Jinja (Uganda) and transfer to Kenya

People come to Jinja for rafting which did not interest us a lot. That is why we preferred other activities: visiting the source of the Nile and communicating with kids in the orphanage.

The orphanage.

We came to Jinja from Kampala and stayed with couchsurfer Meddy in the town suburbs. Meddy is in his twenties, he lives with his parents; also, in their home, they organized the orphanage. The quantity of the children there varies, as sometimes parents get children back. Meddy finds financial means to buy food and clothes for kids; he asked us to buy exercise books and present them to kids solemnly. The solemnity is certainly important, but kids are kids, and the exercise books were immediately crumpled and stained. They hardly survived till school…

The source of the Nile.

After communicating a lot with Meddy and his family, the next day we departed for the excursion to the source of the longest river in the world Nile.

Park entrance fee was 10000, and the first sight there is the monument to Mahatma Gandhi, whose ashes were immersed over the holy river Nile.

Down in the park it is possible to take a boat to reach the source per se. There are different boat and boat drivers: bargain and look for co-travelers.

We joined two nuns with a child and paid 15000 for two of us. The short trip was quite interesting, and the boat driver even told some stories. Yet, the aim of the trip was a sign standing in the place where Victoria lake turns into the Nile river. In 6400 kilometers the Nile falls into the Mediterranean Sea.

You may get out of the boat to soak your feet, walk to the souvenir hut on water and take a picture with a sign. The underwater streams are very active there too.

Finally, for those who still want to go for rafting in Jinja, according to two our co-travelers its price was from 75 to 135 US dollars. It may be organized both for rafting dummies and professionals, and clients are accompanied in the boat.

From Uganda to Kenia.

There is not much to do in Jinja, which is why we headed to Nairobi. Four to five bus companies offer their services to passengers during the day and at night. When we came to the bus station, it turned out that the tickets were available only at Easy Сoach company (73000, departure at 21.00 and 21.30). According to the pictures we saw, Modern Coast buses seemed to be the most decent, but full (they said you may book it at www.modern.co.ke for 60000). The bus is small (about 9 rows), and there is a lot of space for the passengers. Yet, on this bus you may feel the bumps very well, and the windows open by themselves. We crossed the border at midnight, there were a lot of buses and the queue seemed quite long. Yet, crossing the border took only an hour and a half, including the time for filling in the declarations on both borders. There are money exchangers there and a dirty and expensive toilet between the borders. After crossing the border, we slept again and arrived in Nairobi at 10 AM. After Jinja, Nairobi seemed a madhouse…