Hello all, I arrived just in Entebbe, just at sunset last night. Flying over Lake Victoria was georgeous. I thought that the lake would be big, but I did not realize that it was that big. The only thing that I can compare it to is the ocean. You can not see across it, even from the plane. There are tons of flat islands around it, and it is a dark blue color. The flights were rough at best, although it could have been worse. I was not on a 747 like I expected, it was an airbus. The airbus is still huge, 4 engines and all, but not as spacious on the seating end of it. I ended up with 2 seats to myself, not enough to lay down, but just enough to spread out. By the way the beach ball that I brought for an overthruster worked great. It is almost perfect for sleeping on. I had a couple quick connections along the way to Uganda, and amost missed my flight from Nairobi to Entabbe due to a line to check in. Nairobi airport is hot and humid and there were only 2 people issuing boarding passes for all the gates. If you need to change your ticket or have a bording pass issued, it takes an hour to get throught the line. To get on with it, I arrived into Entebbe and haggled with a cab driver to take me to Jinja, (three hours away) for $70.00. I was origionally planning to stay the night in entebbe, then changed my mind because it would have cost and additional $30.00 minimum for the hotel and taxi, so I left. That is where the fun began. From entebbe you must drive to Kampala, then start to jinja. I never want to drive here. There are people everywhere walking in the dark, crossing the road, and the cars all are driving around 60mph past them. There are no stop lights and few stop signs, in fact there are few traffic signs at all. After you leave Kampala the road clears up, then it is streight on till Jinja... or it is supposed to be. There were people along the way waving there hands, I told the cab driver that "I think that they want us to slow down" sure enough there had been an accident just prior to our arrival. The road was blocked, I remember thinking "just pull them out of the way, and lets get on with it." Then we got closer, but not too close, just enought to see the towering flames, and plumes of smoke. It looked like a petrol tanker had colided and exploded. So it was off on a horrible dirt road through the sugarcane fields. The road was a single lane, but dont let anyone else know. The road went past one village, and people came out and blocked our car, they started pounding on the glass and yelling in whatever language they spoke. Luckily all they wanted to do is let us know of a shortcut. I was feeling a bit uneasy though. The shortcut was an even narrower dirt road that people were going both ways on. The road turned to mud and cars began to get stuck. I was nervous, but having a great time. We were driving a toyota corolla. As we were going through the mud that I would have been nervous in my jeep with the cab driver explained "its ok its a front wheel drive" I asked "have you ever driven in mud before?" He said no, then I tried to explain that he needs to keep momentum or he will get stuck too. He did not listen. I finally arrived at the wrong campsite about 11pm but was happy to finally set up my tent and stay in the horizontal position for a while. When you travel for three days, you quickly remember how important it is. The white nile is beautiful green color, and it is fairly quick moving. (it would be difficult/impossible to kayak back up the flat water sections. I have not been down just yet, I had to move camp, and it took a bit on the boda boda (moped style taxi) I had enough gear we almost tipped over backwards going up a steep hill. (and yes I have a picture) The area is beautiful, with tons of birds. The sound of the water, crickets, and bullfrogs fills the air at night, and it cooled down enough that I had to crawl into my fleece sleepingbag. I am having a great time. The internet is abouth 20min drive away so I will keep you posted. Thanks for your prayers. Jeremy
I am having a great time the river is huge, and it takes quite a bit of skill just to ferry across. The first day after moving my camp was a waste, the trips had left down river and so it was off to bed... too bad it was only around 6pm. I woke up at about 2am and had a hard time trying to get back to sleep. The talk of the town the next morning was about a black man found on the side of the road, that morning. He had been caught stealing last night... it was only a local style burrito.(flatbread and an omlette all rolled up together or 'chapata') But the price was when they found him they poured gasoline on him and lit him on fire. His charred remains were placed beside the road for all to see. The local papers quickly had a headline "justice" it said, with a picture. As you can guess the crime is not too bad here. The traffic is though. Everyone walks on the road here, with bikes and mopeds filled with anything you can imagine, couches, lumber(half trees) banannas, and kayaks in my case. The sun is equally as dangerous, the average burn time seems to be 30-45 min without sunscreen. I brought 1 big tube and a small one... neither of them seem to be doing the trick. I have used spf 30 every day, and have been burned everyday. You cannot purchase sunscreeen here, nor aloe. I wish that I would have brought aloe. The people are extremely friendly, although I am not sure if that is because they just want your money. The children run behind the car, and when you stop they gather around you, but are careful not to get too close. They all seem sick to me, I think that the aids here is around 1-4 have it. On average, about 50 percent of children do not make it to adulthood. They seem to be verry happy though. They are quick to say 'kodehyo musungu' or hello white man. Dont quote me on the spelling, although it could actually mean you look tasty. The average age here is around 37-40. I went down the river today for the first time, although scary, I think that it is much safer than I thought it might