Ethiopia - Kenya - Uganda

Leaving New York is never easy, REM sings, but you sure can’t say that about Ethiopia. It’s actually really sad; Ethiopia is one of the most beautiful countries we have ever seen, but we never felt at home, let alone welcome. The friendly people we met were really friendly, but everyone else was really in your face, always asking for stuff and never giving you a break.

After Gonder we stayed a few nights in Bahir Dar, right by Lake Tana and the source of the Blue Nile. We found a really nice hotel overlooking the lake and had a great time hanging out with fellow overlanders Mike and Bonnie, as well as two Swedish guys, Lars and Håkan, who had been working in Bahir Dar for a couple of years. After a while our Brazilian friends caught up with us as well. They had gone through the Simian mountains and had a great time, filled with everything from snow to monkeys. From Bahir Dar it was a two-day drive to Addis, offering us some spectacular scenery as we descended into the Blue Nile Gorge, a big canyon created by the Blue Nile. On our way we did however get a bit more excitement than we bargained for as we suddenly lost the breaks. Kina did however do a great job getting us down safely and Bumblebee was soon ascending the other side of the gorge.

In Addis we found that the Swedish church has a big, gated compound in the outskirts of town. We set course for the US Embassy, since we thought that would be easier to find than the neighboring Swedish church. Upon arrival we met Kersti, who had run the church for the last years and just returned from a few weeks vacation back in Sweden. After installing ourselves Kersti invited us for some coffee and Swedish knäckebröd (untranslatable) and Västerbotten cheese; thus winning our eternal gratitude!

Addis was cold and rainy, but still rather nice. We had a good time with the people at the Swedish church and we also really enjoyed the Ethiopian cuisine. We were also showed to a good workshop that helped us out with servicing the car. The air filter looked like it had just gone through the Sudan… which it had. After the service Bumblebee was like a new car. Apparently air is an important ingredient for a combustion engine. Who would have known?

From Addis it was a two-day drive to the border. The second day was long, long, long, but also really nice since the country got more scarcely populated the further south we came. Before entering the border town Moyale all we could see along the road was Dik-diks (the world’s smallest antelope) and coyotes. It was wonderful!



Crossing the border to Kenya was a breeze. I had been really anxious to see how they dealt with moving the traffic from the right to the left, but since we were the only people crossing it was simply a matter turning left. A bit too easy… Incidentally, it was the only easy thing we did that day. We had been recommended to take off early since northern Kenya offers nothing but appalling roads, but though we got up at around 6 o’clock we had no idea what expected. Enter, the worst roads in Africa. The road from Moyale to Isiolo is 460 kilometers and it took us two long days of driving. The first 240ks took 10 hours and the second day was not faster. Even though we were going at snail speed, we managed to break all for shock absorbers… we are talking heavy duty Old Man Emu Gas shocks… luckily they didn’t cave in totally until we reached Nakuru, a day from Isiolo. When they went they did however go with a “bang” right outside the workshop. Perfect timing! They day had been pretty good as well, as we ended up on a small gravel road running right beside the fence to a private game reserve, giving us a great view of tones of animals without having to pay any entrance fee. Excellent!

Due to our breakdown we treated ourselves to two nights at the Waterbuck hotel, which coincidentally was the closest as well as the best hotel in town. The endless supply of hot, running water felt like heaven. As did the bed and the HUGE breakfast buffet.

Following our two days of luxury we decided it was time to camp again. The town of Eldoret was about a day’s drive away and we had heard there was a nice campsite right outside of town. Man, that was the understatement of the year; the Naiberi River Campsite proved to be the best campsite we had seen so far. Ever. Anywhere. The campsite was created and run by a Kenyan-Indian named Raj, to whom it was merely a fun side activity to his main gig, a big textile factory in Eldoret. Raj likes to travel, but doesn’t have the time. In order to meet other travelers and get to share their stories he decided to build the best campsite in Africa. He has succeeded. Raj also had his mechanic take a look at Bumblebee, since he had felt a bit unstable on the drive from Nakuru to Eldoret. It turned out the problem was a loose bolt on a stabilizer rod and the problem was solved within minutes.

This was our last day in Kenya for this time. In order to save some money we had only gotten a 7-day transit visa and we now had to get to Uganda.


Crossing the border to Uganda was not as easy as entering Kenya. There were people everywhere, we had to get insurance (we got a yellow card that will hopefully cover the rest of the trip) and we had to pay road tax. It was a mess. Once through customs we could however relax and take in the beauty of the scenery. The bad roads kept our speed down, so we had quite a lot of time to marvel the lush, thick jungle and green rolling hills.

