Bwindi – Day 2 – Sunday – 2/20
When we arrived in Kihihi, there were three Range Rovers waiting in the parking area, separated from the dirt airstrip by a split rail fence. As an employee hand carried the luggage from the plane to the parking area, we walked over and find Petrus in a Volcano Safari shirt. He doesn’t have a sign but knew our names and seemed to recognize us. We pointed out our bags which he loaded into the Range Rover as we went into the “terminal” for a pit stop. I took the opportunity to put some Volteran cream on my knee which was now quite stiff after the somewhat cramped plane ride.
Petrus told us that the trip to Volcano Bwindi Lodge would be about 2 hours. It was not really that long a drive, but he made this into an informative ride, stopping along the way to point out sights like termite mounds, tea fields, birds, village shops, etc.
At first the road was paved with dirt speed bumps every so often to keep speeds down. After a little bit, we turned off onto two lane dirt road that continues all the way to the lodge. Along the way, we saw a few trucks and maybe six other cars. But there were hundreds of motor bikes carrying all manner of things, including one with a family of four squeezed on.
We got to Volcano Bwindi Lodge which had a gated entrance and pulled into the interior car park. At a pergola adjacent to the car park, we met Tony, manager, and Kallen, who will be our personal contact during our stay. They gave us a fruit drink and provided us with some basic information about the Lodge. Then we started down to our “banda” or thatched roofed house. It had started to rain, and they provided umbrellas.
At this point, I can’t bend my left leg at all without pain and the path to the main lodge was a downward sloping stone path which contains 55 steps that I took one step at a time. We reached a small patio area just outside the main lodge and then turned left and continue down to our banda. It was a relatively long distance (for me) and there were more “one at a time” steps. Margi and Kallen would get a bit ahead of me and had to stop and wait. Petrus walked with me and a couple of staff members were behind me carrying our bags.
We arrived at the banda and it was full on raining. The banda had a covered front porch with lounge chairs. We entered the banda into a large living room with soft chairs and a coal fireplace. Then through an archway into the bedroom area which was about the same size and had its own coal fireplace. Finally, there was an end room that had the closet/changing area, twin sinks, toilet, and shower. The décor was rustic but stylish and each room had a cathedral ceiling.
Kallen gave Margi a cell phone and explained how to use it to reach her or a backup if we needed anything. She showed us the lunch menu and we selected something and agreed we would come to the main lodge at 12:30 for lunch. After Kallen left, we unpacked and settled in. I took a Tramadol (opioid) for my pain and laid down.
At 12:15, the rain had stopped, and we started up the relatively long path (with steps) to the main lodge. Despite pain Rx, I still can’t bend my leg, so each stair was taken one at a time (good leg lifted bad one onto step and repeat). Magically, there was an older man (40’s??) who walked with me up the path. We got to the top, to the little patio just before the main lodge and I started to feel faint. My recollection was that I leaned against the railing and then sat down. Margi claimed that I turned white and she and my companion got me to a chair that a couple of gardeners hustled over. After sitting for a few minutes, I felt better and we proceeded the short distance to the main lodge.
The lodge was rustic with an initial large room with lots of windows overlooking the valley and it had soft chairs and a spotting scope. Beyond this was the actual dining room which was one long table. We sat at one end and there was a young family with two under 12 yo girls finishing their meal at the other end. We didn’t interact. Margi opted for wine but I stuck with a Diet Coke because of the Rx I took. Lunch was a deconstructed burger and fries for Margi and a Ugandan dish that was egg and veggies wrapped up in something like a pita roll for me. Both were good.
After we ate, Margi left the table for 10 or 15 minutes. When she returned, she informed me that we were changing rooms to something closer to the lodge and that I needed to stay put while she went back to the original banda to pack things back up so that the staff can move our stuff to our new banda. She had also requested that a local MD prescribe something to help me. After 20 or so minutes, Margi and Kallen escorted me to our new banda. It was much closer to the main lodge and with no steps!! It was nice but not as spacious as the original one. In this one, there was a full-length porch and you entered a combined living room with a coal fireplace and bedroom. In the back was a closet/changing room and the bath, with double sink, toilet, and shower. A nice touch at the bed was a larger hanging frame over the bed for the mosquito netting so that you could get out of the bed without fighting with the netting.
