Creation Praises Him!!

Uganda is quite a “tourist friendly” place; there are all sorts of amazing things to do not only in Kampala but all over the country.  As soon as I got here I started hearing about some of the different things there are to do. Two in particular kept coming up over and over; going on an African safari and white water rafting on the Nile. For a variety of reasons I decided to go on the safari but not the rafting trip. I wanted to only do one or the other and the safari seemed like the right choice…

It was!

Cat booked a safari through Red Chili from Thursday to Saturday for Cat, Carolyn, and me. Since we knew the vans would be heading out at 8:30 Thursday morning we decided to spend Wednesday night at the Red Chili hostel. We left home around seven thirty (or half seven, as Cat says!), it was a little later than we had planned but Florence had made us an amazing Ugandan dinner so it was definitely worth being a little behind schedule!

We decided to take bodas to the taxi park since it was later than we had meant to leave. I didn’t bring a backpack to Uganda with me so I was pulling around my little carry-on suitcase...not the easiest thing to get on a boda (though, I figured if they can manage to get a family of five on one boda then my suitcase shouldn’t be too big of a problem!!) The driver took it for me a laid it across the handlebars, I was just glad I didn’t have to try to hold it! We were about halfway to the park when he pointed at it and said “this is disturbing”. I assumed he meant it was disturbing his ability to steer and got a little nervous, I offered to take it but he just kept driving and we ended up making it there safe and sound!

When we got to the hostel we were all pretty exhausted so we showered and went to bed.

Breakfast was at 7:30 the next morning and I had an interesting experience…when I look at a menu I typically look at the prices first, to find something within my price range, then I see if anything sounds good. They had a well priced option of “Muesli with milk or natural yogurt”. Carolyn had told me that muesli was a type of granola so of course I chose that with the yogurt.

The natural yogurt.

Yep, that means it tasted terrible!!! Thankfully there was a big bottle of pancake syrup sitting out so I kind of just covered the whole thing with syrup and it became quite delicious!! =]

I know how to improvise!

We were assigned our vans after breakfast and then we hit the road. We got really lucky with our van; it was full of people our age!

There were the three of us, a group of three from Germany (two girls and a guy), another guy from Germany and then halfway there we picked up another girl from, you guessed it, Germany!

I was so thankful for the group we were in, since we were with our group so often during the three days it really made a difference. We enjoyed conversations about a whole range of things from German politics to Pinky and the Brain. (Globalization at its finest: eight twenty-something’s from three different countries having a lovely conversation about how we all watched the same cartoons when we were little. Bugs Bunny and Roadrunner were particular favorites and even came with sound effects!)

We had a few stops along the way so we could use the bathroom and get snacks. Something I love about Uganda; almost anywhere you go you can find little 500 schilling bags of g-nuts. They are the perfect snack and since 500 schillings is less than fifty cents you don’t even have to feel bad about buying them!! Another good snack (not as cheap though...) are Nice Biscuits. They’re coconut flavored cookies and I love them! (Mom, you would love them too, I’ll bring some home for you!!!)

We got to the Red Chili Rest Camp about an hour before dinner was being served. Since we had some time to spare we got settled into our tents then took a walk down to the river. We were super excited when we spotted a hippo out in the water. Little did we know that the next day we would see more hippos than we could imagine!!

After dinner we played cards with some of the people from our bus then pretty much went to bed. It’s amazing how riding in a car all day can make you feel exhausted! We were told to watch out for hippos, buffalo, and warthogs if we were up during the night; thankfully I slept through the night and didn’t have to take any chances!

We were pulling out of camp for our game drive by 7 Friday morning. We had packed breakfasts that we got to eat on our way out; chipatti, pineapple slices, and a banana…very delicious!

The game drive turned out to be amazing!! We saw everything there was to see except for hyenas! That means that up close and in REAL LIFE I got to see all the different deer/gazelle looking things, buffalo, monkeys, hippos, elephants, giraffe, lions, and even a leopard! They told us before we even started that it was rare to see leopards and not every drive was lucky enough to see lions…thankfully we were the lucky ones!

It was pretty interesting trying to find a lion out in the “savannah grasslands”. I put that in quotes because our safari guide told us that was where we were about a hundred times, it got to be pretty funny! Anyways, to find a lion we would be driving along the road and all of a sudden our guide would tell the driver to go one way or the other and we’d be off the road driving through tall grass looking for lions! Crazy!!

