Sand Monsters

Murchinson Falls National Park, you have challenged us. After noticing that we weren't spending as much time in Fort Portal as we thought, we had extra days to work with for Uganda. We decided to go up north a little, outside your typical tourist trail, and see if we could get to the falls.

A rocky minibus half way to Hoima and then a shared taxi the rest of the way was a warning sign for what was coming - challenges. We reached our record of 24 people in a minibus, going through unpaved red sand roads. The kinds where if a truck is passing in the opposite direction, you close all the windows and breath through your shirt as to not aspirate a ton of sand. The shared taxi broke the record - 10 people in a car that reminded me of my mom's old '85ish Honda accord. The last hour of that 2.5 hour car ride was one of the most painful things I've had to endure... And I have a decent amount of tattoos... My left buttock was screaming for blood that I could not provide...

Hoima was... I don't know. It was dusty since all the roads were that red sand. Everytime any vehicle passed by, you took cover. We would have loved to shower since we felt like we were covered head to toe with either dry sand or mud, but we had made the decision not to find accommodation right away in the hopes to make our way to Masindi this same day. Turns out, the town really isn't that interesting. And carrying our backpacks in a dusty hot town made us a little low energy. Our highlight of the town was finally finding ice cream after searching for a bit. Ice cream has been a rare yet so, so welcomed treat.

A little background on minibuses, or matatu's as they're called around here: it's a really old, yet rough an tough, 14 passenger minivan. There's the driver of course. There's also what they call a conductor. The conductor is the one yelling out the destination from the window, finding passengers, charging everyone while we're rolling and remembering where everyone is getting off. So as a client, you simply listen for the direction you're looking for, wave it down if you're on the street or approach it in a bus station. And you make space for yourself in the fullest one. I say fullest because it doesn't leave until it's satisfied with its number of customers. So you squeeze into the fullest, hoping it leaves soon.

When we wanted to go to Masindi from Hoima, the conductor said his bus was full and pointed to the empty bus behind him. We counted and saw there were 3 people in the back which is usually 4 and no one was sitting on the conductor. Yes that's a legit seat. So we argued but they left us there, in an empty bus. We waited an hour and 10 minutes before leaving, finally full. The only positive there was that we got the front seats, which usually has a max of 2 plus the driver for visibility, which means you don't get piled on. We arrived in the dark, which I hate, but these things happen. Turns out litterally next door to where they dropped us, was a guest house offering "self contained" rooms (private washroom) with hot water for a reasonable price. I haven't had my own washroom with hot shower in a long time and considering the layer of sand we were dragging around, I was quite happy!

Today we set out to find this map of a walking tour of Masindi, written by this volunteer group years ago. We had heard the sites weren't much to see, but the stories made it interesting. We were just looking for a good way to tour the town, so why not. The map took us to these really old schools, some still running, some abandoned, it took us by a hospital, an old European cemetery, a big fancy presidential Lodge and even a monument commemorating the first white guy to meet with the local King and to see Lake Albert in the 1800's. I really wanted to visit inside the hospital but felt a little awkward asking... The white nurse from Canada want to see how you do your work... Here, hospitals and schools aren't tall, no second stories, they are all individual buildings. One building, one class room. Or one building, one ward. There was a men's ward, female ward, children's ward, maternity and orthopaedics. It made for an interesting and different way of seeing the town as I'm sure we went places most white people never go... The people were smiling and friendly, a few welcomed and nice hellos from the locals.

Mixed in with this fascinating walk was our attempt at planning to see the falls in the National Park. Uganda really isn't meant for independent travellers, at least not their parks. Just like in Kibale, they're clearly used to having people with their own drivers. There's no public transportation taking you to the park gates, and if you do make it there, there's no transportation inside the park, nor is there anything accessible without transportation. We looked into staying at a camp site inside the park, but their tours leave from Kampala, they don't offer transportation to their camp site, even though there's no other options, and they don't offer 1 day tours in the park... Every option of public transport or getting a ride was leading us no where. We had hoped to run into a group of fellow travellers going and to hitch a ride, but there's no other traveller that we've seen staying in this town, even though it's the closest to the park. They all leave from Kampala. So that left us with one option, and one option only, hiring a private driver. So for 330 000 shillings, we get someone picking us up at 630am, we get to the park entrance around 9am, do a game drive, then do the boat trip at 2pm, with a hike up the falls where he picks us up, and we return to town. This 330 000 includes the driver, the car, and the fuel. All other fees are on us, like the 40$ entrance to the park (crazy!), 32$ boat ride, 15$ hike... Ouch. This day will have coast around 130$US when all is said and done. And yes, it's the cheapest option. Obviously, we just grocery shopped at the market to pack a lunch. They won't get a single other penny from us! Lol.

Tomorrow is the day we might see hippos, crocodiles, girafes, elephants... Pretty darn exciting! And we get to act like royals, private transportation. I feel like the rich!Read more