We left fort portal and drove down to Queen Elizabeth National Park for Wednesday/Thursday nights. We stayed at the simba camp= simba is swahili for lion. The rooms were great but the food was expensive- one night they tried to serve us potato curry with roast potatoes as the vegetarian option! It was here that we discovered the local banana gin called Warugi- or ugi for short. Tastes just the same but costs $0.55/shot. With a little tonic water or bitter lemon we were set.
On Wednesday afternoon we decided to add an evening game drive to the itinerary. This cost an extra $35 each for park entry and gas but was worth it because we saw two lions- a young male and a female lying down about 10 feet from our car. Wow! They are beautiful. We also saw elephants (up close) and warthogs and many antelope. On Thursday morning our game drive was quieter but we glimpsed a leopard-incredible! Thursday afternoon we went on a boat ride on the Channel that connects Lake Albert to Lake Edward. We saw many hippos, numberous birds including the saddle beaked crane, we saw a crocodile who had tried to eat a python but the python's fang pierced the croc's lip making swallowing impossible- so he swam dragging the dead python with him. We also saw a fish eagle catch a Nile perch. Take that National Geographic!
On Friday morning we drove to Lake Mburo. On the was in we were thrilled to see a harem of zebras! Once inside we went for yet another boat ride with many fish eagles and hippos. We got too close to one hippo and had to race away as it lunged up out of the water to attack our boat. We saw how the local fisherman fish- they use floating papyrus reeds weighted with rocks to suspend the nets. We ate dinner at the open air canteen by the lake and we had a great view of hippos and warthogs. The next morning we left at 6:30am for a brilliant game walk and learned that the most dangerous animal is the buffalo who does not like to be surprised. We saw a new breed of antelope called a Topi. That afternoon we went on a game drive and Sarah spotted a mongoose (I missed it) and we saw a new breed of antelope- the Elan.
We are now in Kampala. Today we went to Mulago hospital and began with rounds. We heard about the extremely high volume of cases (sometimes labour admissions numbered 120 in 24 hours), the many successes but also a few tragic stories of deaths due to anaesthetists not showing up for their shifts, refusing to anesthetize a patient who was too sick only to have them die anyways, a broken oxygen set up and lighting in one of the ORs. Several ruptured ectopic pregnancies were delayed in getting surgery because the gynecology OR was being used for cesearean sections. We heard about a woman who had had a failed abortion at 20 weeks at a local clinic- they tried 5 times to remove the products of conception- perforated her uterus and let her go septic before finally referring her... I have great admiration for the hospital staff and the great volume of women they serve despite shortages of staff and a lack of functional equiptment. Did I mention there was a grave shortage of sutures?
After rounds the BC team hit the high risk ward today in full force- good things- in only 3.5 hours we caught 6 babies between us. Carolyn 1, Sarah 1, Lyanne 2, Alix 1, Cathy 1. Mickey and Angela helping all. All were happy endings but 1- Alix's catch was a macerated still birth. We left work in hopes of finding the fabric market but our driver took us to a craft market instead- no worries- the gals happily dove in. Delicious samosa and rolex for dinner tonight- best $0.50 dinner ever.
Posted by Alix
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