Riding the River

 February 25 – Day 11

Carly and Alan have a serious discussion with Keith about the disgusting behaviour of “Tom Cruise”, and Keith agrees he has heard other reports of problems, though none as extreme as what we describe.  We are confident he will address the issue.

We have booked an adventure of tubing on the Nile with Nile River Explorers, opting for the “lazy river” sortie rather than the adrenaline junkie rafting in the rapids tour.  We hire bodas for the 20+ minutes ride along a very dusty and deeply rutted rural road and, by the time we arrive, poor Susan is in severe hip pain from the ride.  Thankfully, she gradually recovers and is able to enjoy the remainder of the day.

Gathering a boda caravan

Smiling at the start

End of a dusty trail

The slide looks kinda puny from the restaurant patio

We are given a briefing by one of the guides, and fitted with life preservers.  Then we’re loaded on the NRE bus and track back to Jinja, over the bridge, and track the river a little downstream from the dam before pulling over by the shore and watching the guides inflate the tubes.  One guide, who is the photographer, heads out into the choppy water in a zodiac raft, while the 7 Canadians plus Jackie are split into 2 groups of 4 and loaded into tubes lashed together behind a guide in a kayak.

Instruction on properly mounting and riding the tubes

We are dragged out into the middle of the wide stream and ride the current – initially quite strong but soon settling to a lazy river pace.  Beverages are passed around from the raft, and several of us take turns swimming in the warm water. 

Looking back at Bonnie and the magic bus

Chilling back at the NRE patio

We pass pleasant scenes and view an imposing-looking bungie jumping platform (no takers in our group) before arriving at the bay with the NRE dock at the base of a long water slide.

Jamie, Scott and Alan take turns on the slide which launches the riders quite far out into the bay with hair-raising velocity.

Jamie launches

We are disappointed that the kitchen does not have ingredients for the highly touted chili nachos, so we opt for light snacks and accept the bus ride back to the 30 Wilson compound (no more boda rides for poor Sue!).

All the roadside structures are coated in orange dust

Overall, it’s been a pretty great day.