It has been an amazing last 7months away! I am now Home in New Zealand!!! Thanks so much to everyone who was part of my exciting journey this year. Esp. Mike, we travelled together for most of the trip and everything went so well!Cheers. And to everyone else...you know who you are!:)
NZ summer...lets go!
Monday, November 16, 2009
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
The Ugandan Adventure has continued to be super!!As it turns out there are heaps of Kiwi’s here. This place is dominated by mainly British and Kiwi’s. We have been doing heaps of runs down the Silverback section, up until I had a little mishap where I rolled and broke my paddle and bruised my left arm on a rapid called Bujagali. My arm was pretty sore for a few days but came right pretty quickly and I could paddle again after about 2days, my muscle is just still bruised and swollen. We did a mass group day trip down the second section of the river, called Day2 with heaps of rafts and kayakers, it was really fun. We then cruised down to an Island called ‘The Hairy Lemon’ it is at the bottom of the Day2 kayak leg. It has no power in the dorms and long drops for toilets. You get all your meals cooked for you when you stay there and it is 5mins paddle from 2 awesome play holes, ‘Nile Special’ and ‘Club Wave’. We stayed here for a few days playing cards and doing lots of kayaking. Then cruised back to NRE for some relax and chapatti’s! Yesterday Mike and I kayaked from NRE all the way to the Hairy Lemon. It is about 40km and has a lot of flat sections! It took us about 3hours 30mins but we stopped powering it after 2hours and cruised the rest. We ran everything blind, was sweet though. We ran a rapid called Ithunder which is pretty massive and fun!
We are now preparing to fly home to New Zealand!! We have cruised our way to Kampala and are staying in a backpackers here. I am definitely going to miss life here in Uganda, but really am excited for home in New Zealand!!! I will miss the amazing Chapati’s and Samosa’s and smoothies, lovely people, boda boda’s etc. I won’t miss the crazy drivers, slow service and cars breaking down or running out of petrol! But it has definitely been an awesome experience here in Uganda. Such an amazing time and fun rivers. People here are great and the kayakers are all totally sweet.
So it is the end of such a long journey away from home for me. What an adventure it has been. Starting off in England buying our sweet van, heading into Europe, World Cups, World Champs, Trips to Spain, Italy, France, Germany, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Holland and back again to the UK and then finally on to Africa! So many people have helped me out along the way and made for such an amazing year! I have memories that will I am sure last forever. There were Up’s and Down’s but definitely more good times then bad.
Cheers to everyone from Europe and Africa that contributed in whatever way to my fun! Now back to NZ for some summer school, Slalom training, catching up with people, work and more fun in the rivers, mountains and ocean!
Sunday, November 01, 2009
Uganda
Uganda
As sad as it was to leave Zambia I was pretty excited for Uganda! We have now been here a few days and are quite settled. There is a bit more of a relaxed lifestyle here, that’s for sure. Uganda is situated about 45km from the equator. On arrival in Entebbe airport the first planes we saw were UN planes. We then were treated so some typical crazy African driving. Uganda is an even more underdeveloped country then Zambia and this was quite noticeable as soon as we arrived.
I love it here so much! Paddling is easy and fun and I am even getting the chance to practice some sweet play moves. We are staying right next to the river at a backpackers place called NRE (Nile River Explorers) and it is at the start of a descent play run called ‘Silverback’. I am really loving it here. Everyday is very chilled out! We wake up, go paddling and then just chill at the bar that is here at the backpackers. There are loads of paddlers around which is cool and makes for lots of fun. The part of Uganda we are in is pretty in the wild. We are staying near a place called Jinja. It is beautiful and green here. After kayaking we catch boda boda’s (little motorbikes) back up the track. The drivers are pretty crazy and you count your lucky stars everytime you make it back unscathed! Outside the backpackers all the locals have their little stalls. Best one is the Chapati stand. A chapatti is like a pancake and each one gets full of whatever you want…omelette, nutella, banana etc. They only cost about 1000 ping each(not even $1 Kiwi) which is awesome coz they full you up! People here are pretty friendly. Yesterday we went on a mission to a playhole called ‘Superhole’. About 10 of us caught a matato(van) up there and it was pretty fun. The van unfortunately ran out of gas so we had to wait by one of the local villages for another van to come for 3hours!!!In Africa anything goes and things are never in any hurry! It was a fun wait though because the locals lit a fire that we danced around and chilled by until the van came. They have the funniest adverts here… like ‘Say no to bad Sex’ and ‘Say no to morning Sex, Africa’ and ‘Shagging a virgin does not cure aids’. They are all trying to promote people using condoms but are worded so funny.
