Lake Bunyonyi

Last Friday was a public holiday, so Thursday afternoon we took off on an 8 hour bus ride out of town.  The ride was marvelously painless.  Everyone had their own seat, and there was distant Afro-beat music to be heard at all times.  The street vendors at every stop immediately hopped aboard to sell snacks, and usually didn't leave until the bus is nearly full speed.  The countryside of Uganda is beautiful, some parts full of trees and other parts grasslands.  At one point I woke up to the whole bus full of smoke as we were passing by the site of a massive fire on the plain.

Lake Bunyonyi, meaning place of little birds, is in the south-western part of the country--but still far enough from the border to be safe.  It is one of the few lakes in Uganda without the bilharzia parasite (schistosomiasis), and is so deep that the exact depth is unknown.  We did tons of swimming, canoeing, hiking, and running.  As we passed by little islands in the canoe, kids would run out from the trees to the shore and try to get us to come play and swim with them.  We saw the amazing crested crane, the national bird of Uganda and prominent feature of the flag, up-close!  We slept each night in a safari tent overlooking the lake.