be, but that is only the first 4 rapids. The river is broke into two sections. Day 1 and Day 2. Day 2 is worse, although today was impressive. The waves were bigger than I expected. That is saying a lot. 20feet would not be an exaggeration. Luckily those waves are not huge holes to get stuck in. Yesterday I went to the biggest surfing wave that I have ever seen, and had a blast. I took tons of pictures. The light was perfect and I enjoyed the company... oh yeah I met someone that I knew here. She is a pro paddler named debs. It was supposed to be her last day today here, but after last night I dont think that it will be. Apparently late last night she was 'celebrating' her final day, and on her way to bed fell down the stairs. She split her face wide open, and half of her face is severely brused. She went to bed. We were supposed to go kayaking early this morning, and noone showed, when I saw her It was obvious why. She waited to go to the hospitle until this morning where she recieved an IV drip and stitches. No word on wether she has a cuncussion. Oh yeah they also have a kayak ramp here. It is a cement ramp that launches you out over the water, and it is fun. There is a 10 foot drop so if you land flat you are at risk for kinking your back. Food here is great, you can pay from about 30 cents for a local chapata, or get chinese food for about 10 dollars. Fresh fruit is easy to come by and you can get fresh squeezed mango juice for around 10 cents. I am out of time, talk to you all in a couple days. Jeremy
The weather here is still hot, but once the sun drops the temp becomes almost perfect. It gets a bit cold at night, enough to get into a fleece bag at least. It has been raining for about 15 min a day, and harder at night, but then it heats up in the day and drys everything out. I have yet to run the whole river, most people here are not interested. The playboating here is so good most would rather just stay at a great wave for the day. The river is huge, and is difficult to navagate even in the flat water sections. Huge boils and whirlpools threaten to throw you off course and down life threatening rapids. This river is not like regular rivers, as it breaks into channels for the rapids. It is amazing to just watch the power of this river. The white nile is about 3-4 times the size of the colorado in width, and probably 5-7 times the volume. I am hanging out with some irish guys, partly because I can understand what they are saying and partly because they seem sane... unlike a lot of the other people around. The drug scene here is huge. A lot of the guys are doing not just pot, but coke. combine that with drinking from sunup-sunup its not quite my crowd. I was surfing on the back wave the otherday, and jonesing to run some river, and some of the staff asked if I wanted to run Widowmaker rapid. I said yes, the irish boys said no way. So off I went with three other guys that I could not understand. (they all spoke english) The said "fir ga royt n mike ahard lef afder da big ho, den hit harlef pas da bi...." These were my directions. I figured I would just follow them as I couldnt understand them. Well that didnt go so well. As we zig zagged through the rapid, the waves were so big that you quickly lost sight of them. About half way through I saw all 3 stuck in an eddie that had boils and whirlpools the size of a volkswagen beetle. I quickly made the decision not to join them. Ahead was a huge curling wave that could eat a school bus, from there I could see the line. I had to make a hard right onto its back, and keep going right to miss a hole that could swallow a schoolbus vertically. I felt that I was close, but the hole at the bottom caught me. The sheer power of the wave was incredible. All I could do was hold on to my paddle. I was recirculated 5-7 times, every once and a while I would feel myself being thrown through the air, then smack back into the green water. You would think that you might be able to breathe when you fly through the air, but you just dont dare. I remember thinking that I may have to swim out, or I will drown. After enough bashing you arent really sure if you are still in there. I finally felt the wave release me, and had to wait to surface in order to roll. After a couple tries I finally was up, and realized that I was now number 2 in line. Aparently the other guy was in there with me. I never knew it. A lot of people dont run the whole river here due to the amount of channels and the danger involved. Yesterday I went to a wave called malalu. Malalu is a beautiful surf wave that you have to drive 40 min, and through about 5-7 villages to get to. Once there the kids surround the car asking for money, clothing or anything else. We brought empty water bottles. It is amazing how precious things like these are to them. We though a trash bag full of them out, and they were literally fighting for them. There was kicking and fist fighting, and in the end only half of the kids had one. The kids would go down to the river and fill up the bottles with water for drinking. To our surprise they would fill them right next to where they were doing laundry. We would commision two kids to carry each of our boats down to the river for us. The river is about a city block away, and not too hard to get to. We would not pay them until they bring them back up to the top for us. The kids wait around for about 5 hours while we wear ourselves out on the wave. Sure enough, when we get back they will be there waiting for us. The kids are excited to get anything. I paid them 500 shillings each, or 33 cents. That will buy them food and drink in the local village shops. You can buy fresh squeezed mango juice for about 100 shillings. It is not uncommon to see the kids with polio, of other ilnesses. One child I photographed was about 3-4 years old and had his little brother on his back wrapped in a knapsack. His brother was only a few months old. Talk about culture shock. There are spiders everywhere here. Some of the guys in the camp are swollen from infected ones. The spiders range in size from mosquito to some of the bigger ones that are almost dollar bill size, and look poisenous. I found wild aloe vera plants, but they have not swollen due to being the end of the dry season and the start of the rainy season. The aloe grows wild, and plentiful. Also we have seen monkeys and lizards the size of crocodiles. 6-7 feet long. This is truly a wild place. One of the staff had a green mamba crawl into bed with him. He did not sleep there for a while. I am lucky to have my tent. I am religious to keep it closed. There is no bugs in my tent, and I feel quite safe at that. The internet here is slow at best, a pic would take an hour to download. You will have to see them when I get back. Enjoy the cool weather. Jeremy
