It took 28 hours of bus travel to get from Arusha to Kampala. 28 hours which oscillated between hot and dusty and freezing and dark. As I was officially welcomed to the 'Pearl of Africa' by the charming immigration officer at the border, I couldn't help but noticing the headlines on the Daily Monitor: 'Ebola Strikes Again.' Great timing. Ebola is another comedy death that I don't want to die. So I won't be doing any baby-kissing in the villages.
Mountain gorillas are one of the great attractions of this part of Africa. You can get up close and personal with our primate nearest and dearest in Uganda and Rwanda, an experience which is reportedly deeply moving. According to my clearly dated guidebook, the cheapest place for a gorilla rush is the Democratic Republic of Congo. Of course, this was the option that I was most keen to pursue. Imagine, a whole lifetime of being able to say, 'Yes, when I was in the Congo...' and 'I think the DRC has changed a whole lot since my day. It was a bit dicey back then.' Alas, the rebels have become too rebellious even for the tourist operators and the DRC gorilla doors are shut to foreigners.
Hoping for a significant evolutionary encounter, I decided to suss out the gorilla options here in Uganda. Gorillas in the mist? More like Grillers of the Fist! It costs US$540 for a one-day permit to see the mountain gorillas, a permit which allows for one hour spent with hairy ones. So I've passed on the Greatest of the Great Apes. I've experienced enough sub-human hairy ape types in my day.
Next stop: Murchison Falls, north west of Kampala and home, possibly, to some chimps.
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4 comments:
Trying to come up with some kind of genial, by-the-way comment in response to your blogdom all I can summon is a lame little "wow". Meanwhile I am starting to plan an hourly breakdown of my massage and chilli tour of Thailand (minus 2.5 weeks.)
massage and chilli: hurrah!
sir spamolot: blah!
Bonjorno, unemployed-at-last.blogspot.com!
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