My bag is really heavy: Lake Bunyonyi, Gorillas, and Rwanda

After Kisumu, we had 2 drive days. BORING

We then arrived at Lake Bunyonyi, in southern Uganda, near the Rwandan border. It is one of the deepest lakes in Africa and is surrounded by beautiful hills and countryside. And at nearly 2000m above sea level, it is nearly as high as the highest point in Australia! And its still damn hot.

Our first day spent here was a road trip to Rwanda, a place Mardy has always wanted to go. And as amazing as the trip was, it was marred by fuckups. We got up early as to be at the Rwandan border by 7am, where we sat for 3.5 HOURS, because the tour company we were contracted out to for the day fucked up and didn't have there paper work in order for the border, and we were told nothing at the time, just made to sit and wait at a fucking border crossing. They also fucked up lunch, and because we were running late, the whole day was rushed and we nearly didn't make it back in time before they closed the border.

Also I swear our driver was stoned his eyes were so red, and it was a very nails in the seat drive through the endless hills of Rwanda, as he overtook on blind corners, passed when he shouldn't pass, and stayed behind people when he could have passed. Crazy.

Once we got on the road (having lost a big chunk of the day considering we only had a day visa), we made mad dash to Kigali, the Rwandan capital which was a few hours away.
Kigali is surprisingly clean for an African city, our tour leader says its probably the cleanest city in all of Africa. As dumping of rubbish is illegal there. However it is a strange city, with so many people involved in the 1994 genocide still wondering around, you really wonder who is a murderer walking the streets.

Once we got there, just out of town we firstly visited a church, were the most horrific of things happened during the 1994 genocide. 10 000 people locked themselves in a church, thinking they would be safe from the carnage outside, but instead the militia/interhamwe blew the doors open with grenades, randomly shot people, and either clubbed most of the rest to death with clubs that had nails in the end, or cut them up with machetes. You can see the blood stains and bullet holes everywhere, the walls, the roof, etc.

The most difficult part to hear was when they said them picked children up and threw them against the brick walls, you could still see the blood stains where they hit the wall. All the clothes from the people inside were still there (so much clothes...), and there bones were kept downstairs in mass graves which you go down to see. As many as 45,000 people were buried at this church, as it wasnt just the people in the church who were buried here, but also the people from the surrounding area. After seeing the inside of the church you go downstairs were the bones and items left from the people are on display. Nearly all of the skulls have giant fractures in them where they must have been hit with a club, and a large number of skulls are missing parts (like big holes in the top) presumable where they were beaten with a blunt object. It was difficult to see, however we are glad we saw it, it has to be seen to be understood. The cruelty of people truly has no bounds.

We then went to the Genocide memorial in central Kigali. Were there was a lot of information on the genocide and video testimonies of victims. I cannot put into words how much some of these people suffered. Pretty much the worst things that you can image happened. Like HIV positive murders raping women, women being repeated raped by gangs, people cutting off peoples legs and throwing them in septic tanks to die, burying people alive and the list goes on and on. I wasn't just mass murder, it was mass torture as well. Truly horrific.

After making it back to the border (just), we got back to our campsite and hit the hay ready for Gorilla tracking.

The next day we went Gorilla tracking in the hills of Uganda. We hiked for about 2.5 hours, before finding our family. It was a family of 27, and we saw about 17 of them in the rain forest.

We followed a ranger with a machete hacking his way threw the forest, until we found them. You then get to spend an hour with them (limited to an hour to avoid them contracting human diseases), it was incredible, you get so close to them. Like within 3 meters, and they are massive, they have huge beer guts and the silverbacks are just ginormous. They don't hate humans, and aren't afraid of them, but they do find us annoying it seems and always walk away when you get to close. So subsequently we have lots of shots of gorillas asses. There are a few good ones though that I'll put up.

It is definitely a once in a lifetime experience, and I highly recommend you do it. Considering how few of these creatures are left, we have been truly lucky.

On our last day here Mardy visited an orphanage whilst Katie caught up on some sleep. Were Mardy and Katie had bought toys/exercise books/and assorted items for the orphanage. It was great to see what was being done there, and the kids hang off you all day, a few people walked away sponsoring a child. Which is something I think we both might end up doing before this trip is out.

Once again I'm on a computer that I can't upload pics, so I'll have to catch up on the pics later.

Peace out

Mardy and Katie