Well, I finally made it back. I am currently at my parents house in Salt Lake. The last few days has fun. Sorry to worry everyone, It was not my intention, just the way things worked out, timing wise. For the last few days that I spent in Uganda I decided that I wanted to see some of the sites that I determined that I was not going to have time to kayak. The first was atunda falls. Atunda is actually more of a rapid, and a serious one at that. The raft groups walk around the first half of it and then ask if they want to run the second. You have to zig zag through huge holes to run it. Atunda looked to me more like work than anything. When I run a rapid, the things that I look for are how big the waves are, how fun it looks, and then how dangerous it is in comparison to how fun it looks to do. To me, Atunda was not worth it, but it was beautiful to see. I photographed gigantic holes and when I looked up, there were hundreds of those dollar bill size spiders. It was absolutely amazing. The next day we ran the river to silverback and took boda boda's back to camp. It is always interesting to have two people, and a boat on a small moped. There were a few tourists that had scrapes and bruses from boda boda accidents. Mostly bigger people. I think that is that the small black boda drivers get a huge white girl that shifts her weight, and he cant correct. On another note, I have been eating at a resturaunt called Eden Rock every night. They serve almost anything you want, and special orders are not a problem. I have enjoyed steak and mash potatoes for around $5.00 every night. Eden Rock is pretty casual, first you pick up the menu, (as in 1 menu) and order what you like. Then you have a seat, and enjoy some satalite tv, good company, and the gecko's enjoying their dinner by the light. Pretty soon the lights go out completely, due to lack of power. This is a regular thing, and the staff brings out candles and lanterns. About an hour to an hour and a half after you order, the food is out to you and delicious. After you finish you walk back to your camsite under the stars and the fireflys, with the sounds of the crickets, frogs, and the river, and fall asleep. The next day we went Malalu (the surf wave) about 2 hours from the campsite, and then to calagala falls. The falls are a good 4 hours drive, and when we arrived it was almost sunset and the light was perfect. These falls are a small 10-15 foot drop, and are runnable. The left side is a monsterous recirculation,(if you went in, you would not come out) and the right side has a line through about 3 feet wide. If you hit your line correctly, the power would shoot you underwater, and you would surface about 30-50 feet downstream. The falls are rated 5+ and I wished that I had brought my boat. I had origionally imagined something larger, but either way I wanted to run them. Maybe next time. Oh by the way, in order to get places you rent a car. (about $20 a day) the car owner drops it off to you at the campsite,(usually 2 hours late) and then waits there until your return. I spent most of my time with a couple of guys from Dublin, and they drove. I had no desire. The car is steering wheel right, drive on left, stick shift, and weave in and out of traffic around people, potholes, chickens, and goats. The falls were fun, and the sunset was incredible. The final day, I spent at a place called the hairy lemon. This tropical island was purchased by a couple that converted it from jungle, to a beautiful paradise. Here there is no tv, no electricity, and cell phone access is one bar from the top of the island. The price is about $20-30 a night with all meals included. This is where I would stay the whole time next time I go. Nile special (a beautiful surf wave) and malalu are a short paddle away. I had a ton of fun here, and was sad to leave. The driver was supposed to pick us up at 4pm, and did not arrive until 7:30, and it was dark. He was picking up 4 people, and arrived in a honda civic 2 door. So we strapped 3 boats, 3 paddles, all the kayaking gear, and 5 people (including the driver) into this thing. (oh and the driver forgot one of our straps that we had left with him, so we only had 1) I arrived back to camp late, but the people at Eden Rock were still happy to make us dinner. I went to sleep and woke up at 5am, packed up, and took another taxi 3 hours to Entebbe. I had not planned to leave until the next day, my flight left at 5am the following day, but I thought I would find out how far I could get. When I arrived, they said you are verry late. I said oh... sorry. They rushed me through customs, and off to nairobi. In Nairobi, they said your flight tomorrow morning is oversold by 60, and the next available flight leaves at 7pm tomorrow... it was 10am. So I headed over to south african airlines to find out what they had, they put me on after working on my ID90 ticket for 2 hours.(dont ask me why) They told me that they did not have time to get my bag, and that I needed to claim it in Johannusberg, tomorrow afternoon. I had about a 10 min connection in Johannusberg, and a 22 hour flight to atlanta. (so much for my bag) After a 42 hour travel time (campsite to bedroom) I was exhausted. I had an amazing trip, and would love to go back. Thanks again for all your prayers, and support. Jeremy
