Masindi - Rweteera - Kibale Forest NP - Bigodi Wetland - Home

Christmas Eve found us leaving Masindi for our next destination of Rweteera Safari Camp south of Fort Portal in the tea-growing district adjacent to Kibale Forest National Park.

The drive was about 270 km and took 7 hours.  The whole way - bar a kilometer or two - was on gravel - and not good gravel!  Jenny’s phone has a step counter to keep track of her get-fit walks around Hamilton.   Without getting out of the car the counter was over 20,000 steps - giving you an indication of the bumpiness of the roads.  The only good thing was the fact that the road crews had knocked off for a couple of days otherwise we would have had graders and other work vehicles to contend with as well. 

Despite the conditions we noted that some some Ugandan drivers refused to modify their behaviour and continued to astonish us with their foolhardiness and lack of concern for fellow drivers, bicyclists and pedestrians.  Once I came to a dead stop amongst several chaps on bicycles while a truck careened, half out of control, around a bend narrowly missing us all.  Needless to say we paid little attention to the scenery or birds as we travelled.  One thing we couldn’t help noticing was that every village had butchers doing a roaring trade.  It was a bit disconcerting to see large numbers of customers waiting while the carcasses were being chopped up with axes though.  

We arrived at the camp in the early afternoon covered in sweat and red dust and the lake looked very inviting.  We settled for a shower and a beer.

Butchers were doing a roaring trade in every village on Christmas Eve.

This region is high altitude, cool and has crater lakes and rainforest - very similar to the Atherton Tablelands of Queensland in many ways.  Most of the cleared areas are planted to tea or eucalyptus forests with typical African food gardens in between.  Unlike the cane fields around Masindi it is highly picturesque.  Rweteera Safari Camp is set on one of the small lakes and is very leafy and pleasant.  It has tents and bandas as well as self-camping.  We stayed in a nice banda.  It was a bit of a shmozzle with some interesting food, a broken drinks fridge and no internet (despite the sign saying they had it) but the staff were lovely and the place had so many good birds.  Christmas Day lunch was spaghetti Napolitana and dinner was pumpkin soup then chicken in white sauce with rosemary potatoes and mixed vegetables finishing with fruit salad - washed down with a Nile Special beer.

African Blue Flycatcher

African Dusky Flycatcher

Red-billed Firefinch

Red-headed Bluebill

Woolly-necked Stork

Copper Sunbird

View across tea plantations to Rwenzori Mountains

Rainforest-clad hills of Kibale Forest National Park

Always entertaining Black-and-white-casqued Hornbills

Rweteera Safari Park

Village Weaver

African Harrier-Hawk

Malachite Kingfisher (photo by Jenny)

Kibale Forest National Park is a large reserve of tropical rainforest nearby with a huge bird list.  Apart from driving through the park on the main local road we didn’t visit it.  On this occasion we decided to not spend the large amount of money to enter the park and then extra to do a bird walk (you can’t bird on your own).  Instead we did a guided walk around the lake with the camp's guide.  He was a bit fuzzy on some of the birds but he took us into farmland and the tea-plantations that we wouldn’t have ventured into on our own so we ended up having a great walk and seeing some good birds.

On Boxing Day we were up early to head to the Bigodi Wetlands for another guided walk.  This is an initiative of the locals and takes visitors on a 2-3 hour walk through rainforest remnants, a papyrus swamp, farms and eucalyptus woodlots.  Our guide was James and he was excellent.  He was so enthusiastic and made sure we saw many of the monkey species (5 of the 8) and over 50 species of birds.  We did the track in 4 1/2 hours and the cost was a tiny fraction of the cost of a similar walk in the national park.  The money supports local activities such as schools, medical facilities, training etc. so it is hard to justify the national park fees.  Maybe next time we will venture into the park.

Today we left after a leisurely breakfast and had a relatively stress free and 99% bitumen drive home which took just under 5 hours.  Our askari Richard was so pleased to see us.  He surprised us by introducing us to his wife and 2 year old daughter - we didn’t know he had either!  We do know his family live a long way away so maybe he used the Christmas bonus we gave him to bring his wife and daughter here for a visit.

