White Water Rafting... Of Death

I'm not really sure how you can follow an experience like the Gorillas, so we spent the next day doing something 'for society'. We visited a school and orphanage set up by a Canadian woman following her visit to Uganda. We we're really expecting the one hour trek up to the orphanage so were woefully under prepared (i.e. no water, wrong shoes etc). The walk was worth it though as we got amazing views out over Lake Bunyonyi:

On arriving at the orphanage we of course realized that it was Sunday - and therefore there was no school today (so no children) and everyone else was at church - doh! The chap who was guiding us (his job is basically to get donations from people)) showed us around the complex and told us that someone had donated the water tank, someone else was donating a medical center. At this point we didn't have the heart to tell him that we were going to donate a few dollars cause we weren't uber rich. He managed to muster up some children though and we spent some time playing with them and doing my favourite trick of recording them on my camera and then playing it back to them. One thing I would mention is that these children badly need clothes, so if anyone has any going spare (there are babies through to teenagers here) that they'd like to post to this school here are the details:

It decided to rain on our way back, but we managed to get shelter in a villagers house (this was a traditional mud hut and the walls were decorated with newspaper). We were basically stared at for the 30 mins we waited for the rain to pass, but I will never forget the lovely little boy who held my hand when he led me down the path towards the house.

So, back at the camp and we tried to stay out of the rain for as long as we could playing Hearts - our new found fun to pass the time.

The next day we packed up and set off back to Nile High Resort in Jinja, quickly stopping at the Equator for a photo session (the obligatory foot in both north and south) and lunch at an AidChild center (another company that you can donate to if you so wish).

By this time in our travels Dave, Jake, Sean and I were extreme experts and getting quite competitive at both 500 and Hearts. At one critical point in a game of 500, Chris slammed the breaks on the truck hard and our hands went flying. We wondered if he'd hit another police car, or perhaps a pedestrian. We saw him get out of the cab, walk around and then get back in. We figured maybe it was just a branch? It wasn't until we reached camp that Chris produced the tiniest kitten you have ever seen! Turns out the car in front of us had hit it and Chris (being the softy that he is) was worried he'd hit it too so had stopped to pick it up. The kitten was promptly named 'Seven' - two of his lives being lost to the car in front and our truck. Seven's back leg as a bit bashed up but otherwise the kitten seemed to be ok considering his ordeal! The manager of the camp, Brenda, took Seven under her wing and it found a lovely new home with her at the camp. The only issue was that it's name changed over night to 'Meseven' after Uganda's president whose name means 7 anyway.

Chris had picked up two Talapia fish on our way and after paying someone at the camp to fillet it Dave mixed up a huge batch of beer batter and we had fresh from the Nile fish and sweet potato chips - yum yum! Talapia is an amazingly tasty fish and this was possibly one of the best meals with this group (and that's saying something because so far we've eaten very well indeed!).

We had booked in to do White Water Rafting through the grade 5 rapids of the Nile whilst here in Jinja and so at 9am the next day we donned helmets and life jackets, grabbed our paddles and off we went. We were in two rafts. In the morning we were joined by two people who were doing a half day. But they (and the second boat) left us at lunchtime and only Dave, Jake, Sean and I continued on for the full day.

Our first rapid was just a wee introduction - nothing too serious.

The second rapid was jumping in at the deep end - as Cam our Kiwi guide basically flipped the raft and in we all went. I swallowed about 2 gallons of Nile water as the rapids threw me around until I finally surfaced and Sean ended up ages down the river with Dave. We had been told to 'hold on' but that really wasn't going to happen!

We negotiated a couple more rapids (all aptly named by Cam as 'something rapid of death') without loosing anyone and stopped for lunch on 'lunch island of death'. We were starving and also happily surprised to see cheddar cheese!!! We scoffed as much down as we could and Cam was keen to get going.

So just the 4 of us and Cam we set off again. We had a few big pools to row through this time, so we took it steady and paddled on. Our first up rapid was basically a waterfall - and this is where my screaming came into it's own (you can tell how loud this was by the photo and people in the boat knew we'd hit water when the screaming stopped).

I was being a bit of a chicken to be honest and not wanting to sit up front. This is where Cam told me that I was going to 'Ride the Bull'. I had to sit on the front and all the boys were in the back. Oh dear me. I went so high in the sky that I was only touching the boat with the hands that were holding onto the rope! It was so much fun! Unfortunately we seemed to lose Sean though and he fell out the side of the boat (god knows how!).

We then had to get out of the boat on the bank as it had to be taken past the top of the worst part of the next rapid (Grade 6 and too dangerous). Since we weren't wearing shoes this was the most painful experience ever as we walked across the burning sand and rocks trying to rush into shade before our feet burned. I was glad to get into the raft!

The last rapid was called '50/50' as normally 50% of the people fall out and 50% stay in. Sean managed to defy all the odds by making this actually 25/75 - yes, he fell out again. Well done Sean! :) (Ok, so in his defence look at the second pic here and the way the boat fell - Sean is the figure already submerged, he never really had a chance!!)

We finished the day with kebabs, chapatti and beers - hooray! My first experience white water rafting on what is said to be the second best run in the world. I'm pretty sure that any other rapids I encounter just won't cut the mustard. But what a day it was - bloody brilliant!

We managed to get horrendously drunk that night with Cam and his girlfriend, Krissie, who turned out to be the sister of someone from Sean's year at school. He and Krissie were in band together - go figure! It was a great night, even if Sean did swear rather too loudly and often at the TV as Chelsea beat Manchester Utd and the drinking card game 'higher/lower, red/black, picture/non-picture' really made things messy! We were all super pleased for the day off the next day where we literally just nursed our hang-overs and played countless games of 500.

And so we say goodbye to Uganda and head next back into Kenya. It's a shame we weren't here longer, but I felt we packed so much into it that we at least did our time here proud. I have thought of my friend Jackie all the time we have been here (she spent months out here on her own year's travel) and can't wait to speak with her again about exactly where she travelled - it all makes so much more sense if you've been there too!

Here are the photos:

BT50_Jinja 28 Feb - 3 Mar 2011