A Haven on the banks of the Nile

Close to Jinja in Uganda we have come to spend 2 nights at The Haven, a neat and grassy camp site perched above a section of rapids on the Victoria Nile, not far from its source as it flows out of the Lake. It is a beautiful spot, the climate is perfect, there is a lot of birdlife and we had the entertainment today watching tourists white-water rafting down the rapids. Local dugouts, we assume they are fishing, ply back and forth across the calm patch of water before the rapids. A majestic fish eagle perched above us in a tree, and to continue the fishy theme, I had a meal of grilled Tilapia in the restaurant (lots of bones!) while Chris sensibly ordered steak and rice.

Since my last communication, we remained at the Flamingo campsite on Lake Elementaita for a further day to relax. With no on-site internet, Chris splashed out on a day's phone data so that we could What's App our family and he could watch the Monaco Grand Prix online. It was bizarre to be speaking to Andrew on a sunny English afternoon where he was visiting camping friends in Edale with the hills of home in the background while we were in darkness in Africa.

Next morning we had a latish start, reluctant to leave the tranquility of the lakeside, before venturing out again into the busy Kenyan traffic to travel north-west towards Uganda. It was slow going with frequent rumble strips and big road humps at every village and, even worse, on every hill climb so that the numerous heavy trucks could not gather speed. It made overtaking a hair-raising experience but Chris is a hardened African driver and braves it out with oncoming traffic.

The bright morning sunshine up into the hills gave way to late afternoon storm clouds and before we reached the city of Eldoret, it was raining. We must have missed the worst of the downpour and were amazed to find the roads ahead gushing with floodwater. Our destination for Monday night was the Overlanding Naiberi River Resort and Campsite which is used by the big overland travel companies as everything is set up for their needs. Lo and behold, shortly after we arrived a Nomad truck joined us. With good weather and lots of people it would have been an enjoyable place to spend some time and socialize but with heavy rain to keep us indoors it remained an adequate overnight park.

Yesterday, Tuesday, we were at the Kenya/Uganda border by 11.30 and into the chaos of heavy traffic going in all directions. Fortunately it did not take long to get our Carnet stamped out of Kenya and we were able to cross the river into the Uganda calm