The Nile River & Murchison Falls

Our safari guide, George

I awoke on Wednesday, rested and ready for the day. I slept wonderfully the night before. It was actually the best night of sleep since arriving. I fell asleep to the sound of Joey watching a movie and a cultural song and dance going on outside our window and I didn't know a thing until our alarm went off at 7:00am.

After breakfast, we boarded a boat for a ride down the Nile River. There were hippos everywhere. I especially love them when they are down in the water, with nothing showing but their eyes and ears. It amazes me how they can be so cute, yet so dangerous. We also saw crocodiles sunning themselves on the bank of the river. As we road along in the boat, my mind drifted away, in thought of baby Moses floating in the bulrushes of this very river. It was further north in Egypt, but the same river, nonetheless. I had never thought of the animals that might be lurking near the little boat that Jochabed had placed her tiny son it. There must have been crocs and hippos in the water there, too. It made me think of just how much faith and trust that Jochabed must have had in her Lord, to place her tiny, helpless baby in this river, so full of danger. She trusted that her Lord would keep Moses safe. What an example of faith!

We arrived at the falls about an hour and a half into the ride. We weren't able to get very close, as the current is very strong. Andrew promised us that we would be able to see more of the falls on the way home on Thursday. The Nile River is wider than I had imagined. I envisioned it as a small river, winding through a thick forest. It actually looks a lot like our lakes in Arizona. We saw several herds of elephant on the banks of the river on our way back to the dock. 

Now, for some comedy! We arrived back at the dock and were filing, one by one, off the boat, when we saw that the muslim university students had not closed the windows on their bus and the baboons had had a party while we were gone. They had gotten into some food that the students had on the bus, and had strewn it on the ground. We all began to take pictures of the this site and one of the students got a little too close. One of the baboons started toward our group and took a swipe at him, then headed our way. We all started running back to the bus. Joey had a box of bottled water and was running with it in tow. I was the closest to the whole thing, and was the last one of our group to make it back to our bus. I have no idea how close that monkey was, but I wasn't about to turn around and look. We all made it back safely and had a good laugh over the whole thing. The students had boarded their bus by this time and were cleaning out their seats and throwing the food on the ground. The monkeys came back and started eating again. It was a great opportunity to take pictures. 

There was a big male in the group and several females with babies. The babies would ride on the back of their mothers, and would jump off and get food every now and then, but if mama moved away, they scurried right back onto her back. They wouldn't let her get very far away from them. The smaller males would run off every time the dominant male would come their way. He pranced around like the king he was and got all the food he wanted. The other monkeys would scurry up and grab what they could before he came their way. We really enjoyed watching them. It was great fun.

After having lunch and a short nap, we boarded the bus for another game drive. We offered to let a few Australians ride with us on the drive. They were another Watoto team that had arrived at the lodge that day, but they had no bus. The ferry was broken down and so their bus was not able to come across. They rangers had taken the boat over and brought them back to the lodge, but until the ferry was fixed, they would not have transportation. Some of them rode with us, while the remainder of their group was divided up between the range rovers that the park rangers drove. 

George, our safari guide, was trying very hard to locate lions for us. We hadn't seen any the day before and this would be our last game drive. About an hour into the drive, he spotted a group of lion cubs lying underneath an acacia tree. There were about nine of them. It was apparent that their moms had gone off hunting and had left them there to wait for dinner. They lay there and just watched us as we snapped pictures. George said they had been born in September and were now seven months old. We stayed there for a while and phoned the other drivers to bring their jeeps over to where we were. 

We were all very pleased with our find, because lions were the only animal we hadn't seen on the drive the day before. As we drove back to the lodge, we passed several groups of giraffe. These are my favorite. I love to watch them. They are so graceful. One of the things that I learned about giraffe on this trip, is that the males are darker than the females, and as they age, their spots darken. There was one giraffe that was almost entirely black. George told us that most giraffe only live about 20-25 years and that this guy was pushing 25. 

After dinner, we all gathered around for another devotional time and some singing. Afterwards, we had a debriefing session with Andrew. We shared with him some ideas that we had for making things better, and we were also able to share with him just how much we had enjoyed having him as our guide. He has been amazing. He spent a lot of time that first day, learning all our names. He has been much more than a guide, he has been a friend, and we all will miss him when we go home.