A blog full of trite adjectives, by Damian Rositch

Had a wonderful weekend in Nairobi, more exploring. The city center is bustling with weekend markets and busy shoppers. A great change compared to the sidewalk-less, matatu pollution, garbage everywhere up by where we live. Having a lazy sunday-fixed our patio garden, made some candies....and took pictures of our flat!

Last weekend (Saturday to Tuesday, as Tuesday was a Kenyan Holiday-=Jomo Kenyatta Day):
Uganda was incredible. It is very much a tropical rain forest especially in comparison to Nairobi.
We took a bus there all day saturday. Left at 7am and arrived in Jinja at 6 pm. We then went to bujagali where we stayed in a campground/bandas(small rooms) accommodation which dropped off a hill and overlooked the Nile. It was majestic. There was a nice restaurant and bar so we ate dinner (all 11 of us) and topped the night off at the bar. On Sunday we got up and headed back down to Jinja where the rafting starts. We then rafted 30 km on the Nile (10am - 5pm). Through a bunch of class 3, 4, and 5 rapids that were intense...and ended the day off with an accidental run down a class 6 which absolutely annihilated our boat and sent us all flying everywhere. We flipped the raft over on 3 different occasions going through the class 5 rapids. It was amazing. Walls of water would simply destroy the boat and send us all over. We actually will be getting a DVD of the trip soon. The Nile is pretty cool b/c it is so deep and so large that even though there are sick rapids, you don't have to worry much about being flipped out into a rock. You simply get flipped out and then sent through a "washing machine" type rapid and you eventually pop up thanks to your life vest. There were some lull type stretches with small class 1/2 rapids and Anne and I decided to just hop off the raft and float through them, which was pretty cool. The day was gorgeous, warm and sunny, but not intensely hot. The Nile was excellent, mildly warm, yet refreshing. Anyways, after we floated in just our life vests for about 45 minutes, the guide had us get back into the boat b/c in about another 1Km was a region prone to crocodiles. So, no worries, we kindly hopped back in the boat. Lunch was provided on the water. They gave us the world's greatest pineapples and crackers. I've never seen anyone cut an entire pineapple into edible bite size wedges in less than 30 seconds before.
After the rafting trip we took a bus to Kampala about 1hr 45 min away and visited friends there for the sunday evening and all day monday. It was an exceptionally beautiful city on the edge of Lake Victoria (the source of the Nile). Green, lush, hilly, meticulously landscaped, and quaint yet with lively city charm all the way. We ate dinner at a turkish restaurant in a place called centenary park. It was once again beautiful. It was an entire enclosed park, but the inside was just filled with restaurants and bars that were all situated in this huge and elegant garden/waterway landscape. We checked out the local favorite street market and purchased some incredibly aromatic (non-flavored) genuine Ugandan coffee. Can't wait to try it.
So anyways, Uganda and the city of Kampala were breathtaking. Anne, I'm sure, would like me to mention that is was great seeing her East Africa Fogarty crew. Amazing that everyone from Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda made the trip!!