Olive Baboons raiding a maize field

Yellow-billed Barbet checking out a potential nest site

Guereza Black-and-white Colobus

Eastern Red Colobus

Snow-crowned Robin-Chat

Blue-headed Tree Agama

Grey Heron basking in the late-afternoon sun

A few bird facts for the week away.  202 species identified.  40 lifers for me.  71 new additions to my Uganda list.

Now we will relax here at home for a while planning the next trip - maybe to Jinja where the Nile flows out of Lake Victoria and to Mount Elgon National Park.

Murchison Falls National Park and Budongo Forest

All of our commitments completed we headed off on Tuesday for our Christmas Safari.  First stop was Murchison Falls National Park where the Nile River flows through a narrow channel for some impressive waterfalls (claimed to be the most powerful in the world).  We arrived at Red Chilli Rest Camp around lunchtime.  First birds inside the park was a pair of Abyssinian Ground Hornbills.  We took a 3 1/2 hour cruise up river to the falls and back.  The guides knew their wildlife and stopped the boat for cliff-nesting Red-throated Bee-eaters, Goliath Herons, African Darters as well as for every Nile Crocodile and Elephant.  I mentioned I was hoping to see Rock Pratincoles and when we got to the falls I was told to keep an eye on one particular rock.  Sure enough a Pratincole turned up quickly and posed nicely.  We have done a few cruises in Africa and elsewhere and rated this one as excellent value for money - Wild Frontiers was the company.

To get to the main game viewing section of the park you have to cross the Nile to the north side.  The first ferry leaves at 0700 and many campers were up early for this.  We were tired from the previous day’s drive so day 2 started with a leisurely breakfast then the 0900 ferry.  We spent 7 hours driving some of the many trails and returned on the 1600 ferry in time for sundowners and an early dinner.


This is the furthest north we have been in Africa and many of the mammals were new to us.  Uganda Kob, Jackson’s Hartebeeste, Oribi, Patas Monkey and Reticulated Giraffe.  No Zebra and only one or two Elephants and Buffalo.  Lots of interesting birds but many familiar species were missing at this visit.

Red Chili camp is low-mid range but perfectly fine.  The tents and banda were clearly oldish and a bit tired but our banda was fine.  It had the advantage of an ensuite so no venturing out in the middle of the night and bumping into the hippo that comes and crops the grass each night.

Cruising on the Nile

One of the 5-6 different boats that run cruises.

Red-throated Bee-eater at its cliff nest hole.

No swimming!

Colobus monkey

Murchison Falls (remember The African Queen?)

Rock Pratincole

Oribi

Uganda Kob (female)

Reticulated Giraffe

Jackson's Hartebeeste

Day three saw us heading on a slow drive out of the park to the nearby regional centre of Masindi.  We arrived at New Court View Hotel at lunchtime.  That afternoon we drove out through extensive sugar cane plantations to the west towards Lake Albert.  The border with the Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda runs down the middle of this lake.  We ran out of time to reach the lake itself but stopped at the top of the escarpment where we could overlook the lake and into the DRC.  Our stopping point coincidentally was the best local spot for Mocking Cliff Chat. I had three lifers at this spot - the Chat, a Western Violet-backed Sunbird and a Black-billed Barbet.

View from Buiiso overlooking Lake Albert and the mountains of the DRC to the west.

Day 4 was exciting.  We had booked a local bird guide - Raymond - to take us into the Budongo Forest along the famous (among birders at least) Royal Mile road.  We collected Raymond nearby at about 0800 and birded the forest for 4 hours.  I added 17 species to my life list and took it past 2000.  I reckon I would have found 5-6 on my own.  Raymond was well worth his fee.  Birders planning to come here should do intensive training to strengthen their neck muscles. Most birds are 30 m up and vertically overhead.

