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!
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