Friday August 20, 2003 – A lion in a tree, a new phone, and a night in Bwindi

Friday August 20, 2003 – A lion in a tree, a new phone, and a night in Bwindi


It was a noisy night – there was a hippo making the standard range of hippo grunts and calls, as well as the oddest range of squeaks and squeals like I have never heard. It was so close I thought I should be able to see it from the window of the banda, but no such luck. But the noises really were strange. As well there were lions at quite a distance, and hyena whooping periodically from a bit closer. We packed up the car with all our stuff, I paid a small amount to the ‘volunteer” for setting up our fire, and then we headed off for a morning game drive. It was not a total success – so much of Ishasha is burnt and awaiting the rains that there is nothing but black earth and dried earth in the unburnt areas. There may be more game in the park than we saw, but they must be deep in the bush near the river. We tried to get down to the Prince Edwards flats, which are supposed to be a good game area, but only a few km from the lakefront marshes the road, we reached the end of the recently graded road and it became virtually impassible with the ruts and I chickened out on going any further. So we backtracked, seeing a large herd of buffalo, some elephant, and a lot of topi, the first place we’ve seen them. The males stood by the road and stared at us for almost as long as we stared at them. Our plan was to get tea and maybe breakfast at the Ishasha Wilderness lodge, ¾ of the way around the morning circuit but for the first time here we were turned away as we were not ‘registered guests”. Oops, must be really up-market or else just short on food. So back to the bandas for oatmeal and noodle soup.
Game drive number 2 was our attempt to see the famous tree-climbing lions of Ishasha. There are large fig trees to the east of where we were staying, and apparently the lions like to climb up in their branches and spend the heat of the day in the shade up where there is a breeze. So we drove round in a fair number of circles, dutifully inspecting the fig trees for lion-shaped masses, without any success. Given the fact that the terrain was dreadfully dry and there was virtually no game we eventually gave up in disgust, hypothesizing that it was unlikely that the lions would be hanging out there without much in the way of food in the larder. So what do we see on the way out to the main road – a lion up in a tree snoozing, tail and paws dangling down in the air on either side of a large branch. It was quite funny as we had so totally given up on the possibility of seeing one.
Lion ticked off the list, we rejoined the road heading south and went along our way towards Kihihi, the next “major” point on the map, almost missing the turn. A trip to the Congo border would have been quite inconvenient! Kihihi was eventually reached, I’m sure our speed is about 20 km per hour average, and we spotted the electronics outlet Wayne told me about. Outlet might be an overstatement, but they had an excellent collection of phones, as well as an enormous bank of phones and other gear being charged. Providing charging services for electronic equipment is a good business. I found the same phone as mine, with an asking price of 100,000 shillings. When I exclaimed that I paid 85,000 in Kampala for the same thing the price became 90,000. Better. Plus I got a charger with a different plug type so now my phone is electrically bilingual. Plus a gas fill-up, and we were ready for the final run to Buhoma. It amazes me that the roads we are travelling are the main routes for the tourist ‘circle”, and they are all terrible. A number of Ugandans have asked me why the large East African parks get more tourism traffic than the Ugandan ones, and I would bet the roads and infrastructure (or lack thereof in many areas) have a big part in it.
It’s getting late and we’re getting hungry and Buhoma may take a while to reach so we stop for “local food” in a local spot. I don’t know they have ever had a muzungu here. It wasn’t a big success! Sarah and I had rice and matoke and a beef stew, with more gristle than beef. And to top it off she had to use the bathroom, which was the most rickety latrine I’ve ever seen, off behind the restaurant in the village area. The girl from the restaurant brought a key to open the small padlock – I guess there are private latrines here. I don’t think they could believe that we wanted to use it, but use it we did. Elizabeth passed on the whole exercise and read her book in the car – I think she was the smarter one in the end.
Following Fred’s instructions, we reached Buhoma, passing through a serious stretch of curio shops immediately before the park gates. We were signed through no problem thanks to Fred’s arrangements, and found the MGVP house without much problem. A rectangular one story building with a series of doors around the outside, and a steep back yard with a charming but decrepit and unusable raised bungalow and a pit latrine up on top. We holler a bit for Isaac, who appears and greets us and shows us to our room – a double bed and a single mattress, with an ‘ensuite”, that is a small concrete chamber with a drain on the floor. We’ve got our sleeping bags and we’re set. Isaac is dead keen to be as hospitable as he can, under pretty direct orders from Fred, but his English is a bit so-so leading to some rather complicated exchanges. We unload and go for a stroll – checking out the community accommodation across the road – bandas, flush toilets, and a restaurant. It is definitely beer-o’clock so we have a beer, enjoy the beautiful view out over the heavily forested mountains of Bwindi and plan to have dinner here. To our surprise we bump into John, the Canadian birder from Red Chili. He is here with his wife on their quest for birds. And apparently gorillas.
After a little rest we are ready to tour the craft shops. Both sides of the road are lined by small kiosks with hideous carved gorillas outside selling woven baskets, small carved gorillas, and lots and lots of Congolese masks. Plus gorilla-themed t-shirts. Sarah is totally excited about a gorilla shirt so we dutifully compare prices and styles in all the shops, check out the Congo masks which tempt me, but not enough. Our best stop is in the Batwa support program shop. The Batwa are the original indigenous people of the area, a tribe of pygmies. They have not fared well at the hands of the subsequent Bantu tribes and live a pretty marginal life. So their shop sells very nice baskets to support social programs, and they have a small bar with tea and coffee and cinnamon bread. By this point Sarah is dying of starvation so we get her some cinnamon bread, and the nice man behind the counter throws in an extra slice for Elizabeth and I to try. Client loyalty instantly assured! Out behind there is a stage with a group of orphans doing a local song and dance routine. We later find out from Fred that they aren’t all orphans, but it makes a better selling point for the tourists to say they are.
Back to MGVP -, where Isaac tells us he has tea ready for us, and pulls a set of chairs out for us to sit in. we sit, he sits, we chat. Eventually Elizabeth asks about the tea and he says it is ready. More time goes by and eventually I ask where the tea is and it turns out the tea things are laid out on the counter in the pantry, whose door is closed and whose existence we were not aware of. Miscommunication number one. Isaac, who is 26, tells us about his 2 young children who live with his wife in the home area, about ½ an hour away by boda boda. He has a man he hires to look after his matoke and his tea bushes, so I guess there is a whole hierarchy of who works for who. He is surprised I was happy to stop after 2 children, especially with both being girls. He intends to have at least 5. He is surprised Elizabeth and Sarah are as old as they are, we are surprised he is as old as he is. We manage to get Jan on the phone and it turns out they will not be back in time for supper, so we are on our own. Isaac tells us with great pride that he has made dinner for us, which kind of blows our plans for eating across the road. Isaac turns the generator on so we have electricity to see by, and we clean up with a jerry can of lovely warm water that smells incredibly strongly of woodsmoke, and we are seated in the office come storeroom come medicine dispensary. Isaac has set the table and serves us a dinner of spaghetti (in chunks) and matoke with g-nut sauce and meat stew. Meat stew here in Uganda isn’t really what we think of as stew at home – it means boiled meat and the water has enough colour and taste to act as a gravy. Pretty basic fare, even for local food. Tea and coffee, and the rest of our pineapple carefully chopped.
Before bed we have a long and we thought clear conversation about tomorrow morning. We do not need breakfast, we are eating with friends across the road. We will probably get up at about 7 or 7:30. Seems all clear. Or so we think!