The Albertine Rift is a major region for endemic animals and plants - most notably the Mountain Gorillas of Rwanda, the DRC and Uganda.  There are 41 Albertine Rift endemic bird species and the far west of Uganda is home to 25 of them.  I am clearly hoping to see as many as possible over the coming days and the months ahead.

The Royal Mile, Budongo Forest with some French birders.

In the next post I will report on our long drive to Kibale Forest National Park and our three days in that district.  

For more bird photos see my Flickr album at:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/bukoba_steve/albums/72157676791465850

A depiction of the Albertine Rift (from the top: Lakes Albert, Edward, Kivu and Tanganyika) 

Along the road south of Masindi.

How to solve the carnage on Uganda's roads

With a population of 1.6 times that of Australia, Uganda has a road toll 8.2 times higher.  In 2013, over 10,000 people were killed on the roads here.

My research into comparative national stats has revealed that the situation in Tanzania (where we lived in 2010-11 and drove regularly) is actually worse but I think that the poorer road infrastructure and larger cities there might make up most of this difference - and we rarely drove in the cities there.  Certainly Uganda is the worst country for driving I have experienced.

This graph shows the Uganda and Tanzania road fatality rates on a per 100,000 person and per 100,000 vehicle basis compared to Australia and a range of countries many of us might have visited in our travels.  Basically if you thought India (or China or Thailand) was bad …

After driving for 3 months here in urban Kampala and on the highways leading out of town I have become somewhat used to the chaos and anarchy that tends to rule.  Rarely do we head somewhere in our car without seeing something that makes us gasp in stunned disbelief.  

We have seen coaches full of people forced off the road and trucks that have clearly had head-on collisions with other similar sized vehicles.  Fortunately we have not yet witnessed the accidents as they have happened - just the aftermath.  

The main problem is poorly trained drivers making extremely poor decisions.  If this could be fixed with a wave of a wand all would be well.  That of course is not going to happen overnight.  So what changes could be made quickly that would improve things dramatically?  

My solution is for the traffic police to target trucks.  

Nearly all trucks here - from small delivery vans to huge semi-trailers - are heavily overloaded - and many are clearly unroadworthy based on the smoke pouring out of their exhausts.  The consequence of these two factors is that the trucks crawl along the roads and highways and inevitably have a long stream of other vehicles following with impatient drivers who have poor training and make poor decisions (as previously noted).  This leads to insane overtaking and cutting in and regular accidents - either vehicles forced off the road or head-on collisions.

So my suggestion is to first target illegally overloaded and unroadworthy trucks.  “But this will add to the cost of everything we buy” I hear you say.  Maybe so in the short term but if you can haul less stuff twice as quickly and more reliably there shouldn’t be a cost impact - probably the reverse in fact.  The breakdown and accident rates and the huge costs involved with the road toll would be reduced.  A side benefit would be less pollution from the many smoking, unroadworthy trucks.

Once this is underway and the problem with trucks has become manageable I would get the police to enforce the road laws being flouted regularly by most motorists.  Priorities would be speeding, unroadworthy cars, failing to indicate when required, not using lights in foggy conditions at at night, using mobiles while driving, not using seat belts, failing to give way at intersections etc.  All these laws exist but they are not policed.  Typically we pass regular police roadblocks with numerous cops standing around.  They occasionally stop vehicles - seemingly at random.  They check for licenses and car papers only.  Overloaded and unroadworthy vehicles are routinely sent on their way.  I have seen police cars and motorbikes in traffic ignoring the most outrageous driver behavior.  

So:

1. remove the main cause of frustrations - the trucks that can’t travel at highway speeds because of overloading or unroadworthiness
2. enforce all the laws that exist that are generally ignored by most drivers
3. improve driver training
4. improve road infrastructure and signage so drivers have no excuses.

Why these things are not happening is a mystery to me!

This video is a good illustration of the driving conditions in Kampala.  Our route typically takes us through 4-5 roundabouts just like the one shown here.  It is even worse out on the open roads because of the potential speeds involved.

