Crossing the Equator

Look at me! I'm on the equator!!! Spending a week in the Southern Hemisphere and loving every minute of it.

 

I'm here with my two co-volunteer friends, Charlie and David. We took a taxi (minivan stuffed with 21 people) to a town very near Queen Elizabeth National Park called Kyambura. Along the route we crossed the equator and the driver kindly stopped so we could get a quick picture. We asked one of the locals who was stuffed in the van with us to take our picture, hence the crooked shot and the thumb. 

More Elephants

I wanted to share another picture of the herd of elephants that crossed right in front of our vehicle. Look how little the baby is, barely comes up to its mama's knee! Sooooo cute. 

Awesome timing that we were driving down this trail at the same time about fifty elephants were crossing. A few of the medium sized ones walked toward us, as if to say "that's close enough, mister", while the big ones and the babies crossed. What an amazing sight!

Now This is Africa

Eight months in country and I've finally seen some wildlife!

This is at Queen Elizabeth National Park. Two other volunteers, David and Charlie, and I hired a guide to take us through the park on a game drive. It was an amazing day. In addition to the elephants, we saw water buffalo, Kob, warthogs, hippos, Waterbucks (they look like reindeer with straight antlers), lions (very far off in the fields, thank goodness I had my binoculars), and the Crested Crain (Uganda's national bird, the one on its flag). I was hoping for zebra and giraffe too, but I'm told they are in different parks. Means more sight seeing trips in my near future!

The only way to travel on a game drive! It took a big chunk of our volunteer allowance, but worth every shilling. 

Water buffalo. These guys were huge and not one bit afraid of us. 

Hippos, just lazing in the water about ten feet from the shore. We were able to stand right at the water's edge. None of the locals seemed to care about these creatures (we were in a fishing village inside the park). People were coming and going on boats and kids were running along the shore, no one was paying any attention to the hippos but us. 

These are the Waterbucks. They seemed so well placed in the open savanna, exactly as you imagine Africa to be like. Hahaha, just like Busch Gardens except on a massive scale and no fences. The Kob were all around as well, but they were smaller and much more skidish so I couldn't get a good picture. 

The lions were out there too, we counted seven of them, all female, creeping through the long grass. We watched as they stalked a water buffalo that had become separated from his herd. We were hoping to see them take down their prey just like on the nature shows, but after an hour we grew bored. Our guide told us they would probably toy with the lone buffalo until sundown and then make their attack. Either that or they weren't really hungry, just stalking prey because that's what cats do. 

The worthogs were really cute running through the fields on their stubby little legs, looked just like Pumba. Well, so ugly it made them cute. 

So far, fabulous trip. Our next stop is Lake Bunyonyi. I'll try to get some more pictures to share. I'm afraid my iPhone is on it's last legs but I'll post the best shots I'm able to get. 

Hugs and kisses from Uganda!