After seeing the Equator (below), we headed up to Kampala to drop off my brunette friend and one of the other members of the group who would be leaving the tour there. After a goodbye and a latte, we moved on to Jinja.

Sights & Culture

Equator

After a few hours’ drive, we reached the equator between the south and north hemispheres. It is a personal peeve that the road that crosses the equator does not cross it at a right angle. No one else seemed to understand my complaint or even why I had an issue at all with the fact.

There was a bit of shopping at the tourist traps and my brunette friend picked up an amazing children’s book. It was about two siblings who discover their parents have locked a severely disabled third child in a windowless room in the house for years. It was aimed at six-year-olds. Amazing.

Shopping and lunch were done, we went to see a demonstration of the change in water direction (the Coriolis effect). I have a suspicion that it was faked, as it was a little too obvious and powerful an effect for the few feet we moved. (Author’s Note: After the holiday, I confirmed that the whole demonstration is a relatively well-known scam.)

Restaurants & Bars

Jinja camp

Jinja camp overlooks the Nile and is focused on an adventure; offering rafting, quad biking, horseback riding, paragliding and more. It was a shame that we only had one full day at Jinja, as it meant we could only do one activity and I’d have loved to take the quad bikes out on the back roads of Uganda.

As we did only have one day, most people wanted to do the white water rafting, something the Nile and Jinja, in particular, are famous for.

Once we all got booked on the adventure rafting we retired to the bar, which was totally inundated by bugs!

Equator Stops

At the equator stop, a range of restaurants offer local foods to visitors.

Sports & Activities

White Water Rafting on the Nile

We stopped at the Rafting office for equipment, briefing and breakfast of “Rolex” rolled eggs in Chapatti, which was both filling and delicious. From there it was a longish drive in an open-walled truck to the rafting point and we were looking over the Nile.

We went down to the edge of the river and broke out into teams. There were two groups who wanted to do grade five rafting, but I, the six madmen and one madwoman all managed to get into the same boat and we made it clear that we wanted to go extreme.

8 rapids awaited us, most of the rapids grade 5. There is a 9th, but it is grade 6 and no one has completed it due to the whirlpool, so we portaged around it.

We threw ourselves down the rapids with reckless abandon. Early on, the boat flipped a few times, throwing us into the raging Nile.

Halfway through the rapids, we stopped for pineapple and biscuits to give us energy. As we were finishing them up, the heavens opened and we were caught in a tropical hail storm. On the Nile. In Uganda. In early September!

After the break for lunch, our only flip was when we completed the final rapid and the guide turned to us with a grin and asked “Want to do that one again??” after a chorus of “Yes!” he had us paddle back into the rapid. We got perhaps 2/3 of the way through before the boat flipped violently and we were buffeted by wave after wave until we exited the rapid and floated in the calm. We were the only group to attempt the reverse transversal.

We did nearly have an emergency, after the hail, one of the guys on the boat had been wearing only a lifejacket as it was so warm, but after he began shivering as it became cold. He toughed it out and made it to the end of the session, but it was a close call with hypothermia.

Jinja