And Then Tracey Went to Hospital.... AGAIN!

---

Major Man-flu

Back to Kampala and thank goodness for the fast free ride because by the time we got to the Backpackers David was feeling sick... really sick. Of major worry was that he had five major symptoms of malaria including a roaring temperature and aches and pains all over.

Now if there is one thing that Africa does well it's having clinics that specialise in the quick detection and treatment of malaria, especially since some of the strands here can kill you in 48 hours. So, having consulted our trusty guidebook for doctors that would be open on a Sunday night we jumped on the back of a boda boda (motorcycle taxi) and headed for a 24 hour clinic.

Long story short, it was not malaria but it was a combination chest and throat infection and the flu. Therefore fully loaded with antibiotics and lozenges we decided to stay in Kampala for a few days. Dave, who was freezing cold (in the hot) and totally miserable spent the entire next day lying/sleeping on a sofa on a veranda. Tracey meanwhile took to the streets of Kampala for a days shopping and exploring.

Kampala is a great city, but it's also completely nuts. Imagine if you will Christmas Shopping on London's Oxford Street in mid December. You know, thousands of people in a slightly mad panic trying to get places regardless of who is in their way. Add to that totally mad drivers... boda bodas on the wrong side of the road and on the footpaths... smog you can chew... dirt, mud and rubbish everywhere and absolutely everyone trying to sell you something and you pretty much get the idea. But for all this craziness, it somehow really works and instead of being a dirty disorganised mess of a city it instead feels exciting and energetic and quite prosperous.

Of course all this was helped by the obsessive preparations for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting. There was cleaning and painting and road repairing going on everywhere. The government even decided to introduce fines for litter in the week leading up to the event. Oh, if only this concept would stay, because the one other thing that Africans do very well is throw a lot of litter!

Pain

Now, sorry to take you back in time but it's worth telling you that our trip to a Kampala medical centre was NOT the first. Last week in a rather freak accident Tracey seriously hurt her leg with enough pain for us to think it might be fractured. So off to a medical centre we went and then, very efficiently, straight off to the hospital in a taxi for an x-ray and consultation. The good news was, no break. The bad news was quite serious bruising of the muscle. Much to Tracey's relief the doctor prescribed some hospital strength painkillers. He also said that the best thing she could do was to keep walking on it normally which is why we headed off to Murchison Falls without delay.

Ok, back to the present and by Wednesday Dave was feeling much better. However Tracey's leg was making a slow recovery and with a very important Gorilla Trekking date in Rwanda on the horizon we decided to head to a camping ground we had read about on an island in Lake Bunyoni in southwestern Uganda. This stop was designed to serve three purposes; 1 Tracey could rest her leg sitting around a lake in the sunshine, 2 it was very close to the Rwandan border and 3, it would get us out of the Kampala smog.

We also had one other significant stop to make first.

Dave gets back to the southern hemisphere

Uganda is one of only 10 countries in the world through which the equator passes and the middle of the earth was just 78km south of the capital. Having (hopefully) communicated to the bus driver that we wanted to stop at the Equator we boarded and in less than an hour we were standing astride both hemispheres. Well to be more precise Dave, who unlike Tracey, had never been to the equator before, spent about 5 minutes dancing back and forth over the line singing "Now we're in the south.... now we're in the north... etc etc" causing so much interest from locals that a man actually left his shop and crossed the road to come talk to us and get us to sign his equator guest book.

After all this and a cup of tea at the excellent Equation Cafe we then had the problem of needing to flag down a bus that could take us south. The equator, although rather important, is not actually a bus stop and from experience we knew that any bus leaving Kampala would be full to bursting. But flag one down we did and after some quick roadside bargaining we stowed our luggage and climbed into our seat.

Problem.

