We have been able to take a few vacations since we have been here. We took two mini ones to lakes nearby and a week-long vacation that took us all over the east and central regions of Uganda.
Our first sightseeing adventure took us to Lake Mburo. It's about an hour away from Mbarara and is known for being one of the only places in Uganda that has zebras. It also has a lot of hippos, antelopes, warthogs and things of that nature. No elephants or giraffes, though. The same friend that took us from Kampala to Mbarara took us to the lake and also took on the role of safari guide. Haha, and by safari guide, I mean a man who zoomed down the roads, blared music, and didn’t know where to go or anything about the animals. But it was a really good time and a proper guide wasn’t really necessary. We decided to go on a water safari to see the hippos, and the friend that was driving was not a big fan. He has seen one too many people with missing limbs from hippo attacks and was not thrilled to be only 15 feet away from the beast. And he might not have been able to swim, I can't remember. But we survived, all limbs intact, and got to see lots of hippos.
We took another weekend adventure a week or so later to Lake Bunyonyi, which was 3.5 hours west of where we stay. And well worth the drive! Is was GORGEOUS. It is like the Venice of Uganda. There are 11 small islands within the lake and massive, lush hills all around. We got to see a little nub of Rwanda poking up into the sky.
This is a picture of Punishment Island...dadadum...
it was were unmarried pregnant women were sent. All that is there is that one small tree in the center. Many of the women died of either starvation or trying to swim to the other islands. This was also the hot spot for bride shopping. If a man was feeling lonely, or needed a wife to cook for him, he would just go to Punishment Island and claim one. Insta-wife.
And here is how most of the landscape on and around the islands looked:
We went to Bunyonyi saying it would be a beautiful backdrop to a long weekend of typing transcriptions. Beautiful it was, but typing wasn't what we ended up doing. There was an outland group staying at the same lodge that was full of Australians. Ridiculous Australians. So we spent the whole night hanging out with them and the whole rest of the next morning with a bit of a headache. It was fun and we got a few good stories out of it too. And fate would have it that we would cross paths with the same outlanders a week later rafting the Nile.
And now the good stuff-our week long vacay! It was pretty stressful trying to plan it with the other girls in Gulu and trying to please everyone. Location, activities, timing, etc. is hard to plan through text messaging. We were planning it right up until the day we left. But I'm really happy with the way things worked out. Because we were traveling all of the country, we rented a van + driver to tote us around.
Kara dubbed it the grasshopper
1) because of its color 2) because we bought fried grasshoppers for the first time while we were in the van and 3) because an hour after we had those fried grasshoppers, Kara pucked them up all along side the van. So the name is very fitting and stuck.
On the right is a picture of Kara and a grasshopper...if she only knew...
The very first day we left, the driver-Kakuure-I guess didn't get much sleep and had to keep pulling over to stretch every hour. Me, loving to drive and really wanting to do it on the opposite side of the road, volunteered to relieve him of what we were paying him to do...drive. Besides hitting every pothole possible (and I remind you, this is Uganda. Street maintenance is not a priority) the ride went pretty smoothly.
We spent the night in the capital city and headed out bright and early the next day to Jinja. Some fun trivia: Jinja is the source of the Nile...who would of thought it was in Uganda?! So not only did I get to go to the source, I also got to raft one of the top rivers in the world!! And what a good time! It was just three of us girls in the boat with an Aussi guide and an oar rig. Lily and I flew out on one of the first big rapids. I had never been recirculated in a hole before and got to experience that. My shoulder got dislocated through it all and was stuck out of place for what seemed like a good minute or two. But since that has been happening for the past three years now, it was more unpleasant and annoying that I couldn't really paddle for the rest of the trip than anything else.
So if the thrill of that wasn't enough, seeing where we were staying that night put me over the top. It was the most beautiful place I have ever seen. I giant tent, on a cliff, overlooking the Nile. Gorgeous.
Our next stop in Jinja was horseback riding along the river bank. 
And this was no head-to-tail trail riding. We rode retired Kenyan racehorse that hadn't lost their passion for speed! My horse was Ghost, and I think I fell in love that day. I have never gone so fast on a horse, and I absolutely loved it. One of the best parts was chatting with our guide. She is a Kiwi that has been in Africa for 15 plus years. She started as a safari guide, then became the first woman to raft the entire Nile (she's got her own National Geographic documentary!), and now buys Kenyan racehorses while she lives on the bank of the Nile. I got a few names from her of people that might be looking to hire a crazy American girl when she gets done with school. I slightly envied her life, I'm not gonna lie. She was pretty great.
There was a bit of a tragedy, though, during this horse ride. Kara's stirrup leather broke, mid-canter, and she ended up toppling off her horse and into a ditch. Being her extreme self, she just needed a minute to crawl out of the ditch and she hopped right back on the horse to finish the ride. Her hand and shoulder got pretty beat up, and we decided a visit to the hospital for a xray wouldn't hurt. Turns out she chipped two of her hand bones and she would be left with a blow glove as a hand for the next few weeks.
After Jinja, we headed to Sipi Falls in the Eastern side of Uganda. We stayed here for three days, and again, I was blown away by the beauty of nature. We were the only people at this place and got to enjoy the view of the waterfall right outside our window all to ourselves. Kara and I hiked up to a 100ft waterfall and played in its pools the first day we got there. Here is the top of it:
And here is the bottom:
Again, gorgeous.
The next day Lily,Lindsay, and I went to check out another waterfall that was maybe an hours hike away. This one was an even bigger and better adventure. We had no idea where we were going and hiked through banana plantations, along boulders of the river bed, up hills of cabbage patches, and finally made it.
Sipi was by far my favorite place we visited. Truely perfect and picturesque.
Next on our list was Ssese Island. This is one of the many islands in Lake Victoria, and I had pictured in my head a tropical paradise. Julia had visited this place last summer and loved it. There were beaches, dogs, BBQ, bonfires, etc. But when we got there the place we stayed was under construction and the accomidations weren't like the rest of our trip. The dog had some fungus growing all over them, and the beaches were full of snails that carried the schisto parasite. But this is where we all meet up again and so it was nice that we all got to enjoy each other one final time.
We saw Julia (the supervisor for the first month) off and headed back to Mbarara with Tesfa (the new supervisor).
All in all, it was a great, great vacation and I enjoyed the week off. Uganda is quite a beautiful place! Hopefully next weekend-our last weekend in Mbarara (!) we will travel to Fort Portal in the Western part.
Time is running out for my summer and I plan on making the most of what is left!
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