I got into bed while Margi unpacked. We were told that the Lodge found a doctor but he wanted to see me and will probably want me to go to the local hospital. So, we were back on the move again, this time up the inclined path with 55 steps to the car park area. They had found me a walking stick (really a stick), which helped a bit, but lifting myself up repeatedly with just my right leg was beginning to wear. At the car park, Petrus helped me to get into the Range Rover which was a bit tricky as I had to slowly bend my leg to fit in.
We sat there waiting for the doctor. After a few minutes, a very fit white-haired man knocked on my door and introduced himself as Scott Kellerman, a 76 yo Family Practitioner from CA who has been in Uganda since 2005. He asked me what happened, and I explained. He wanted to look at my knee, so I exited the car (carefully) and hobbled over to the pergola by the car park. As I have jeans and hiking boots on, I removed both so that he can see my knee. Dr Scott examined my knee and said he wanted to get x-rays to be sure nothing was broken. So, pants and boots went back on, and I squeezed back into the Range Rover and along with Dr Scott, we took the 10-minute ride to Bwindi Community Hospital. As we pull into the hospital parking lot, through a gate with a guard, Dr Scott pointed out a separate building which contained 4 new ICU beds which increased the total number of ICU beds in Uganda from 43 to 47 (in a country of 48 million). He was very proud of this and understandably so, as we learned that he founded the hospital himself.
Dr Scott directed us into the 2 bed ER, which had one other patient. Dr Scott called for a Ugandan MD to look at me while he attended to the other patient, who was already hooked up to IV’s and other medical equipment. After a quick check by the Ugandan MD, I was pushed in a wheelchair to the building that had the x-ray machine. The machine looked fairly new but still required that the x-rays be manually developed. After some careful positioning by the technician, there were two sets of x-rays for Dr Scott to review. He concluded that nothing was broken, and this was a soft tissue injury, basically a sprained knee, that will heal fine within a week or 10 days. He recommended that I see an orthopedist when I got home. They gave me the x-rays to take with me.
They wheeled me to the administration area where we talked about treatment. As I already had an opioid pain Rx, Dr Scott suggested a knee immobilizer, but they didn’t have one in my size. So, I left with some ACE bandage to wrap my knee. We asked about payment, but they said there was none as the owner of the Volcano Bwindi Lodge was a generous patron of the hospital. I also asked Dr Scott about payment, and he also declined. We will do a donation after we return to the US (donated $1000 to Kellerman Foundation on 4/28/22).
After about 1.5 hours, we were back in the Range Rover for the short ride back to the Lodge. Then I tackled yet again the downward sloping stone walkway with the 55 steps. Dr Scott went all the way to the entry walk of our banda because it turned out that his house was only about 100 yards further down the path. I thanked him profusely.
Back in the banda, I needed Margi’s help to get my shoes off and get my PJ’s on as I still cannot bend my left leg at all. With the walking stick, I hobbled around but sitting of any kind was a challenge. I took some Tylenol and went to bed. Kallen came with a dinner menu as the lodge was willing to bring our meals to our room (we were relatively close to the main lodge).
We requested a fire (charcoal) and had our dinner in front of the fire around 6 pm. As with lunch, the food was good. We both had some wine and talked. We had paid the non-refundable $800 per person per day gorilla permits for 2 days but it was clear that I would not be able to go on Monday. So, we agreed that Margi will go alone on Monday, and I will stay in the banda and hopefully recover enough to allow me to go on Tuesday.
Kallen came to pick up the dinner plates, etc and brought the breakfast menu. We ordered breakfast for 6:45 am in the room as Margi must depart for the gorilla trek at 7:30 am.
Day 3 – Monday – 2/21
My night was fitful sleep, and I got up a few times, slowly and carefully, to use the bathroom. The alarm sounded at 6 am but Margi didn’t hear it, so I got out of bed and hobbled over to turn off the alarm on my phone which had been plugged into our charger on the writing desk. I went to Margi’s side and woke her. She dressed and we had breakfast together.
