The Safari, Part Three: Everything That Can Go Wrong Does

Continued from The Safari, Part Two: Bliss.

In the morning as we were eating breakfast, our driver walked in. We thought he was there to pick up our bags, but we found out that he was actually coming to let us know that our car had a flat tire. He tried to change it, but the spare was flat too. He had to remove the tires and carry them across the river to a service station and get them fixed. He told us he hoped to be back across on the 12 (which meant we couldn't leave until after 2). That actually worked well for us because it gave us time to swim and eat, which as you know, we did.

The Ferry to leave the lodge was leaving between 2:15 and 2:30, but, we could actually see when it left the other side, so we had a good idea of how to time our departure which we could do from the balcony where we were eating our lunch. We thought we were ready to go, and that my mom just had to sign for our lunch before we left. We thought wrong. Or rather, we were given bad information. It turned out that checking out was much more complicated than we had been told it would be by the front desk, because our lunch had to be added to our stay (each night includes three meals, but we had eaten lunch the previous day as well). It finally got taken care of, and we raced down to the dock only to see the Ferry just pulling away. Just.

We were disappointing, but there was another one scheduled in a half-hour, so we settled in to wait, and had an amusing baboon encounter. It turns out that baboons are the raccoons of the jungle, and they will do almost anything for food, including jumping into an occupied taxi. I got a great video, which I will post when I get home, of the baboon picking our trash out of the can and eating our granola bars and cheez-its.

The Ferry came, we boarded, and waited for the next car to load. My mom was sitting in the front passenger seat, and our driver was outside of the car. Mom spotted some hippos by the Ferry and decided she needed her binoculars to see them better, and climbed into the back to pull them out of her bag. Just as she stepped into the back we heard a loud crash. Our windshield suddenly had a huge chip, just off center on the passenger side, with crack radiating outwards all the way down and across. Small chips of glass littered my mom's seat. We thought that maybe the car backing up onto the ferry had kicked up a rock, or something. Windshields don't just break.

Just then we saw a little boy being scolded. It turned out that he had been throwing rocks into the water. The ranger, who had a gun, asked the boy to stop because there are so many animals in the river. The boy decided it would be an excellent idea to throw rocks at the ranger instead. The ranger was standing near our car. The rock missed the ranger and hit our car.

Have you ever seen or read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. If you were to imagine all of the children except Charlie, and roll them into one, you would have this little boy. He probably would have turned out to be a very nice little boy, if it wasn't for his parents (who were absent). He was on vacation with his grandparents, and they had absolutely no control over him, as evidenced by the fact that he was throwing rocks at a park ranger with a big gun.

We got across the river and waited on the other side for our driver to sort things out with them. They declared that they would fix the windshield, once we got to Kampala, and until then they had a wonderful temporary solution- a bumper sticker, that they would use to hold the windshield together for the 6 or 7 hours over bumpy dirt roads that we still had to travel. Mom and I objected rather stubbornly. We were not going to travel, at night, through the bumpy dirt roads, with no cell phone service, and the possibility that our badly cracked windshield could explode at any moment. The grandparents of the boy felt this was unreasonable and loudly declared that we were only upset about the situation because we were racists. And yes, they knew about Tommy. They weren't Africans, and thus they must have felt (absurdly) that our racism extended only to their particular ethnicity. I think they just wanted to get out of taking responsibility for their grandson's actions, as the events that unfolded proved.

They decided that we could share their car, so that we could ride in safety, and that our driver would just have to proceed, but that we would caravan so that if anything happened we could help him. We got into their car, and they all promptly got out (there were five in the family- two grandparents, an aunt and uncle, and a child) and crammed into our car, even though there was an entire bench seat open in the van. Whatever. Then their drive informs us that we need to stop and pick up their luggage and some food they had ordered, because one of them was diabetic. Of course we agreed, because diabetics need to eat, and since they had already ordered the food it would be fast. We were getting nervous because all of the sorting out had taken some time, and it was getting late quickly, and we were hours from paved roads. We proceeded to their lodge (Sambiya River- a total dump compared to Parra and only slightly cheaper). On the way there we were attacked by tsetse flies inside the van. Awesome. When we arrived, we went in and ordered a coke and a banana for Tommy to give them time to eat. Then we noticed that they weren't eating. In fact, they were just drinking. A bottle of wine. And our new driver (since we were in their car) was having a very large beer. Interesting. Mom went and asked the waiter what was going on, and we were informed that they had not previously ordered food. In fact, they had just ordered, and they had ordered the thing on the menu that takes the longest to prepare, and it would not be ready until at least six. Awesome. At length, their food came, and they ate it as slowly as possible. Finally, at 6:25 Mom asked them to hurry. The little boy declared he could not be hurried, because people who eat quickly become fat, and he did not want to be a fatty like his grandfather, whose belly was, according to him, so huge that he broke his belts everyday. Yes, he said that out loud. And no one contradicted him. His grandfather really wasn't even that big. Then, they called for tea, and started pouring out cups of tea, and sipping them, as if they hadn't lied to us about their dinner being previously ordered and ready. Finally Mom said we had been more than patient and that we had to leave NOW. The grandfather got so angry, but eventually they moved and we finally left at 6:45.

By the time we reached the park gate it was after dark, and there was an issue about the ranger letting us out due to how late it was, and us needing to pay another fee in US dollars (which we didn't have). The matter was settled to the satisfaction of both parties, and he opened the gate.

After driving a but further, the van we were in blew a tire. Yes, another flat tire. Now there were more of us in the van, as the Aunt and Uncle decided to ride with us after all. Between the two drivers it was fixed fairly quickly. Then we went to gas up, and Mom, barely, and I mean barely, escaped falling in a five foot ditch. Grace of God.

We still had at least two hours to go, when our drive fell asleep at the wheel. That's right, he fell asleep at the wheel. We knew because he totally swerved, and he had to admit it to us. Then he did it again. It turns out that he had barely slept for the past two nights. And, remember, he had been drinking beer. So Mom, who was sitting in the front, had to talk to him for the entire rest of the way in order to keep him awake.

Then we got to Kampala and met the agent of the car for negotiations over the payment. Not surprisingly, the grandfather basically refused to pay. He agreed to 95 dollars for the windshield. He refused to pay any damages to the owner of the car, who lost out on a great deal of money because he had the car booked for the rest of the week. He barely agreed to the 95, because he felt it was too high. FOR AN ENTIRE WINDSHIELD. Our driver had expected that this might happen, which is why we had to stay in their van the entire time, instead of switching back to our car when the roads smoothed out. They probably would have ditched us and ran without paying a dime. Of course the man tried to say that we had benefited because their car had air conditioning (which mattered almost not at all since we traveled at night and it was unnecessary). Then the owner of the car turned on our driver and decided to charge him, because the other man wouldn't pay up. We actually don't know how the situation ended, because after negotiations broke down our driver brought us home.

The point is, we got home at 2:30 am. We were exhausted and miserable, but safe, which was a miracle considering.