Entebbe weekend

We decided to have a night in Entebbe.  This is the Lake Victoria town that hosts the Ugandan International Airport.  It was the seat of government in colonial times and is very leafy and still has many luxurious homes.  It is also home to a great birding spot - the Botanical Gardens.  We found a nice little B&B (Serene Guesthouse) and headed down Saturday morning.

The satnav wanted me to head into Kampala and down the main connecting road to Entebbe.  This is to be avoided of course for all the standard reasons you should never drive in Uganda.  I studied Google Earth and found that we could cut across country on gravel roads through villages and avoid 90% of the traffic snarl.  Apart from the heavy overnight rain which muddied many of the gravel roads it was easy and probably quicker than going through Kampala - 90 mins included a short period where we were lost and had to backtrack.  If we have visitors I would take this route to pick them up at the airport rather than traumatise them with the Kampala roads.

We checked into the B&B around noon and headed to the gardens.  These are quite large and slope down to the lake shore.  They must have been magnificent 50 years ago but are now suffering a lack of love and attention.  Some of the trees are spectacular in size and character.

Gnarly buttress.

Hamerkop nest (about 1m across).  Not sure if it is still in use.

Ancient strangler fig.

A walkway with trellis and creeper - how many years since it has been pruned? 

There have been over 300 bird species recorded here and some regularly reported species would be new to me.  Being a Saturday afternoon heading into the festive season the gardens were full of picnicking families and other groups.  It is apparently mandatory that any group has a huge speaker system powered by a portable generator.  The speakers are invariably turned up to 11 with full bass and distortion.  The music is either rap or repetitive bongo.






We were continually changing direction to avoid this noise but never really got away from it.  Despite this the birds were active and we saw 55 species in 2 hours.  Orange Weaver was new to me.  We saw a good range of bush, forest and wetland species but decided to pack it in and revisit at 0900 Sunday morning when the gate opened and hopefully before the crowds returned.

Black-headed Heron looking cool.

Western Yellow Wagtail recently arrived from Europe.

Wood Sandpiper

Black-headed Heron - bathing (not so cool looking)

The B&B was very nice and quiet with a lovely garden full of birds and monkeys.  For dinner we walked 10 mins to an Indian restaurant (called Faze 3) and had chicken or prawn curries with rice, nan bread and wine.  Breakfast was simple but tasty with fresh fruit, yoghurt, coffee toast and eggs.  We gave the manager a lift into Kampala and she told us how mistreated she and the other staff were by the owners  - so I guess we won't stay there next time!





Unfortunately it bucketed down in the morning so we headed into Kampala for supplies before going home.  We plan to revisit for a couple of nights in January for more birding and nice meals.

unstated.palace.flexed

We have had ongoing power problems here at home.  Beginning last Saturday morning we have had a week with only 1 1/2 days of power.  Initially we assumed it was affecting everyone in our area but by Thursday we decided it was mostly us.  So Friday we contacted UMEME (the state owned power company).

The biggest hurdle we had was explaining to UMEME where we lived.  There are no street names here away from the roads connecting major towns.  There are no house numbers.  Everything is surveyed of course for legal purposes so we have a village name and a plot number - we just don't know what they are.

In my conversations with the UMEME folk over Twitter I sent them a lat/long (0.326788N, 32.444584E in case you were wondering).  Then I sent them a screen capture of the location in Google Earth.  Twice after this we had technicians asking on the phone where we lived.  Finally I gave them our landlord's phone number and he must have been able to direct them because at 9 pm last night the power flickered then came back on - it is still on as of Saturday afternoon.  Our fridge has beer and meat again!

Some clever folk have come up with a system for situations like this: what3words gives every location on earth (each 3m x 3m square) a unique 3 word address.  The middle of our compound is unstated.palace.flexed (or maoni.kufuga.miwani in Kiswahili).  The what3words app could be on every UMEME computer and technicians smartphone.  This problem would be solved.  Yes they could do the same thing with their phone GPS apps but giving a lat/long over the phone and expecting it to be accurately recorded and plugged into the app is asking a lot.  An incorrect digit could put you in another country.  Three clear words is a neat, less error-prone system.

