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20th november - 8th december

Overlanding across Afica in our Land Rover Defender: Uganda

Andy Lees
2006-05-14 18:47:09

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sounds that we had heard at lake navaisha. peering from the tent, two hippos were clearly visible just below us in the light of the full moon.

busingiro - 29th november

we left murchison falls via little travelled dirt roads, heading south bordering lake albert. we camped in a small wooded clearing at busingiro, which bordered the southern extension of the budongo forest, in which we'd tracked chimps a few days earlier.

rising at dawn, we decided to try our luck on another chimp track. our guide was a man of few words and we marched purposefully through the jungle, which was, if anything, denser than before. an hour or so later the guide stopped, pointing out a small dark shape moving silently through the undergrowth. but it wasn't a chimp. at first i couldn't make it out, then as we drew nearer we found ourselves advancing towards a small frightened young girl. the guide told us she had been missing for a week, and that the villages had been out searching for her but given up after three days.

she looked pitifully frail. her thin dress was tattered, ripped, and dirty. many children in rural uganda are similarly dishevelled. but as she stood there in the jungle, clutching a small banana leaf bag - containing mushrooms she'd been collecting for food - wide eyed with shock or relief or fear, she looked as much like a forest imp as you're ever likely to see.

at that point we aborted the trek, clambering back through the vines, creepers and fallen trees to return the girl to her family in the village. the journey back was troubling though. the "lost" girl didn't seem to have any trouble finding her way back. she didn't look relieved, in fact she looked scared. perhaps it was shock, exhaustion and malnutrition, but to me she didn't look like she wanted to be found. i didn't like to think what she might have run from that would warrant living in the forest for a week, ...