Rwanda

Not a bad place to wait for a visa - Lake Banyoni Uganda

Rwanda was a place I wanted to see for no really good reason.

Our path into Rwanda however was stopped short at Kabale Uganda, as we had to jump through some hoops to get an entry visa. If we were American, French, German, etc, we would not have needed a visa, but since we were Australian, and apparently did nothing towards the peace keeping operations during the genocide (tell that to all those who had to serve here) we were on the 'make it difficult list.'

We had to apply via the new on line visa system (a system undoubtedly thought up by some idiot foreign advisor who had never travelled in Africa).We applied on line which was no small effort in Kabale as the electricity reliability was only surpassed for unreliablity by the internet access. After many failed attempts, and heated phone calls to Rwanda government officials (whos indiference did surpass the unreliability of the power and internet)...we were ready to give up. Four days at the border had rubbed off the luster of the need to see Rwanda.

We were having lunch, discussing how pleased we were with the Rwandan government, when a nice chap introduced himself and said he could help. As it turned out his good friend was the Deputy High Commissioner for Rwanda in Uganda....within 1 hour our visa was granted! Clearly it's not what you know.

The drive across the border was punctuated by me stopping head on with another car who was making all sorts of wild hand movements. It wasn't until Tanya looked in the guide book we realised we were supposed to be driving on the right hand side of the road. We politely waved to the helpful chap and moved to the correct side of the road (perhaps a helpful road sign would have been a better investment than the on line visa system).

Kigali is a pretty city, but the thing that struck us was just how many Americans and French there were. As it turns out, the biggest industry in Rwanda is Non Government Organisations (NGO's) which seem to run projects on everything from training doctors to weaving baskets. As a result, everything is overpriced and just 'not quite Africa'.To be fair, Rwanda is pretty, and the people are nice, and it is very safe (there are armed police and soldiers everywhere).

For Valentines day I treated Tanya to a trip to the genocide museum..... which was not as well recived as I had hoped.... but there you go. To pick us up after the confronting genocide museum we decided to go 'chimp' tracking at Nyungwe National Park - $100 was much more palitable than $1000 for the gorillas.

When we arrived we were told there was no more accomodation (except for the newly opened lodge which was $400 a night). Needless to say we camped however we were kindly informed that camp fees in the park were $60 US a night! After some challenging discussions, we were allowed to camp in the lodge car park...for free (tanya was estatic). Organising the trek was like trying to run peace talks on the West Bank. We hooked up with two crazy Slovinian bikers and convinced the rangers to take us. The only problem was that the start point was very far away and on what we were told were 'bad' roads. The bikers decided it would not be possible to take their bikes through such heavy mud, and asked if they could sit on our spare tyres for the drive... which I thought would be OK - how bad could the road be!!

We all set off at 5am in the dark and rain into the unknown. It is always difficult to explain how bad or dangerous a road (goat track on side of mountain range) was unless you saw it. Surfice to say the drive into the valley was two hours, and I think the highest gear at any stage was thrid gear low range. The road was mostly a washed out clay cutting with a sheer drop one side and falling trees and mud on the other....and driving back out was worse. It all went bad crossing a log bridge when a log boke under our weight and the rear of the Larry fell through the bridge, stopping when the axle rested on another log. A recovery operation swung into action, drawing on way too many local villagers, and the car was gently jacked up, and a log slipped in to place. Apart from some soiled linen, there was no damage.

All up it was four hours of outrageous driving, and I am stunned that we got out with no worse than falling through a bridge.

Four hours of relaxing driving

Oh, and the one hour with the chimps was kind of nice. The two bikers thought riding on Larry was way more fun than the trek.

To try to summarise our Rwanda experience, I would say...It is safe, clean, friendly....and you can find adventure....but if time is not built in to your itinerary, blow it off.