Leela and I caught a boda boda into town the other day and my guys bike ran out of gas so we had to sqeeze onto Leela’s. It was pretty fun. We checked out the markets which are really cool. We got a whole lot of pineapple and mangos and passionfruit and some massive avocados! Awesome. All the local black people call us Mazongu’s(White people) and are always yelling Jumbo Mazungu(Hello white person). Food is really cheap here along with everything else! I had fish curry the other night and it was really good. There is even a local chick that is doing Slalom here. She has put up some flat water gates on the river and has a brand new Vajda boat she got from the ICF. She said Mike and I can borrow it while we are here which is awesome. She wants to train up for the next Olympics.
Sweet, I am off to find some dinner then I think there is a wee party going down here, last night we celebrated Halloween and I painted myself green and went as The Incredible Hulk!
I will try get some pics up soon.
As sad as it was to leave Zambia I was pretty excited for Uganda! We have now been here a few days and are quite settled. There is a bit more of a relaxed lifestyle here, that’s for sure. Uganda is situated about 45km from the equator. On arrival in Entebbe airport the first planes we saw were UN planes. We then were treated so some typical crazy African driving. Uganda is an even more underdeveloped country then Zambia and this was quite noticeable as soon as we arrived.
I love it here so much! Paddling is easy and fun and I am even getting the chance to practice some sweet play moves. We are staying right next to the river at a backpackers place called NRE (Nile River Explorers) and it is at the start of a descent play run called ‘Silverback’. I am really loving it here. Everyday is very chilled out! We wake up, go paddling and then just chill at the bar that is here at the backpackers. There are loads of paddlers around which is cool and makes for lots of fun. The part of Uganda we are in is pretty in the wild. We are staying near a place called Jinja. It is beautiful and green here. After kayaking we catch boda boda’s (little motorbikes) back up the track. The drivers are pretty crazy and you count your lucky stars everytime you make it back unscathed! Outside the backpackers all the locals have their little stalls. Best one is the Chapati stand. A chapatti is like a pancake and each one gets full of whatever you want…omelette, nutella, banana etc. They only cost about 1000 ping each(not even $1 Kiwi) which is awesome coz they full you up! People here are pretty friendly. Yesterday we went on a mission to a playhole called ‘Superhole’. About 10 of us caught a matato(van) up there and it was pretty fun. The van unfortunately ran out of gas so we had to wait by one of the local villages for another van to come for 3hours!!!In Africa anything goes and things are never in any hurry! It was a fun wait though because the locals lit a fire that we danced around and chilled by until the van came. They have the funniest adverts here… like ‘Say no to bad Sex’ and ‘Say no to morning Sex, Africa’ and ‘Shagging a virgin does not cure aids’. They are all trying to promote people using condoms but are worded so funny.
Leela and I caught a boda boda into town the other day and my guys bike ran out of gas so we had to sqeeze onto Leela’s. It was pretty fun. We checked out the markets which are really cool. We got a whole lot of pineapple and mangos and passionfruit and some massive avocados! Awesome. All the local black people call us Mazongu’s(White people) and are always yelling Jumbo Mazungu(Hello white person). Food is really cheap here along with everything else! I had fish curry the other night and it was really good. There is even a local chick that is doing Slalom here. She has put up some flat water gates on the river and has a brand new Vajda boat she got from the ICF. She said Mike and I can borrow it while we are here which is awesome. She wants to train up for the next Olympics.
Sweet, I am off to find some dinner then I think there is a wee party going down here, last night we celebrated Halloween and I painted myself green and went as The Incredible Hulk!
I will try get some pics up soon.
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