What is worse than a bad gravel road? A bad tar road.
South from Fort Portal the road was tarred but a bit lumpy with the occasional pothole. It slowly got worse - until it was mostly pothole. A lot of the time it was easier driving in the dirt at the edge. A lot was very scenic though with the Rwenzoris in the distance to our right.
We recrossed the equator just after entering the park - at least on this road it was marked, to be honest we've now crossed it so many times that we just sailed straight on past leaving an overland bus pulling in for the customary photos.
The main road like all public roads in the park is free to use, so we drove slowly watching for wildlife.
Before getting to the channel we turned off onto another public road, this time poor dirt towards Kasenyi on Lake George. We intended just doing a short stretch just to get an idea of its condition and what could be seen. We saw 3 big male elephants, two were browsing near the road, then the third arrived. He started tossing his head, glaring at us and looking quite grumpy in spite of our engine being off. For the first time ever we decided to reverse away slowly to give him some space. This worked, he followed the others gradually into the bush, grazing as he went. Sue has got more nervous about elephant encounters since we met a grumpy female with calf in the Masai Mara a couple of years ago. In the end these were the only ellies we saw at reasonable distance in QENP. After a while we turned back to the main road to go and find the campsite.
Just before the bridge over the Kazinga channel there is a settlement called Katanguru - possibly the scruffiest looking place that we've seen so far. The bridge over the channel was spectacular - thousands of birds flying close to the water, terns, swallows, cormorants, kingfishers all feeding. The power lines acrosss the channel were all covered with hundreds of pied kingfishers perched on them, but the activity over the water was intense.
We stayed at Engiri lodge as recommended by Robert - slightly odd but at $20 each including both dinner and breakfast it was relatively good value. There is no toilet on the campsite (they're still building it?) and no lock on the door of the ladies in the main building and hot water for showers comes in a jerrycan.
On arrival we noticed something a bit strange stuck in the tread of the rear left wheel. Closer inspection showed that it was a repair that had been done previously that was slowly working its way loose, so we changed the wheel just in case.
Dinner was surprisingly good!
South from Fort Portal the road was tarred but a bit lumpy with the occasional pothole. It slowly got worse - until it was mostly pothole. A lot of the time it was easier driving in the dirt at the edge. A lot was very scenic though with the Rwenzoris in the distance to our right.
We recrossed the equator just after entering the park - at least on this road it was marked, to be honest we've now crossed it so many times that we just sailed straight on past leaving an overland bus pulling in for the customary photos.
The main road like all public roads in the park is free to use, so we drove slowly watching for wildlife.
Before getting to the channel we turned off onto another public road, this time poor dirt towards Kasenyi on Lake George. We intended just doing a short stretch just to get an idea of its condition and what could be seen. We saw 3 big male elephants, two were browsing near the road, then the third arrived. He started tossing his head, glaring at us and looking quite grumpy in spite of our engine being off. For the first time ever we decided to reverse away slowly to give him some space. This worked, he followed the others gradually into the bush, grazing as he went. Sue has got more nervous about elephant encounters since we met a grumpy female with calf in the Masai Mara a couple of years ago. In the end these were the only ellies we saw at reasonable distance in QENP. After a while we turned back to the main road to go and find the campsite.
Just before the bridge over the Kazinga channel there is a settlement called Katanguru - possibly the scruffiest looking place that we've seen so far. The bridge over the channel was spectacular - thousands of birds flying close to the water, terns, swallows, cormorants, kingfishers all feeding. The power lines acrosss the channel were all covered with hundreds of pied kingfishers perched on them, but the activity over the water was intense.
We stayed at Engiri lodge as recommended by Robert - slightly odd but at $20 each including both dinner and breakfast it was relatively good value. There is no toilet on the campsite (they're still building it?) and no lock on the door of the ladies in the main building and hot water for showers comes in a jerrycan.
On arrival we noticed something a bit strange stuck in the tread of the rear left wheel. Closer inspection showed that it was a repair that had been done previously that was slowly working its way loose, so we changed the wheel just in case.
Dinner was surprisingly good!