I just saved $1400

Sorry for the clickbait: I did not want to start with gorillas or monkeys or the bumpiest car rides ever.

Volcanoes national park is known for the gorillas and people spend $1500 here to track them and spend some time with them, and the whole activity lasts a few hours. Instead I opted for the one day hike up the volcano mount bisoke, where you can sometimes get lucky. The hike was very steep, went up to 3711 meter with a beautiful crater lake at the top (no fish), and very very muddy. Beautiful flora but did not see any fauna; until we were almost all the way back down, went suddenly two silverback gorillas came across the corner. Not threatening at all, big strong muscular apes that are very chill; and so we saved quite a bit of money by getting lucky. Ok, we did not have time to hang around them, but after having felt myself what it feels like to have people constantly stare at you, I was totally satisfied with just leaving these animals alone.

Also very interesting was the car ride to the start, which went over huge rocks for probably two kilometres, it was just a rock garden all the way; I guess they want to give a “genuine experience”. I don’t know if it’s genuine but its an experience. And the info and websites for the park are honestly really horrible, as I had to look forever to find where to book, the answer to a whatsapp question —“please contact us over whatsapp!”—was “we make your dreams a reality. Thank you for contacting us, we make your dreams a reality” (yes that was the answer), I called a service number which took me twenty minutes to find, which insisted that booking was very easy despite my objections to the contrary (it did not make it any easier), and then on the morning itself it turned out I should have also arranged a ride to the trail start (I wasn’t the only one who didn’t know). But yeah, everything worked out in the end, and nature makes you forget all that.

Oh, there were also like 6 porters that joined and an equal number of armed personnel against buffaloes, alongside the guide; the porters join whether you ask them or not, and if you dont give them money, they don’t get paid. Well I carried my own backpack but “mine” did help in sections, so I happily gave this guy something for the help. A shit salary nonetheless.

I decided to take another rest day before uganda, and was stressing a lot to try to find an atm that worked. People helped me a teeny tiny bit and asked for money; I was too tired so I gave in. And then something strap which is very important for my gear got stolen from my bike, which can really stress me out. Somehow other tourists seem to carry dollars with them for payment, but I am not that organised…

Well if things go well I am heading to uganda tomorrow: Bwindi impenetrable national park, where I can again see wildlife.Leer más