Amy had purchased two Go-Pro type cameras for us but as we have never used them, Margi opted to take my Nikon with telephoto lens. She had used it before but I gave her a short tutorial on the automatic mechanism. Kallen came around 7:25 to escort Margi up to the car park to meet Petrus who drove her to the main guide station and assisted her with getting into a group of 8 people.
My day was boring. I took Rx, slept a little, wrote in my journal, and watched the cleaning ladies as they worked. After lunch that Kallen brought (a deconstructed burger), I ventured out onto the front porch with a pair of binoculars and was able to sit in a chair and looked across the valley at the dense forest. Nothing but trees to see.
Margi returned at about 1:30 pm and she was triumphant. She saw the gorillas, even sitting within 5 feet of the silverback. We sit and she described her trek. After being assigned to a group of 8 and meeting her guide, Petrus drove her about 45 minutes to a location on the edge of the Impenetrable Forest. The guide then led them for another 45 minutes to a habituated group of 9 gorillas, which they followed, up and down hills, as the gorillas ate and moved through the forest. Following the gorillas was a challenge as they don’t call it an Impenetrable Forest for nothing. After their hour with the gorillas, they trekked back out.
As recommended, Margi had a female porter who helped her, carrying her knapsack, and helping in trickier parts. She only fell once at the end while crossing a log. I looked at the 100’s of pictures that Margi took. I was envious
Margi showered and then went for a complementary 30-minute massage which she extended to a full hour for $25. Back at the banda, she showered again to get off the lotion from the massage.
We had wine brought to the room at about 5 pm. The wine Margi had been drinking was not available (included) so we went for a premium bottle of red for $35 which Margi enjoyed. They kept the bottle so she finished it at dinner the next day. I drank my included white wine. We ordered dinner; Margi got steak and boiled potatoes (good) and I got tilapia meuniere and rice (also good).
We continued to talk about my trekking tomorrow. Rob, our travel agent in UK, thought it would be a shame for me to come so far and not get to see the gorillas, so he proposed the “stretcher” option where I would be carried to the gorillas. I found this to be humiliating but decided to swallow my pride and do it (at an additional cost of $300). Rob pointed out an ancillary benefit in that we would be providing employment to a group of young men who would be sharing the carrying duties.
Day 4 – Tuesday – 2/22
Rose at 6 am, dressed, and breakfast arrived at 6:45. At 7:25, Kallen showed up to escort us to the car park to meet Petrus who will take us the short drive to the park welcome center. At the welcome center, they took our temp and recorded it with our name. Then into an open auditorium area where a women’s empowerment group was doing a native dance presentation. After about 45 minutes, we were divided into groups of eight and assigned a guide. Our guide was Meddie and our group consisted of 4 Swiss (older husband/wife and younger daughter/son-in-law) and an American couple from Indiana (Paula and Scott). I mentioned to them that I am being carried and I found out that the older Swiss lady will also be carried.
After some brief instructions from Meddie, we got in our respective vehicles and Petrus drove us about 15 minutes to where we began our journey. As a side note, the guide (and Margi’s guide yesterday) never discussed anything about how to act around the gorillas. Nothing about what to do or not do. Nothing!!
As I got out of our vehicle, I saw the hated “stretcher”. It was a car seat welded to piping that extends out in front and back. Each person walking had employed a porter (or two) and each of the stretchers had about 10 young men assigned, so with two guides, the 8 paying customers, all the porters, and two guards with rifles (to scare away elephants who can be aggressive), we were quite a contingent. Four young men took the stretcher and hoisted it and me onto their shoulders, and we were off. So, I was riding 5+ feet off the ground with the porters switching off frequently as they walked.
Now for the trek itself. Given that there were two stretchers in our group, I thought we would be assigned an easy route. That thought was wrong. Where we started required a 3 hour hike (3 miles), mostly uphill, to get to the edge of the Impenetrable Forest!! We were traveling on a wide rocky trail past people’s houses and cattle, stopping frequently.
We started at 9:15 am and did not get to the gorillas until after noon. Near the top, the trail narrowed to a single file path and my porters changed to having just one person in front and one in back with the stretcher now carried down at arm’s length. We reached the top of this mountain, which was a cow pasture and then began a descent into the actual forest. My porters began to RUN down this narrow path, over tree roots and fallen logs, seeming to make a game of the job.