When we did eventually find one I was in awe. The first one we saw was a male and he was hiding in some bushes. We were stopped next to the bushes and our guide goes.."there!” and points. It took me a second to find the lion, it was like looking at one of those mirage things where out of nowhere the image jumps out at you (though thankfully the lion didn’t literally jump out at me!)  Once I saw it I just kept staring; I couldn’t believe that I was less than fifteen feet away from it! I’ve seen lions before, in the zoo or in movies or what not, but this wasn’t the same. Seeing it in such a natural state was just different, and that goes for all the animals I saw. Looking at the elephants I just couldn’t get over how diverse creation is. I’ve always heard that “creation praises Him” and it always feels natural to pray and thank God when surrounded by creation. This was true especially on the safari. When you see something you’ve never seen before, like mountains, or the ocean, or real live lions, I think it must be impossible not to immediately tell God how amazing he is!

There was one other thing I realized during the safari, and I don’t mean this as a complaint in any way, but no matter how amazing an experience is, it kind of feels like something’s missing when the people you love don’t get to experience it with you. Maybe next time..=]

At one point we were driving along and there were all these giraffes way out to the left of us; combined with all the trees and the sun in the background it made for a gorgeous skyline.

After the drive we had lunch then had a little down time before we had to leave for our boat cruise to Murchison Falls. I bet you’ll never guess what I did for my down time…took a nap! Surprise surprise, even with plenty of sleep the night before I couldn’t turn down the opportunity to take a nap! (Emily, I know you’ll appreciate that!)

The boat cruise was great; we had perfect weather! It was warm but just a little overcast so we weren’t uncomfortable. Right away we were able to see lots of hippos. I was taking lots of pictures then I realized they all looked exactly the same; like a river with rocks sticking up all over! Then we got lucky and found a group of hippos that were out of the water. They are massive! There were even some baby ones which as strange as it sounds to say are just adorable!

We were really hoping to see some crocodiles but that didn’t happen until about two hours into the cruise, still though, incredible. Despite being on a huge boat and being over twenty feet away from them, seeing huge Nile Crocodiles kind of made me shiver.

When we made it to the falls we were able to get out and take some pictures for a bit then we headed back. The falls were gorgeous, but were much prettier up close the next day when we got to hike next to them!

Friday night was just like Thursday night; dinner, cards, bed! Thursday I learned a great new card game though…Sara and Lys, if you’re reading this, we’re playing it when I get home!! =]

Thankfully Friday we had a little later start so it was actually light out when we left! We drove to a little park near the top of the falls then went on about an hour long hike. We had some really beautiful views of the falls and lots of great picture opportunities! We were even so close at one point that we were all getting hit by the mist!  My favorite part was that over the falls there was this constant rainbow. The way the sun was hitting the mist it just made an arc over the whole thing and it was marvelous! As long as there’s a bit of sun there’s always a rainbow, it may be cheesy but the little girl in me found it to be quite magical!

That was pretty much the end of the safari but the events for the day were far from over!

On our way back to Kampala our driver decided to make a pit stop at his friend’s house. We all ended up going on this little trail through the woods out into this mango farm. It was so cool! We got to pick mangoes right off the trees and got to talk to the farmer for a little bit too. He was asking us how long we’d been in Kampala and was pretty impressed when one of the German girls said nine months. Then we asked him how long he’d been in Kampala and he said 65 years, needless to say nine months no longer sounded like a long time!

After the mango farm it rained the rest of the way home…that made for lots of fun in the taxi park! Cat and I decided that no matter what happened as long as we didn’t fall in the mud everything would be ok! I managed to carry my purse, my suitcase, and a pineapple I had bought all the way home and I didn’t fall; success!

We scrubbed our feet when we got home from the fresh mud that was covering them then we watched a movie and ate reeses cups!

Sunday we went out to coffee with Julie and Beth. I ordered a Mixed Berry latte and ended up with quite an interesting looking drink! It came layered in a clear glass; grenadine, espresso, milk, white chocolate. Thankfully it tasted as good as it looked!

We went to Watoto Central after our coffee and it was awesome!! The worship was amazing and I thought the message was great too; I’d love to go back. I’m still trying to figure out exactly what to do about church here though. I’m only here for two more months which really isn’t a long time…yet I don’t want to miss an opportunity to get involved in some way in a church here.

When church was over Cat, Carolyn, and I met up with Josephine and headed out of town to her sister’s house. We hung out there all afternoon and had a delicious lunch with them. They made us tilapia, rice, potatoes, matoke, and the most delicious juice I’ve ever had! It was such a good time and they were so generous, not only with giving us lunch but they also gave each of us gifts of homemade jewelry.

  

From beginning (which in this case was Wednesday night!) to end…my weekend was fantastic! I will certainly join with creation (lions and all!) to praise God and thank him for his many many blessings!