakes in the trees”
“Yes 20,000 shillings and I’ll take you”
“What like huge, giant, massive, Python snakes in the trees”
“Yes, yes”
It sounds amazing. One tour I would happily pay for. I tell him about my visa problems and how I need to leave today. I’m really disappointed I would love to see the pythons, really totally love to it.
“What like huge, giant, massive, whopping great Python snakes in the trees”
“Yes, yes, 20,000 but if you cycle there I’ll do it for ten”.
I really can’t risk an arsehole of an immigration officer. I’m disappointed as I head towards to the border on my bike.

I’m at the border in an hour or so later. I really want the immigration officer to see my bike as I’m its my reason for being late. I walk in, pass him my passport and put on my best English accent.
“I’m awfully sorry, my visa actually expired yesterday but the road was a little rougher than I’d envisaged and unfortunately I wasn’t able to make it”.
“Don’t worry I will not put you in the cells”. I smile and say thank you.
“They say manners cost nothing and you have manners and are very polite”. Wow the accent worked. I don’t tell him a few days ago I hit a small child and verbally abused a load more. He stamps my passport and I head across the border and out of Uganda.

I’ve enjoyed my time in Uganda. I’d spent a lot more time here than planned. The few days cycling around Mount Elgon, the elephant in the road and the sheer splendor of the Bwindi forest have all been some of the best highlights of the entire trip. But going on within this beautiful country are some horrendously tragic things. I don’t see the IDP (Internally Displaced Person) camps where thousands have lived for years. I don’t have to deal with the politics of a government which appears to becoming more and more authoritarian each day. I don’t see the child soldiers of the LRA (Lords Resistance Army) or have to deal with there reemergence back into normal society. I have no contact with Congolese refugees, living in Uganda for years as war and instability continue to ravage their own country. And I’ve no idea how the ninety-five percent of the population live without electricity. I don't have to walk miles to get water each day. I wonder whether what I have seen is purposeful, or whether its simply self indulgent and possibly selfish. But I’ll take away memories of helpful friendly people, of feeling small in huge expanses of space and very importantly some overwhelming feelings of total happiness.

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