I have been to many of Uganda’s national parks several times, but each visit was work-related; so, someone else picked the tab. On the eve of Women’s day this year, nine women professionals and I (ages 23 to 46) embarked on a three-day trip to Murchison Falls national park to celebrate womanhood in the wild.
Many of the women had never visited a national park before, or seen a wild animal outside a book; so, I was excited to be a guide of sorts to them. We agreed on Shs 250,000 each, starting out with Shs 2.5m in the pool.
We hired a new, 10-seater diesel-engine (this matters, with the fuel prices and all) tour van with a driver, which came for Shs 220,000 a day, minus fuel. Our pool was thus down by Shs 660,000 and a further Shs 210,000 after filling the tank.
We hit the road to Nwoya, having booked with a facility near the park’s Wangkwar gate, off the Karuma-Pakwach road. We negotiated for Shs 75,000 per head per night, on condition that we cooked all our meals. This ended up being the big downside to the trip; we later found out that for that fee, we could have found decent facilities inside the park, meals inclusive.
Still, each of us came with something for our ‘pantry’. Some bought eggs, others bought flour, meat, fruits, bread…name it. Hunger was never our problem and this cooking twist ended up making the trip actually more memorable.
We stopped in Migyera, where one of the ladies unpacked flasks of wonderful African tea and we had breakfast, took selfies and shook off the remnants of Kampala’s stress. Meanwhile, the journey from Karuma falls to Nwoya was unforgettable. Elephants were roaming the highway and in the bushes visible from the van.
Even travelling to Wangkwar gate the following morning, there were giraffes, kobs, waterbucks, buffaloes, warthogs, Jackson hartebeest, name it, all in plenty. It was nice hearing the two young children in the van squealing with excitement. The other downside, however, is that the park gates open at 7am when tourists who slept inside the park are already on the first leg of their game drives!
For example, our tour guide (whom we paid Shs 20,000) told us the cats hate dew; so, when you go earlier for the game drive, you are more likely to see them perched on tree branches, on big rocks or walking in the middle of the road.
But at 7am, the grass is dry enough for them to go back into hiding. And that is how we never saw a single lion or leopard. After paying park entry fees of Shs 20,000 each and Shs 30,000 for the van (the children were not charged), we drove for about two hours to the ferry, where we each paid another Shs 5,000 to cross Victoria Nile to the southern bank, from where we drove another hour or so to the top of the Murchison falls.
That was the highlight of the entire trip, if you asked the ladies.
More like top of the world
Some were taking selfies like they were about to be banned, some were simply staring at the thundering, rainbow-decorated water in awe, and one was even screaming, “Hallelujah! Hallelujah!” over and over.
It was hard prying them away from this beautiful spot. But we had a boat cruise to catch at 2pm aboard the newly launched Uganda Wildlife Authority boat, Giraffe. At this point our Shs 250,000 budget was exhausted, unless we were planning on pushing the van to Kampala.
But the women were so amazing and each paid an additional Shs 30,000 for the two-hour boat cruise where we did some birding and also saw the hippos and crocodiles, not to mention all those selfies we took with the Murchison falls tumbling down as our backdrop.
When we returned to our evening campfire in Nwoya after yet another hearty meal that this time included local Acholi delicacy boo (we had eaten malakwang the previous night), it was to amazing stories and sharing pictures.
Home girl Lillian told us why some places are called particular names. Did you know, for example, that Paraa means ‘place of the hippos’? Or Pakwach – ‘place of leopards’? Or Pajobi – ‘Place of the buffalo’.
She had no idea what Pakuba means, but when we went there in search of the elusive cats, I saw the swanky, $180-a-night Pakuba Safari Lodge up and running near the ruins of the Amin-era Pakuba lodge that was bombed out.
I silently added ‘sleeping at the new Pakuba’ to my bucket list. It looks beautiful. Having saved just enough for fuelling the car back to Kampala (in all we used one-and-half tankfuls), we had breakfast on Friday morning and hit the road.
My conclusion? Shs 250,000 was quite ambitious; put aside Shs 300,000 at the least – Shs 400,000, if your group is smaller – unless your budget does not include the car hire component.
At least now I know, these safari things are totally doable and it was so worth it.
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