TRAVELLING TO UGANDA

It has been a busy first week in Uganda! Well not quite a week but today is the end of the school and work week. Let us tell you a bit about our journey so far. We’ll try to do it in small chunks so it is not so tedious to read. Note: We’ll probably make one or two comments that will be most interesting/better understood to the team that we travelled with in May 2008 but of course everyone is welcome to read them… they just might not mean much to you. They will be identified by this setup [team: words about something].

Our flight over was pretty good, all things considered. We were disappointed that we ended up paying for the extra bag but with what we know now that was pretty much inevitable. We did however get a bit of a break on the overweight baggage. We ended up taking about 270 lbs. (probably 280 actually) of checked baggage with another two backpacks loaded to the brim plus an additional carry-on as well but the great news is that it all arrived here in Uganda safe and sound.

On the way over, as many of you know, we had a 2 hour layover in Montreal and then a 12 hour layover in London. We did some advance research and though we were a little nervous, the two of us left, on our own, out of London airport through Immigration and headed off to see the town! [team: the new Terminal 5 is great! Really nice place to hang out for a few hours – much nicer than the one we were in last time but you either need to come prepared to shop or hold on to your pocket book!] We took the London Underground into central London, then took a double-decker bus tour around the city lasting a couple of hours. You could hop on or off wherever you wanted and we did some of that. Went to see the Tower of London and Crown Jewels, did the whole tour led by one of the Beefeaters – jolly good time and we were kinda proud of ourselves. It was pouring rain so the photos aren’t great… just enough to remind us that we were really there in this huge bustling city. Really, really glad we weren’t trying to drive to find our way, that’s for sure! Late in the evening we were back at the terminal ready to go on the final leg of our flight. We had some reasonable sleep on both long haul flights (6.5 hours over the Atlantic and 8.5 hours to Uganda). Chad especially seemed to have no trouble catching a good 40 winks. Still we were pretty tired when we arrived at 7:40 on Wednesday morning into Entebbe Airport. For those who knew about the troubles they were having here last weekend, that has all completely settled down and there has been no sign of anything since.

The temperature when we arrived was only 22 degrees Celsius – a cool day by their standards. It had been overcast for much of the day apparently and we could see nothing of the ground until less than 10 minutes before landing. The sunrise above the clouds was pretty spectacular though. The flight path is directly over Suubi (which strengthened my notion that Suubi is north of Kampala but no, it appears I am mistaken. The sun this evening – now that I am awake enough to notice, is of course setting in the west and Kampala is in the exact opposite direction so we are actually west and slightly south of Kampala! Surprise, surprise. I realize now though where my confusion lay and for those interested, see the end of this post). As mentioned our baggage all arrived safely and we went through the green lane in Customs out to meet our driver, Jingo. That first smell of Africa when the plane doors opened though was pretty amazing to say the least. It is not that it is such a pleasant smell or maybe even not so particularly unique but it brings such a lot of great memories to mind and so it is sweet-smelling to our hearts.


“You are welcome to Uganda” is a greeting we have heard many times now. Our hearts say “Uganda, it is so wonderful to be here”.

Location, location, location! How do we find Suubi on a map? I have been wondering that and some of you have mentioned it as well so here it is. Gerry finally cleared up the mystery for us. If you can find Entebbe and Gulu on a map of Uganda and draw a straight line between them, you will draw a line right through Suubi Village. From the west side of Kampala there are three roads – one heading north, one heading west and one heading south west along the coast toward Masaka (the Masaka Road). We are on the Masaka Road very close to the village of Nsangi. Hope that helps.