At about 12:15 pm, the guide stopped us all and told us we were near the gorillas. All the porters pulled back and Meddie explained that we needed to be patient as the gorillas were in the trees. All the walking sticks were taken, we had to mask up, and we had to get only our camera equipment out. No food or drinks were allowed. Then we ALL (including me) started walking down the short distance to the gorillas.
We saw them in the trees, spotting a female with a baby hanging on her back and then the silverback. As if on cue, after just 5 minutes they started down from the trees to the ground and moved a short distance to where they laid down to nap. There was one silverback, 3 mature females, and 4 babies (like 1 year old). The silverback sat upright for a time and then laid on his stomach. The females spread out around him, and the babies just played with each other kind of in the middle of them all. It was so eerie to have these powerful animals look at you like you were not even there. There was no sense of them being concerned about our presence. For about 40 minutes they rested, and the babies played, sometimes on the ground and sometimes in the vines above. The adults occasionally moved, and the babies would sometimes go to their mothers and nurse. The silverback occasionally growled at the antics of the babies when they got too close. All eight of us changed positions to get different views of the gorillas.
Meddie warned us when there was 20 minutes left and then 10 minutes left. Just after the 10 minutes warning, one of the females started to move off from the group and slowly the others, including the silverback began to follow. As it turned out, they were moving in the direction we needed to go to return home, so we followed them through the forest. Every so often, the silverback with stop on this trail and just sit for a minute or so. As I was a rather slow walker, Margi and I were at the back of the group, so we didn’t see when the gorillas moved off our path and went somewhere else. In the end, I think we got more than 60 minutes as we followed them out.
Here is 10 min YouTube video of our gorilla experience
The path out was up to the cow pasture at the top of the mountain. I opted to forgo the stretcher and walked this section, which was uphill and over tree roots and along the edge of a steep drop-off. I had my walking stick in my left hand, my right hand was held by the porter in front of me, and there was a porter behind me occasionally pushing me over obstacles. I did the one step thing over obstacles and had issues bending my knee to swing the leg over some. After a bit of walking, we stopped for lunch. At this point, the large group of porters rejoined us and we get our box lunches out of our knapsacks.
I didn’t have much of an appetite and took just a bite or two from a salami sandwich. Margi ate my mini banana. We rested for quite some time. I continued with porter assistance but not in the stretcher. We made it to the cow pasture at the top. I wanted to continue to walk but Margi insisted that I be carried. It started to rain, and this section was still narrow, so the porters teamed up with several on the downhill side keeping me steady. The rain was steady, and I got soaked as my rain jacket was in my knapsack being carried by a porter with Margi.
Next stop was back where the trail widened out and we started going by houses. My stretcher was the first to get to a small two room mud brick house with a dirt floor, one room of which seemed to be a store of some type, as all the porters were gathered around a bar. I was invited to take a seat on a bench in the other room where there was also a woman with a couple of small children. After sitting there for a few minutes, I got up and stood outside the doorway under the overhang. The stretcher lady arrived next followed by the other Swiss and then Margi, who was flanked by two male porters who had literally carried her down the steepest parts.
The rain stopped and we started again. I tried to get Margi to take the stretcher for the remainder of the decent to our vehicles, but she refused. So, I got carried to the next stopping point which was conveniently beside a group of locals who were selling all manner of black carved gorilla faces and figurines. I got out of the chair and when Margi and the group arrived, I insisted that she take the stretcher the rest of the way down. She relented and I told the porters not to stop to wait for me but to proceed directly to the vehicles.
I proceeded down on foot with one of Margi’s female porters carrying my knapsack and holding my hand to steady me. I used my walking stick with my left hand. The way down was not too bad on my knee as there was little need to bend it but I did notice that when I fell on Sunday, I jammed my big toe and because of the rather steep angle of the path, it was rubbing against the toe of my shoe causing some discomfort. After maybe 60 minutes of walking, I saw porters coming back up with the stretcher as Margi had sent them to rescue me. When they got there, I gladly got on and they took me down to the vehicles. It was 4 pm when I got there. The trek has taken almost SEVEN hours,
I spoke to Petrus to ensure that the porters knew that I will be paying via a credit card as I did not budget for this extra $300 in the cash I brought. He had already spoken with the head of the porters, and everything was cool. We were exhausted so we didn’t wait to say goodbye to our fellow hikers; we left to go to the women’s empowerment center where my credit card was processed.
