travelling upcountry 20 Feb

6 am Friday is an ungodly hour. I know pilots are used to hours like this, but let’s face it. I am not a morning person. So when I had to be out the door 10 minutes before 6 to meet Rosemary at 6, I was not entirely thrilled. Especially since Rosemary didn’t show up until at least 6:30. African time versus Mzungu time, I guess. So Angie and I were looking forward to a nice relaxed car ride.

When Rosemary pulled up, I realized something that had escaped her mind when talking about the trip. Her daughter, Betty, would be joining us. So instead of 3 people plus driver, we are up to 4 people plus driver in a little Nissan. Did I mention that the trunk was already full of stuff? Angie’s bag fit, but mine did not, as well as another bag we had to take out for some reason. A little fuzzy on those details, as it was 6:30 in the morning and I was trying to calculate how much space I would actually have in the back of the little car for however long the journey would be.

So the bags went in the car with us, and we folded ourselves in. Rosemary told me that the roads have improved significantly, and a journey that used to take 10-11 hours would be down to 6 or 7. I dozed in and out of sleep for the next two hours while we went from Nairobi to Nakuru. We stopped for tea in Nakuru around 9:30. I was perfectly content without stopping, but if Rosemary says stop, we stop.

From Nakuru we went to Kisumu. We passed through Molo, where a fuel truck tipped over a few weeks before. The Kenyans did not heed the warnings of petrol being dangerous, and hundreds of people rushed in for free gas. An explosion killed over 100 people. Next we went through Kechiro, the tea plantation land. I could definitely live there. Rolling hills, covered in green, cool air, reminded me of the northwest. After tea land, we descended through sugar cane land before hitting the rice fields.

In Kisumu, we stopped at a big Nakumatt for, well, I am not entirely sure. Angie and I took the opportunity to buy a little water for the rest of the journey, as well as a few snacks, as it was well past lunch time. This was around 2 in the afternoon.

From there, we continued west. All I knew is that we were headed to the general vicinity of Lake Victoria, and Uganda. About 25 km from the Ugandan border, and 2 hours later, we turned off the main road. The road we turned onto was, well, an adventure. Half the time I was waiting for a lion to come out of the bushes and pounce on our car. The other half the time, my mind was drawing up images of primitive tribal villages, and hoping human sacrifice wasn’t terribly common anymore. A few thoughts of getting stuck came up, but I tried not to dwell on the 4 wheel drive that we didn’t have.

After a half hour of bumping along the awful road, we came into Port Victoria, Kenya. Then we passed through, into the real village. We turned off the dirt road into a bit of a field, which was sort of a driveway. The car pulled up to a house and stopped around 5 pm. If you have been keeping up with time, that means it was about a 10 hour trip, considering we didn’t leave until 7 am. That is African time for you!