So when you come to visit just remember to knock on the gate at unstated.palace.flexed.  With luck the lights will be on when you arrive.

The courtyard garden at unstated.palace.flexed.  Note the two trees and the birdbath (so far unsullied by birds).

Jenny shopping at height.speech.acted - Mama Goreti's shop, our corner store..

Driving licenses and shopping

Uganda (like Australia I hasten to add) prefers visitors who stay for a while to get national drivers licenses.  We were told by colleagues soon after we arrived that this was a requirement within 3 months of arrival.  We arrived less than 2 months ago so hadn’t got around to this yet.  

Last Wednesday we were stopped at the police checkpoint on the highway near our house turnoff.  The traffic policeman asked to see my license so I handed him my Victorian one.  “How long have you been in Uganda?” he asked.  “ A few weeks” I replied.  Other questions followed regarding the ownership of our car and where we lived.  I don’t think he believed us when we told hem we lived a few blocks away in semi-rural Buloba.  He let us go with a warning that to be a safe driver I must get a local license as soon as possible.  I asked him how to do this as I’d heard it was complicated.  He admitted he didn’t know!

So today (Friday) I risked another year off my life and ventured into Kampala in search of a license.  One of the most important people working for School for Life here is Bosco.  Bosco knows pretty much how everything works here and he has been so helpful to us.  He found our house, sorted out our temporary accommodation and supervised our purchase of the car (which is going well - touch wood).  Bosco wasn’t sure how to get licenses for us either but off we went with him to the issuing office.

The first chap we spoke to told us we couldn’t get a license because we didn’t have work permits.  He said we could only drive on our Australian licenses for three months (this would take us to the end of December only).  We have 6 month business visas so don’t qualify for a license.  At this stage I was thinking we can’t manage without driving so we’d have to abandon our stay here.  We persuaded him to bump it up to a more senior staffer.  She contradicted everything we’d been led to believe by saying that we could keep using our Australian licences while our visas were current and to tell any police that challenged us that this was the case.

So, we will continue to operate as we have been to date.  We keep laminated copies of our licenses, passports and visas in the car at all times.  Hopefully any future encounters with the police will be smooth.

On the whole it was a highly successful trip into the city today.  Apart from saving 120,000 shillings ($44) on the license thing we had a long shopping list and managed to get nearly everything on it.  Food items for westerners can be a bit hard to find out here in the regions so we stocked up on crunchy peanut butter, chicken breast fillets, beef mince and nice bread.  Our local supermarket has the basics but does not yet cater fully for the only wazungu in the village.

<<< UPDATE:  Our electricity went off in the wee hours of Saturday morning and didn't come back on until 0630 Monday morning.  Our meat has been thrown out.  >>>

Our local supermarket (occupies less than half of this building).

The drive in was ridiculously easy for some unknown reason.  I think I only cursed a couple of times.  We left to come home in pouring rain which meant the motorbikes and pedestrians were mostly off the roads and it was also fairly easy - and with minimal profanity.

Lake Mburo National Park

Jenny checked my stress levels and decided I needed a couple of days of relaxation in the bush.  The closest national park to us is Lake Mburo to the south-west.  It’s about 220 km on the best highway in the country but for various reasons it still took over 4 hours to get there on Saturday morning.  Lots of slow trucks and small towns every few km.  Still we were in our luxury safari lodge - http://mihingo-lodge.com - in time for a great lunch with home-made bread and real coffee.  We had stayed here in October 2010 while living in nearby Bukoba, Tanzania and it was as lovely as we had remembered.  We were welcomed to our tent by a beautiful Spotted Green Bush Snake, were entertained by the calls of owls, nightjars and raucus Rock Hyrax each night and a scorpion visited the loo for a while.

