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This is just a great picture
Do you see the bird flying by in the front? May 31, 2006 - Day 46 - Up at 4:30am today. All day driving again. Finished Dragon and started reading I choose to live, a true story by a kidnap survivor. Horrifying but good. Today we drove into Uganda and got the $30 visa instead of the transit visa for $15 because Matt was unprepared and didn't have the information we needed to do it right. We stopped in Kampala, the capital and headed into the mall for an hour or so while they did some grocery shopping. Got to camp and that was about the day.
June 1, 2006 - Day 47 - Again, another long driving day, from 6am to 6pm. I finished my book and started reading A Cruel Courtship. We had lots of crazy winding roads to navigate but James is an impressive driver. No worries there. We ran across more of the "give me pen" kids, so at least we knew they were still around. Drove to Kisoro where we would be based for seeing the gorillas. Met with Daniel who organized our trip into the Congo the following day. He explained how it would work with the gorillas and what would happen. We also
had to fill out which group we would be in, slow, medium, or fast. My understanding was that the fast group would have the hardest and longest walk, followed by medium and then slow with the easiest and shortest walk to the gorillas. Each group would be visiting a different family. There was a lot of strike over who would be in which group, as nearly everyone wanted medium or fast and these filled up quickly. Got to bed to get up early again the next day.
June 3, 2006 - Day 49 - Today we got in the truck in Kisoro and got out again in Lake Bunyani, where we would spend two nights. It was a beautiful place, but a bit cold and cloudy and not really good for swimming for that reason. My first thought was that I was unimpressed becuase the camping area was way down the hill and this is a long way to drag your filthy tent bag and all the sleeping stuff you need in your tent. But we managed ok. Once we were all set up I had just walked back to a place with a bunch of tables and a
good view of the lake. I looked over and saw the strangest things - someone was bouncing around with no pants on. They were turned around from me, so all I could see was a t-shirt ending in someone's backside, but it looked like Stephen. And yes, it was. I could only assume that it was ants in his pants, and that was why he was naked and flailing about in open daylight. It was ants actually, and it was the funniest thing I had ever seen. It made the afternoon really. We finally had a really late lunch, around 4pm, and then dinner. Perfect.
June 4, 2006 - Day 50 - Had a bit of stomach problems today, of course. Spent the day reading by the lake, freezing a bit. Started the Bronze Horseman, my new favorite book. Really enjoyed it. This one took more than a day. In the late afternoon I took a little walk by the lake and sat with Vicki, where we watched an otter pop up occassionally. Closer to the evening we went to an orphange and watched the kids dancing. Then some of us got in and danced with the kids. It
Over we go
This is just a trial flip in calm water to get everyone comfortable with exiting and entering the raft in the water. was a lot of fun. Came back and had dinner and a relaxing night.
June 5, 2006 - Day 51 - I was on duty again today, so that was fun. We went back through Kampala again, so back to the mall where I spent the rest of my shillings. Bought some fun shampoo and condiitoner - it's the little things that make me happy. And chocolate of course. We stopped at the Equator for some key photo opportunites, thought mine were limited as I was preparing lunch there. It rained a lot at one point, and it actually rained in that truck too. Very unfortunate. Mostly down the back wall, where my Malawi chair was. So we had to move that and wait for things to dry out a bit. Very exciting. Stayed at the same camp we had been to previously.
June 6, 2006 - Day 52 - Today some of went rafting down the Nile. They picked us up in the morning and drove us to where we would begin, at the head of the Nile. This would be my first white water rafting with a class 5 rapid. We got separated into two boats
- those who wanted to flip and my boat that wanted to stay in the raft at all times. They knew there was a good chance the boat would flip at some point, so they made us practice that straight away. The guide flipped our boat before we really got started to show us how it would be. Then we had to get back in and swim under, all kinds of craziness. Finally we were on our way and we hit a class five pretty early on. He asked us if we wanted to do the 5 or go an easier way down a 4. We said 5 - why not? Why not indeed. Drowning is why not. We go tthere and the rapid was called the G spot (I know). We flipped immediately and got sucked down straight away. I felt like I was under forever. Once I managed to get up I was slammed back down a few more times. Then I was floating down the river, no problem. Except hysteria. I somehow managed to keep hold of my paddle and started collecting them on the way to being rescued. Very calm. I got back to the boat
and felt terrible - Mari was there with the guide and having a really hard time, crying and stressed out. But she made an amazing comeback - she got back in the boat and went the rest of the day. It was great. We did the rest of the morning and then stopped on a little island where the company had set up lunch, which was yummy. Got back in the raft and had to row a while as there wasn't much current. When there was a current but no rapids, we floated in the water down the river. It was great. At some point it started raining and it was strange to be rained on in this boat, but rather cool. Then we had lollipops and the female cast of my boat took on a rather sexy look - could have made it on to a poster in a mechanics shop I'm sure. Finally we had our last rapid, a class 3, and we still managed to flip it. But this was much less scary and everyone remained unscathed. Once back we walked up to the van where we had bunches of water, cokes, and beer waiting for us.
The guys wasted no time getting wasted and I had some cokes. Drove back to camp where I had just seconds to reach the toilet - I felt like Adam, who has the weakest bladder ever. After dinner everyone hung out in the bar at the camp and proceeded to get relatively smashed. I had a nice evening sitting on the couch with Stephen, chatting it up, and playing with the best kitten you've ever seen. I even had it laying on my lap for quite a while, on its back, playing with my hands. Best cat ever. My arm developed quite a bruise as the night went on, sustained during my near death experience I imagine. Very cool. Meanwhile, Adam proceeded to sing and dance himself into a drunken stupor, which ended with him falling into the fire after I had gone to sleep. Funny and not, all at the same time.
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steve schweitzer
non-member comment
rafting
I had no idea that the Nile had class V rapids. That is equivalent to the worst rapid on the Colorado, in the Grand Canyon, which I rafted for 18 days in May with my friends from Eugene and had an incredible time, better than anything I had done during my 7 months overseas. You sure have become brave during the past 6 months. Rock on!