Kinigi, Rwanda to Ishasha, Uganda by Road

  Kinigi, Uganda
Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Kinigi, Rwanda to Ishasha, Uganda by Road

Tuesday June 10th, 2008. Kinigi, Rwanda to Ishasha, Uganda by road

We knew this was going to be the longest day in the car for the entire trip and we knew it had been raining so the roads would not be good but Martin (our guide) didn't tell us it would be sooooo long. It was supposed to be about 6hrs of driving with stops making it about 8hrs for the day. It ended up much longer than that.

So we set off from the Gorilla Nest Lodge at about 7am after having a truly crap breakfast. Funny thing is they cater for gorilla trekkers only at the Gorilla Nest Lodge so if you are not up and out by 6am then you get what ever is left over. No milk, the worst bread they have, no eggs, you get the point. Anyway its just a tip for anyone else heading there - be prepared for a crap breakfast if you are not up at the crack of dawn.

Enough bitching...overall I thought the Gorilla's Nest Lodge was pretty good. The location is awesome with the volcanoes as a backdrop and it seemed to be the closest decent hotel to the park offices (trekking start point). The food was pretty bad and the room itself was OK. I would go back there for lack of any decent alternative but if there was another decent hotel in the area I would probably try it out before returning to the Gorilla's Nest (PS: a group from Dubai has bought the hotel and has plans for renovations but they need to do more than fix the rooms to get this hotel up to scratch IMHO). 

We headed from the Lodge directly to the Ugandan border and the roads were nice but there were plenty of people up early going about their business. Kids on the way to school, people taking things to market, builders rolling huge planks or piles of bricks up or down the long hill on bikes or wheelbarrows. It all looked too energetic for us so we just lay back in the car and watched the world go by. It was around now that we realised we were being tailed by another couple on a trip with the same company as us. The guides drove in convoy to reduce the risk of any problems. I think it was mainly mechanical that they were worried about, but it was reassuring none the less to know there was another car behind us ready to help - and vice versa. On board was a mother and daughter couple from Melbourne. We never got their names even though we were literally with each other all day long but at the border crossing I got their family name as Heath (Rose and ?)

After about an hour we arrived at the border (a very small border control station to say the least) to find that the immigration officer was having his breakfast and we would have to wait until he was good and ready to do his job. In the mean time I got pushed and shoved by any number of locals looking for the right card to fill in while waiting. Then when said immigration officer did return, the locals that were there after me didn't even bat an eyelid and ask if I wanted to go in first, they just charged in and didn't really care about who was there first - especially not the stupid white guy dressed like Steve Irwin (that would be me). Come to think of it, they probably don't know who Steve Irwin is, that's why they didn't let me in first I guess. It didn't take too long but it was amusing to see how urgency was the last thing on anyone's mind apart from the two Congolese women on their way to market across the Ugandan border into Rwanda.

Next stop Uganda and although we had already set foot on Ugandan soil as we transited in Entebbe a few days earlier, this would be our first official visit and we have the passport stamps to prove it now. One thing about this border is that the cars swap sides - Rwanda was a Belgian/French (left hand drive) colony and Uganda was a British colony (right hand drive) - so the border crossing is one lane and as soon as you pass the Rwandan gate the sealed road stops and the bumps begin - and I mean straight away. There is no pretty road for the border and then it turns to crap around the corner. This road is crap the second the Rwandans are rid of you. No man's land has small pot holes, but they were nothing compared to the beasts we would find a few miles down the road in Uganda proper.

A quick note about the border crossing in Uganda. For full employment you have to first visit the local policeman and he takes some notes in his old ledger, asks where you are headed and then sends you on the immigration official. I have no idea what value the police man adds, but at least he is being paid for something. The immigration official on the Ugandan side was also out for breakfast - actually he was just out for a cup of tea because in his words "its very cold this morning". Now I don't know if it was the Ugandan state of mind or if he really was as I thought but this guy was a dead ringer for Idi Amin - and I mean the real Idi Amin, not Forest Whitaker playing Idi Amin. I know it sounds ridiculous but if he had let me take a photo then you would see what I mean. If this guy had shouted at me I think I would have soiled myself remembering scenes from "The Last King of Scotland".
He actually turned out to the possibly the nicest immigration official I had ever come across which frankly wouldn't be too hard because I think that have to take a "being an arsehole" course when training to stamp passports all over the world, but this guy was truly nice and interested in us and where we were headed. He took Rina's passport first and immediately opened with "selamat pagi" (good morning in Malay in perfect accent). We were both taken aback and then he followed with "apa kabhar" (how are you?). It turned out he had spent one month in Malaysia earlier this year for a government training course and he loved it there. He loved it so much he told Rina that as a Malaysian she didn't need a visa (US$50 each and officially she did need one, but he was going to ignore the rules for her). He wasn't as nice to me but still pleasant enough and pretty quick about it too. A few minutes later we were on our way to Ishasha Tented River Camp (minutes from the Congolese border) and some hours drive away.

