Wednesday, 13 January 2010

The Pearl of Africa (Uganda I)

Here's a few pictures and impressions from the Pearl of Africa to put you in the mood for a series of posts of my recent adventure in Uganda!

By the way, I can assure you that it's not just called the "Pearl of Africa" because they've written it in big letters on their airport terminal!

This is taken at Lake Bunyoni in the south-western corner of Uganda, close the boarder of Rwanda. Set in a mountain range, there are lots of lush little islands in the lake and boats cruise between them all day long. One of the islands, Punishment Island, only has one tree on it and until the 1920s the villagers used to send girls there who became pregnant without being married. Any man was allowed to go and “take” the girl; if no one took pity and came to her rescue, she would starve to death …



Uganda seems to be permanently covered by a layer of mist - especially in the mornings and in mountainous areas. While this is really annoying when it comes to taking photos, it is incredibly spectacular in real life as all the mountains and islands appear to be “layered”, making it all look even more magical!


This picture was taken on our way to another lake in southern Uganda. The view into the valleys is breathtaking with mountain ranges partially hidden in clouds stretching as far as the eye can see …


The view from our dinner table...


Mount Elgon in the eastern part of Uganda is the sixth highest mountain range in Africa. After visiting the source of the Nile in Jinja, we came here to enjoy the tranquillity and adore the magnificent waterfalls in the area. Together with a local guide we walked through the beautiful countryside, through villages and sometimes through people’s gardens and fields to watch the three waterfalls of the river Sipi.


One of the Sipi Falls.
When lying in bed we could hear the water dropping down into the valley …


Abseiling next to the waterfall.





With my travelling buddies and fellow ODIs Hamish (Rwanda) and Vinayak (Sudan) - slightly soaked in front of the fall.


The next highlight of our trip through Uganda were the Murchison Falls. The journey to the falls in the northern part of Uganda was long, painful and incredibly adventurous, but the boat tour on the Nile was so worth it. At the falls the Victoria Nile (50m wide) forces its way through a tiny 6m wide gap in the rocks before peacefully continuing its journey to Egypt. Boats can’t get close to the falls as the sheer power of the water would be enough to capsize them and all along the river it looks as if a washing machine has exploded because of all the foam created from the drop.
In the bottom part of the river – quiet and peaceful after the big squeeze - hundreds of hippos floated in the water, statue-like crocodiles soaked up the heat and buffaloes grazed on the river banks.


Anyone say my name...?!


When I said statue-like, I really should have added a “mostly”! It turns out that crocodiles like to chill in peace and quiet…

… but get quite angry about noise, boats and people watching them be lazy!!!

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