Eldoret, Kenya to Jinet, Uganda
Up this morning at 6am for 6:45am breakfast and departure at 7:30am sharp for border crossing to Uganda. This might sound easy if I was staying in a hotel and everything was prepared but it’s a bit more complicated when overlanding. That’s that the official title for what I’m doing: overlanding.
I got up at 6, washed myself down with wetwipes; start at the top and work down. Then I put the stuff I would need during the day in my daypack and the stuff I would need at night, while camping, in the night pack. Then I unpitched and folded my rent and put in and it’s pegs in another bag. Finally, I dumped the contents of my wee bottle into the bushes. and washed it out and stowed it away in the night bag.That’s not wee as in small, Remember, you don’t leave your tent at night when snakes, scorpions and spiders abound, even lions and other predators on occasions. Then I brought the whole lot down to the truck and stowed away in the locker under my seat. Whew, all that before breakfast!
Then, on 3 out of 4 days I wasn’t cooking, breakfast . After breakfast, we wash everything up, load all the provisions, pots and pans , gas bootles and cooker, tables and chairs back into their respecting places in the truck. We then fill our water bottles from the water carriers on the truck and hit the road.
So, you can see its nothing at all like staying in a hotel. If I’m cooking when we’re leaving, I get up earlier or rush like crazy.
The border crosfind was fairly uneventful. Unually, for me, both Kenyan and Ugandan immigration stations were side by side. No no-mans land with armed soldiers like in many other countries I have travelled through. We got our exit stamps, shuffled to the other window, got Ugandan entry stamp and we were in.
I changed some money, $100 for 369,400 Ugandan Shillings, UGX. I’m rich now, rich beyond the dreams of avarice. While we were waiting for the rest to complete immigration, I bought some samosas from a street vendor. They were delicious.
Street vendors in both Kenya and Uganda are remarkedly persistent and unfailing friendly, smiling constantly.
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