In which we make an expotition into Uganda and see lions

Last weekend we again hired Jacques, and drove from Kigali north to western Uganda and the Queen Elizabeth National Park.  The border to Uganda is only 1.5 hours from here, we crossed at Gatuna in Rwanda entering into Katuna in Uganda.  The frontier crossing was an adventure in itself.  Jacques had to go into 4 different offices to get approval to bring the car through, the approval comes in the form of a white slip of paper about 1 inch by 1 inch on which someone wrote in hand, "gate pass."  We had to stand in lines to do exit forms for Rwanda and then entry forms for Uganda which included getting photographed and fingerprinted and visa purchase.  There was a mass of people, trucks and buses and seemingly very little organization in the whole operation.  Before we arrived Saadya was wondering how they handle the switch from right hand side driving to left hand side driving and the answer is...with no clear instructions and often with the road being blocked as trucks and cars all try to make the switch in both directions simultaneously.  The entire affair took us about an hour but with visas in hand we headed into Uganda.

The drive was long, we left Kigali around 9:00am and arrived into the outskirts of the park in the early evening as a big storm approached. At the entry to the park we were greeted by some vervet monkeys crossing the road. Further along, we found our first elephants. 

Elephants and yes, a rainbow

Our initial plan had been to camp but with the storm looking menacing we enquired about lodgings at Mweya Safari Lodge, somehow we couldn't fork over the $600 per night for lodging (we are just not that type of safari family) and we made our way to the campsite setting up our tents by the light of the car.   The campsites at the park were not as pretty as at Akagera and we were sad that we couldn't just travel into the park and set up camp anywhere.  Our night's sleep, once again was serenaded by the sounds of hippos, hyenas and this time...lions!

On awakening we noticed the weavers in a bush near our tests and we had our first campsite visitors, marabou and warthogs. 

Weaver with a nest

Good morning warthog, aren't you handsome today

Marabou from the backside at our campsite, from the front you see his black raincoat

Nava describes marabou as looking like guys in black raincoats who seem to be dressed for the wrong party.  From seeing them at the tops of trees and up close, I'm now pretty sure that it is marabou who have the "Whacha wanna do" conversation in the movie Jungle Book and not vultures who appear much, much more intelligent.  After packing up for the day we went to the park office to get our passes and camping permit.  The grounds of the office were right in the wandering path of a group of mongoose who seemed to be hoping for a treat. 

Banded Mongoose

While at the office, I bought Saadya a true safari hat, I think he looks great in it.

Saadya reading at the camp site in his new safari hat

Queen Elizabeth Park (QEP) has an incredible number of birds (more species than in the entire UK I read somewhere) and other animals.  Our list of wildlife spotted increased on this trip and included elephant, banded mongoose, warthog, hippo, Nile crocodile, African buffalo, Ugandan kob, waterbuck, chimpanzees, black and white colobus and vervet monkeys, baron lizard, fruit bat, and many birds like the coucal, palm nut vulture, long crested eagle, fish eagle and Egyptian goose.  The park is bordered to the west by the Rwenzhori Mountains and the Congo which make a beautiful back drop, and look very tempting as a hiking location.  Lake George marks the north of the park and Lake Edward marks the south.  We camped near the Kizinga channel that connects the two lakes.

Our first day we drove off to the track that runs through the crater area.  These craters were formed by volcanic explosions and create a really beautiful landscape. 

Crater in QEP

There is not much wildlife viewing up near the craters but on the way we did have to stop for an elephant Xing.

Elephant crossing

Safari girls

We lunched at the overpriced Mweya Lodge and then, in the afternoon we took the boat ride on the Kizinga channel which offered a different view of animals and many amazing shorebirds. 

Elephants having an afternoon swim

Hippos

We returned to our campsite, as Nava was gathering wood and straw for our fire, we heard a noise and looked up to see an elephant approaching.  Patricia quickly called Nava into the rain shelter and the elephant sauntered through the campsite disturbing only the brush but leaving our tentsite intact.  That night we were awoken by a very loud hyena paying his visit to us, Jacques got up to look at him and told us in the morning that he was not only loud but pretty large.

Our second day of driving was a quest to find some lions.  We had heard that people were seeing a pride not too far from us and drove off hopeful.  After a couple of hours of driving, getting lost and looking we were almost ready to give up.  The park ranger who we asked encouraged us to go to the "mating grounds" where he just saw 9 lions.  We drove up there and noticed quite a bit of freshly killed kob but couldn't find the lions.  We circled the mating grounds 2-3 times, and then, suddenly we spotted them resting under some trees and recovering from their feast.  The kings and queens of the savannah.  Seeing any of these animals in the wild is amazing but seeing a lion in the wild really left me totally awestruck.

Lion, he was panting and exhausted from the hard work of eating his Kob

After two nights in tents, we treated ourselves to an evening at a lodge driving up to the ridge in Kichwimba and staying at the Kingfisher Lodge.  From the lodge we had views of the park and with binoculars could even see herds of elephant. 

View from Kingfisher Lodge

We had dinner at the overlook and enjoyed a relaxing evening.  In the morning, Patricia and Jacques set off to track chimpanzees in the Kyambura Gorge while Nava enjoyed the swimming pool and Saadya and I read. 

Kingfisher Lodge had 3 pools and 2 cool water slides

From Patricia's report, they gorge was also beautiful and really different from any other terrain we saw.  Although many people track and see nothing, they found the chimpanzees and were treated to quite a show including a teenage chimp showing off his swinging abilities.  Doesn't matter your species, teenagers always steal the show. 

In the afternoon we drove back to Kigali knowing that this was probably our last BIG family adventure of the trip, as we now enter the final month of our stay in Rwanda.