Apart from the state of the roads, the human flotsam was much the same. People  working on the road, moving things from one place to another and kids everywhere. We were constantly amazed by the number of children. It seemed there were 5 kids to every one adult and they were almost all willing to wave and say hello. Many of them would also bark out either "give me money" or "give me food" or my favourite "give me plastic bottle" (they use it to carry water for school and/or recycle them for money). It was a constant flow of these kids with none of them having anything really interesting until we found four boys blocking the road singing us a song. It sounded like traditional music until we listened closely and realised they were singing "we are happy to be singing you this song...". While it was extremely tempting to give them something, we were not going to be broken by their pure audacity and cuteness alone. Giving them anything would only encourage it and within days there would be troupes of singers blocking the roads to tourist cars every km or so.

We stopped at a road side hotel called the Travellers Rest Hotel. It seemed to be in the middle of nowhere but it turned out that had plenty of things to do there which usually involved a bush walk or hike. You could stay there for about 5 days and not do the same thing twice. They also had a number of Congolese arts and crafts all over the hotel that were all for sale. We had fluked our way out of $50 with Ugandan Immigration so we decided to spend a little on a really nice Congolese mask (I love masks and this was the first time Rina had agreed to let me buy one - in fact she was the one that wanted to get it!). This would have been a perfect stop for an overnighter as it was a little over 1/3rd of the total time to Ishasha and the hotel was nice and there were plenty of things to do there. Instead we drove on over mountain passes, up and down dodgy roads with 1,500ft drops on one side and nut bag truck drivers coming round the next corner. Not to mention the crazy mini van taxis that were belting up and down the road who were driving their cars to a very early grave (mostly due to wear and tear, not from falling off the edge). 

the trees mark the impenetrable forest

Only just soon enough we were at the entrance to the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest where we stopped for our glorious (read with sarcastic tone) packed lunch.  The location was amazing at the entrance to the park with views that can't be matched. The idea was that we would see plenty of wildlife while driving through the park but we saw 2 monkeys and then nothing else for the entire hour or so that we were in the park. While there is now a road through the Impenetrable Forest it is pretty clear where the name came from as the under growth was serious and exploring this would have been a complete nightmare - not to mention very slow going. I did spend the entire drive through the park in eager anticipation of which animal would confront us around every single corner - but we saw almost nothing.

At the exit gate we heard that they had recently opened up another group of gorillas for tourist tracking which made a total of 5 for the Impenetrable Forest and 7 for Kinigi. Apparently the global mountain gorilla count is now approaching 700 - where it was down around 450 only a decade ago. The last case of poaching around Kinigi was 5 years ago and the last in Bwindi/Impenetrable Forest was about 4 years ago. Things are still hanging very precariously but at least they are improving. 

fuel stop

From here it was a long drive to a small town called Kihihi where we refuelled and headed into the Ishasha Game Reserve in Queen Elizabeth National Park. The town was fun with people all around and a really cool mix of local music with a reggae/dance hall beat coming from the barber shops. I was tempted to go in for a hair cut just for the fun of it but we were about 10hours into the 7 hours drive and every one was ready for dinner and a bed.

From Kihihi it was about another hour and half with the last 20mins or so in the park itself. Not far past the gates we found a large compound for an oil exploration company which is obviously disturbing - Martin was probably more worried than us because he knows how important Ishasha is for the tourist trade because this is where they have the famed Tree Climbing Lions (a misnomer because they are not a specific species, they have just learned how to climb over generations and passed it on to their young so they should be called lions that climb trees according to Martin).

5 minutes into the park we spotted some buffalo which were hard for us to find in Madikwe when we were there 3 years ago so I was quite excited but I would find out in the next few days that they were everywhere here so it wasn't a big deal except that they were our first sighting. The next one was better....2mins further down the road were 2 lions strolling along the road. They didn't really care about us and took some time to move off into the grass where they joined another lion and sat and watched us for a minute or so. It was getting pretty dark so we could only see dark blobs off in the grass. 

home for a few days

Arrival at Ishasha Tented Camp was hampered only by our state of mind. We were exhausted after 12 1/2 hours on the road. It was 8:30pm local time and we wanted to go to bed, but we were starving too so off to the room (tent) for a quick refresher and then back to the main tent for dinner. It was all a blur but the tents are really nice and only about 20ft from the river's edge. One problem is they all have 2 x super single beds, no doubles/ So you have to push the beds together with a really comfortable wooden edge in the middle (not). We were too tired to complain and Rina was not in the talking or doing mood so I pushed them together and off to bed...

A very long day that will test many people so I would suggest breaking that journey into two with stop at the Traveller's Rest Hotel (and get there early on your arrival day so you can do one of the long guided walks from the hotel). The scenery and people watching is amazing though so its a drive that most will soldier through with good memories.