Filming Roses story and updating everything took me a few days in Kampala. All this time I could stay at Grants place. A friend I met while climbing the Nyaragongo volcano in DRC a while back. He’s also a motorcyclist, a great man with even greater stories that we always share with some good food and a few cold beers. Well, a few is maybe an understatement. When I talk to him I see that he also wants to do a great motorcycle adventure. In fact, he already made a big decision towards such an adventure.
Kampala was also the opportunity to catch up with some old colleagues and friends. I leave Grants comfortable house with some hesitation, but I’ve been far too long in the same place. I’m starting to feel restless and that means that the road is calling. I leave in the late afternoon, just before rush hour.
I reach Jinja just before sundown, after being soaked to my socks by an unexpected shower. The roads between Kampala and Jinja were clearly also not prepared for this kind of weather. At some points it’s just impossible to see where the drain should be and where the road. One truck clearly also didn’t see it and ended up sideways, creating an even bigger stream. I stay for the night in Jinja, a nice place where the Nile joins Lake Victoria, which is famous for its wild water rafting.
The Nile joins Lake Victoria, but doesn’t it end in the Mediterranean sea? Even in Rwanda they claim to have the source of the Nile. It’s still all a mystery to me and when the day comes that time is not an issue to me, I will definitely read on Wikipedia about this.
Next morning I’m heading to Mbale, in the east of Uganda, close to mount Elgon and close to Kenya. Before I leave Jinja, I go into town to buy a few bolts. Kermit, the name of my motorcycle, has lost some bolt along the way (all credit goes to the Ugandan infrastructure!).
A guy who I address myself to, asking for directions, says he can show me. It’s next to his brothers’ shop. So I give the man a ride. His name is Edrin and he works in his brothers fishing gear shop. The bolts shop is just next to his store. Edrin sells life jackets, ropes, nets and… more ropes. He knows lake victoria inside out but he doesn’t want to become a fisherman. “ Life is to hard for them” he tells me. I leave him and his brother to sell their ropes. I head for Mbale. After a while I see the mighty mount Elgon rising from the horizon.
I have a small lunch for a small price in Mbale, just the equivalent of two euros and I’m again amazed by African ingenuity (see picture below):
WILDTRIPPING 