We drove the various tracks on Saturday afternoon, all day Sunday and for a few hours on Monday.  Entry to the park in $40 US per head per day plus extra for the car.  Quite expensive for expats.  Why don’t we charge foreign tourists to enter our parks in Australia?  It is hard to see that much of the money gets spent in the park as the roads would not have seen a grader since we were last here and other infrastructure is in poor repair.  The park itself is in great condition however with recent rain greening everything up.  They have introduced giraffes to try to keep on top of the thickening acacia woodland but we didn’t see them.  A few elephants might be a better idea.  

Of course I was after a big bird list and wasn’t disappointed with the 115 species we saw (another 2 were heard (Black-shouldered Nightjar and African Wood Owl).  We didn’t go on the lake boat tour so missed out on 20 or so wetland birds.

I saw 4 new species: Rüppell’s Vulture, Jacobin Cuckoo, Tree Pipit and Striped Pipit.  This latter species was most unexpected as all the field guides I had access to said it was not found in Uganda.  However the species was recorded in Lake Mburo NP in 2011 and 2013.  ‘My’ two birds were first noticed on the thatched roof of the dining room of the lodge on the Sunday morning.  They flew down to the natural rocky area adjacent to the swimming pool.  I had never seen a heavily streaked Pipit with yellowish wing edging before so knew I had something new.  On Sunday evening I hadn’t seen them but played a call on the Birds of East Africa app and one turned up on the rocks immediately and allowed me to get some decent photographs.

My stress levels are now reduced and I’m sure I will be fine until we can get away again for an extended trip in the second half of December when the holidays start.  The only issue is choosing where to go.  In the meantime we have plenty of work to do and things to buy for our house.  I fear more trips into Kampala!

See photos at www.flickr.com/photos/bukoba_steve/albums/72157675063745602

We have moved!

We have finally moved into our house (Wednesday 2nd November).  Our landlord Mr Stanley told us he would be at the house on Sat afternoon or Sunday and would be in touch to let us know.  He had previously told us the house would be ready for us to move in on the Friday.  We didn’t hear from him so popped in for a while on Saturday.  The promised clean-up had not occurred and the kitchen bench had a chicken on it.  Building materials were scattered in several rooms.  We decided the only way we were ever moving in was for us to do the cleaning.  So Sunday we spent most of the day clearing stuff out, sweeping, washing, scrubbing etc.  It’s not done yet but we made a great improvement.  We finally heard from him on Tuesday afternoon and he gave us the go-ahead to move in.

Jenny sorting out where things go in the kitchen.

Kitchen cupboard and one of our two chairs. 

Lounge-room looking towards kitchen and hall. 

Hall with two bedrooms and bathroom.

The chook was not staying.

This morning we checked out of the hotel after 25 nights and moved into the house.  Assembling the bed was a challenge that required a visit to a hardware store for hammer and nails.  It is now sturdy but not sure how we will get the nails out to ever move it.  Our new cooker inexplicably came with a plug not compatible with Ugandan sockets so we will need to source an adapter before we can use it.  We'll buy a fridge on the weekend and look for a table, some comfy chairs and a couple of floor mats.

On Friday we had a day in Kampala.  Jenny had an appointment with some educators at a posh school for rich folk in the afternoon.  Earlier we hit a department store and bought some essential household items - from a small stove to toilet paper and lots in between.

Our friend from Bukoba - David Jackson - works at the posh school and we had lunch with him then a tour of the school.  It was great to catch up with David again and meet his 6 week old baby daughter!  After Jenny’s meeting we checked into the Red Chilli Hideaway and met up with a work colleague Martin and his wife Chaz.  They are on a 3 month holiday in Tanzania, Rwanda, Uganda and Ethiopia.  We chatted for hours with pizza for dinner.

No active birding of late but I did manage to add a couple of new species Grey Parrot and Black Bishop.  The first bird seen inside the house compound was a Sooty Chat.

Our bedroom (now has a 4-poster bed with mozzy net).

L-shaped bathroom.

Shower (note hot water heater!!).

Wardrobes (or woodrops as some house adverts would have it).  Note the height of the rails - beyond our reach).