At the women’s empowerment center, we get delayed because Petrus had to contact the head of the porters to see what the extra charge will be for carrying Margi down part of the way. He found that the charge was $150 which does seem steep to me, but I agreed to pay it because I know how hard those guys worked. The lady who processes the credit card transactions got busy with something else so we sat and waited about 20 minutes for her to return. All done, we headed back to the lodge and arrived a little before 5:00 pm.
As they did with Margi yesterday, Lodge staff met us at the pergola adjacent to the car park. They removed our spats and hiking boots and gave us slippers to wear to our banda. They returned the cleaned items that evening. We were dog tired but had a Covid test required for us to get into Kenya. Margi also wanted to get another massage (my complementary one) and we wanted to eat dinner at about 7 pm.
Covid test happened at about 5:15. We thought they would come to our banda but then we were asked to walk to the main lodge. We got to the patio outside the lodge and Tony, the manager, said we should go back to the banda where the test will be done. Three people showed up to do the test and they swabbed Margi first so that she could quickly take a shower and go for her massage. I completed all the paperwork. They needed passports and must fill out some forms and then they swabbed me and I paid $110 cash (as pre-planned). As all of this was happening, Kallen came and got Margi to take her to her massage. Testing team left promising we will have results tonite. The results arrived around 7:30 pm as they must have gone right to the Bwindi Community Hospital and done the test.
Margi got back from her massage (again extended to 1 hour) at about 6:40 pm and had just enough time for another shower before dinner arrived. We had dinner before a fire. Margi had steak and I had tilapia (both good).
We had requested Kallen to have Tony come by our banda to settle for the extra charges (two extended massages and a premium bottle of wine). We offered the remainder of the premium bottle to Tony but he demurred as he was still working. We promised to leave the bottle on our porch so he could pick up later. We also discussed with him the issue of our LONG trek today. He said that most people get back by about 3 pm (we got back at 5) and he promised to take our feedback to the park rangers. We thanked Tony for all the good service and extra special support he provided to me, the lame one. After he left, we finished packing and crashed into bed.
Day 5 – Wednesday – 2/23
We got up early and had a 7 am breakfast in the room. Then it was up the long stone walk with the 55 steps for the last time. We met Tony halfway up and he graciously carried my knapsack up to the top for me. Hotel attendants carried our luggage.
Petrus met us and loaded the bags into the vehicle for the 40-minute ride to the Kihihi airstrip. The return trip was faster than the drive here because there was no sightseeing along the way. At the airstrip, Petrus brought our luggage into the small terminal house and we paid him for his 3 days with us.
As we wait, we spoke to a young Mexican couple who had trekked yesterday. They did not have the marathon that we experienced but they did hear about another group where a female gorilla came over to a female hiker, gently grabbed her leg, and pulled her down. She was startled but not hurt. We also saw the same CA family of 4 who flew in with us, but they didn’t really acknowledge us. The plane arrived and we all get in and with a few people already on the plane, it was a full flight for the 1:10 trip back to Entebbe.
In Entebbe, we parked on the tarmac and took a bus, with our luggage, to the terminal. At the terminal, Margi got off to find a luggage trolley and I secured our bags. We headed for the door as this was not an international flight, so no passport/immigration.
We got outside the terminal to the place where we found our driver on Saturday, but there was no one there with a “Fatcheric” or “Jerome” sign. We waited about 10 minutes and then I dug out a number provided by Rob for the local contact. I tried calling with my cell phone but had no idea how to dial a local Entebbe number from a US phone. Luckily an airport employee came over and used his phone to call Rebecca. I told her that no one was here to pick us up and she said she will send someone.
After about one-half hour watching a couple of lizards run in the outside waiting area, a guy hustled up to get us and took us the short ride to the Boma.
Hit back button and select Boma Second Stay.