There were no seats. Like we've mentioned, no bus in this country moves unless it's so full that people have to stick their elbows out of the windows. So for the next 200 kms we sat on the dirty floor until we reached Mbarara, 147kms north of Kabale. In Mbarara we needed to find another bus to Kabale - our final destination for the day - but as is always the case, from the moment we stepped foot out of the bus we had every man and his goat trying to sell us a ride in their taxi/motorcycle/bike/horse and cart. As it had started to rain we agreed a deal with a taxi driver to take us and 2 other people to Kabale. Or so we thought. With the 5 of us already quite squashed in (well, not Dave who was in the front) we all of a sudden stopped and another person was added to the back seat. Now, in hindsight we should have just got out and waited for another taxi or bus, but with the deal done and the rain falling we stayed in the car and Tracey got her already bad leg crushed for the next two hours.

Upon arrival in Kabale we asked the man to take us another 2kms up the street from the bus park to the hostel we wanted to stay in. Fair enough we thought.... but upon arrival our driver insisted on more money, something we ABSOLUTELY were not prepared to pay after the discomfort that Tracey had experienced. Well... he kicked off... a right angry strop that started in the street and then continued into the reception of our hostel.

Luckily the hostel people were great, being rather used to con artist taxi drivers, so while we retreated into the safety of the courtyard they quickly dispatched the fella on his way. Phew!

The "New Zealand of Africa"

So that was Wednesday. Thursday morning we were up early and on two boda bodas for the short but beautiful trip over a mountain road to the edge of the Lake. Dave (and his 20kg backpack) had the "hilarious" pleasure of being too heavy for the motorbike so pack and person had to do the uphill trip separately!

To quote the guidebook "If Uganda is the pearl of Africa then south western Uganda is the mother of pearl, a hauntingly beautiful region of island filled lakes and towering mountains". The best of these lakes is where we now found ourselves and it would be fair to say that the area was magical. To get to our island we had to travel by dugout which is basically a canoe made from a hollowed out tree trunk. Having found a driver/paddler and made a wobbly entrance into our vessel we then sat back and enjoyed a silent 90 minute ride across this majestic lake to our little island and The Byoona Amagara resort and camp ground.

We won't bore you with two much about these two days other than to say we eventually mastered paddling our own dugout having done what is known locally as "the white man's corkscrew" and we also enjoyed an outdoor shower with the best view from any shower we had ever been in. By Saturday, when it was time to return to Kabale and head to Rwanda Tracey's leg was feeling much better and we were both in good spirits.

And then it all went terribly wrong.

On the return dugout journey the heavens opened, biblical style and we had to make an emergency dugout stop and seek shelter in a school on the mainland about halfway back to our destination. Soaking but ok we then met an American volunteer who called us a taxi on his mobile. Problem... the taxi could not make it to the school because the road close to it had turned into a mud bath. Our only option was to put on our packs and to walk across muddy fields and paths to a point that the taxi could make it to. We nearly made it all the way without incident and then...

disaster

... Tracey slipped in the mud and felt a crack and huge pain in her already damaged leg. We made it to the taxi... just.... and then for the second time in two weeks, Tracey went to a hospital. Well, we say hospital, it was really a clinic for giving birth or having Aids, something that you see in most towns. As it was Saturday they had to call a doctor to come from home and of course, there were no x-rays until Monday so she had to rely on a physical assessment only. The good news... no break. The bad news.... more muscle damage and properly some soft tissue damage as well. Once again she got a dose of painkillers and instead of heading straight to Rwanda we have spent the last two days resting in the same lovely hostel in Kabale. However a visit to the Gorillas beckons so tomorrow it is off to Rwanda, the "Land of a Thousand Hills".

---

Photos

The Equator
Home from Home

1st class travel
Preparing for our 1 hour ride across the lake

Al fresco washing
Have you ever had a shower with a better view?

Land ahoy
Arriving at our island retreat

Where's Wally?
Our campsite at Byoona Amagara...Tracey is in there somewhere!

Muzungu Corkscrew
We eventually managed to master the dug out rowing well enough to get to another island for a picnic

Hurting...again
Resting up at Edirisa after the mud slip!