Monthly Archive: April 2017

In our first day in Murchison Falls, we took a cruise on the Nile, followed by a hike to the top of the falls.

Murchison Falls is the site of the movie “The African Queen” starring Humphrey Bogart, Katharine Hepburn and Lauren Bacall, and directed by John Huston.

The making of the movie was an adventure. Pit latrine outhouses were used, and due to the cast drinking foul water, everyone but Humphrey Bogart and director John Huston came down with dysentery. Bogart and Huston supposedly were protected by drinking large quantities of Scotch. Released in 1952, this was Bogart’s only best actor Oscar. There was a time when there was a long line in front of a pit-latrine when a woman came screaming out of it after having encountered a poisonous Black Mamba. A few years earlier, Ernest Hemingway clipped a telephone line and crash landed near Murchison Falls. He was rescued a few days later by a man who later piloted one of the three “African Queens” used in the movie..

“The country is like a great sponge—it finally absorbs you. Eventually you will get malaria or you will get dysentery and whatever you do, if you don’t keep doing it, the jungle will grow over you. Black or white, you’ve got to fight it every minute of the day.”
― Katharine Hepburn, The Making of The African Queen, or: How I went to Africa with Bogart, Bacall and Huston and almost lost my mind

Hippos were a big attraction

This crocodile is over her nest waiting for her babies to hatch.

In this amazing close-up you can see the mom flipping one of her newly hatched babies back to her throat pouch to carry down to the water.

The baby crocs

A family of Baboons

African Bald Eagle

Hello there!

Great Egret

Two Kingfishers looking out two directions

A not so wild Peace Corps Volunteer

We disembarked near here to begin our hike to the falls

The hike was not strenuous at all. Here you can see how the Nile gets squeezed through some narrow channels.

After we left Fort Portal we dove ten hours on Hoima Road to Murchison Falls. It is a very bumpy dirt road. PCV David calls it “Puke Road”, a fair appellation. Our driver John said we were getting an “African Massage”. At Murchison Falls, we stayed at Pakuba Safari Lodge in the heart of the park. Nearby, there are sprawling, over-grown ruins of the original lodge complex. The current lodge and our accommodations were built out from the original servant’s quarters.

As this article explains, the Pakuba Safari Lodge became a favorite haunt of Idi Amin, who turned it into a “State Lodge”, his private retreat. He did hunting from there, nearly decimating the entire elephant population. Now his haunt is sort of haunted. The cited article does not indicate how this site got destroyed. The manager of the newer lodge told me, after Amin was toppled, the remnants of his troops destroyed it as they were being chased by the advancing troops loyal to his successor, Obote. My driver John disagrees, saying it was attacked and shelled because of a mistaken belief Amin was there.

We stayed three nights, and John took us over to the ruins every time we went out or returned. He knew there were leopard(s) there. We were fortunate to see a lounging hyena on one trip and the leopard you see above on another trip.

It had a swimming pool too. That’s the Nile in the distance.The tiling looks like it is still in good shape, since the 70’s.  The newer resort has finished and filled a new pool but needs to finish landscaping. It’s already hosted baboons and a hippo. 

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Hyena

If its true the leopard was keeping cubs, wouldn’t this hyena on the other side make her nervous?

The tiling is exquisite

This is the original shot of the leopard at the top of the post, which is only zoomed in halfway.

Full zoom- Different colored eyes. In a few weeks it’s back to more writing, crummy cheap smart phone pictures.

This is the newly built lodge where we stayed. Posh Corps! And this was actually “Moderate” rate on the choices John presented us. Food was fantastic.

The pace was more sedate the next morning at the Bigodi Swamp, as we observed flowers, birds and monkeys. We had an amiable guide explain many things. Pictured above is a male Black-Headed Weaver Bird. The maies build the nest hoping it will pass inspection from a female.

Lots of competition!

Female assesses her choices

Parts of our path were planked but dry season had not loosened it’s grip, so it wasn’t too swampy.

Lets talk about ants. We had to tuck our pants legs into our socks to keep them out.

This was a busy convoy across our hiking path. It was hard to stop and examine them, as they would start up our shoes.

Eventually the ants wound up in this structure they built in the side of this tree.

“Look at the pretty flowers!”

OK monkey headliners. I thought I had all the names but I don’t.

Patas Monkey

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Red tailed Monkey

Beautiful. I didn’t get the name of this type from our guide because I didn’t see them until yesterday when I zoomed in.

The original picture of the one above it!

We encountered baboons often, and I see them on the road from Bugiri to Tororo. This is an Olive Baboon.

You have to keep your windows up when you pass on the road, as they are aggressive and will climb in your car to grab what they can. They were passive when we walked by, but will flee Ugandans, who kill them due to crop destruction.

After our Swamp walk we headed to Fort Portal for a night. We drove to one of many Crater lakes in the area (from volcanoes) and in particular, enjoyed the view from this lodge, which charges $500US per night. We just had an expensive beer there.

View of crater lake from the lodge. There is a swimming pool with this view too. For $500 there should be!

Swamp walk