It was almost dinnertime when we reached the Nile River Explorer’s Campsite in Jinja, thus we got to have dinner overlooking the sunset over the White Nile. Magnificent! Jinja is the adrenalin capital of Uganda, but we didn’t produce that much action juice during our stay here. While people were rafting and kayaking left and right around us, we were chilling in the shade, reading, having a good time and simply enjoying life. We met two Swedish guys, Marcus and Oscar, who had come here for the kayaking. When “the boys” wanted to go to a place called Hairy Lemon we decided to join them to the small island, downstream in the Nile.

The Hairy Lemon turned out to be a little piece of paradise, hidden in the middle of nowhere. There was only one problem, the accommodation was full board only, and the food was appalling. After two nights we decided to leave for the town of Jinja, and later Kampala, where we spent a few nights before heading for Ssesse Islands, for some RnR before meeting the gorillas in Rwanda. Or so we thought. An hour before we were supposed to board the ship that was going to take us to Ssese we got a call from Leslie, the woman who helped us get the gorilla tracking permits. Apparently there had been a mix-up and our permits had been sold twice. Crap. She had however been able to hunt down two permits for tracking in the Bwindi Impenetrable Forrest National reserve two days later, so we simply turned our car around and set course for Bwindi. We arrived the day after… just at the border to Congo.

As we had dinner at the community run campsite we were staying at a Boda Boda (a local motorcycle taxi) pulled up. We looked at each other, trying to figure out where the US Boda Boda-passenger had started his journey. It was quite far to the nearest town, and that really wasn’t a place were you’d expect tourists to go. It turned out he had gone from Kabale, a staggering 3.5 hours away! Craig, the passenger, immediately won our respect and that was even before we got to hear some of his stories (more about that later).

The gorilla tracking was amazing! We were first assigned to the B-group, but the people who had visited them the day before only got to see two gorillas, which would make the going rate USD 250 per gorilla peek… can’t say it’d be worth it. Anyhow, we did quite a lot of begging and were eventually moved from B to H, the biggest family in the park. 27 gorillas.

Since we were allowed to tag along another group it was 10 of us making our way through the jungle. 10 Wzungos (foreigners) that is; add one guide, two guards and 8 porters and it was quite a party making its way through the undergrowth. It took us three-and-a-half hours to get to the gorillas, but once we arrived all signs of exhaustion quickly vanished as we got to see the first gorilla sitting next to a tree, just chilling. The following hour just flew by. We saw around 20 gorillas of all shapes and sizes. The silverback was huge! The trek back was a bit shorter but we were all quite tired, and happy, when we got back to the cars.

In order to save some money we decided not to go to Rwanda, since it would imply costs of around USD 200 just to cross the border. Instead we set course for Lake Bunyonyi, a beautiful lake that actually has crayfish. The campsite was very nice, but we never felt quite at home. The personnel were all rather pushy and furthermore the crayfish was quite a disappointment. The day before we left a car identical to Bumblebee pulled in. The driver, Ben, had gone from London to Cape Town, meeting his now girlfriend Bree in Ghana, and they were now on their way home. Ben didn’t consider driving through Africa to be enough of a challenge, so he is also running five marathons and climbing the five highest peaks of Africa. Quite impressive! He has now done Mt Kenya, is set for Kilimanjaro and we will try to meet them in Nairobi, when he is doing the Nairobi Marathon. Somehow I don’t think he expects a medal.

Getting to Ssese was pretty interesting. The “boat” taking us over Lake Victoria didn’t have a proper port to dock in, so we all had to reverse aboard. Or rather up… it was steep! But, with low gear and diff lock it was a breeze for Bumblebee. The Toyota minivans had a pretty hard time though. On Ssese we stayed at a really quiet and rather idyllic campsite just by the water. After three nights we needed some more action and headed back to Kampala and the Red Chili (they had free wifi!). Four days later we were back in Jinja with Marcus and Oscar, and we are all now chilling in the shade since it is rather hot today. Life is, however, pretty great. =)

We’ve (or rather I’ve) been horribly bad at updating our English blog, but we promise to improve our productivity from now on. The thing is, up until now we’ve mainly been writing for friends and family back home, so Swedish have been the only language needed. But now we are meeting so many great people from all over the world, and we would love to be able to keep contact with as many as possible, and this is one way of doing just that.