New Year in Africa

The last two days were a chore... traveling for  29 hours.  I am not a big fan of spending so much time on my butt!  But last night, at 23:00, I finally arrived in Entebbe.  It had slipped my mind that folks would be celebrating New Year's Eve.  I felt unusually emotional as the taxi drove to my Air BnB with fire works popping all about.  It seemed so right to be here, in Africa, far from home, at the start of 2018.  Out of work.  Waiting to go back to school.  A new chapter in my curious life.  Up till my arrival I kept second guessing what I was doing; if I packed the right things; where I'd be over the next few weeks.  But on that short drive suddenly everything was as it should be. 

Not that finding the Air BnB was without incident.  My Ai BnB host, Susan, had arranged a taxi for me.  But that driver hadn't bothered to make up a sign with my name.  So I found my own taxi at the airport.  This was the same airport that brought Uganda to my attention as a child.  Back then it was a horrible hijacking and daring raid by Israel while Idi Amin was ruling the country that had Uganda dominating the news.  Things are much better now.  So anyway, apparently the Google map link on Air BnB is not so accurate in Uganda.  I ended up at the wrong location.  The taxi driver called Susan and found out we were still 3 km away.  Off we went down a red clay road with red clay speed-bumps on the outskirts of Entebbe.  At one point the drier flagged down a motorcyclist to help show us the way.  As we drove, suddenly the road was blocked by 6 or 8 burning tires.  In Uganda, if you can't afford fireworks then burning old tires is an acceptable substitute.  Unfortunately these tires were all over the road.  It was impossible to drive around them.  The guy on the bike showed us a back road through a different part  of the village that got us past the fires.  I eventually got to the Air BNB somewhere around 12:30, I think. 

There hasn't been any internet connectivity since I arrived.  I realized as I lay in bed this morning how uncomfortable that made me feel.  I suppose if I planned this trip better it would have been a non-issue but I was hoping to do  bit more research once I arrived.  This place is on the far outskirts of Entebbe so I can't just walk into town.  And being January 1st it's a holiday and many places are closed.  I haven't even been able to post that I arrive safely.  Hopefully my family is used to that by now.  It forced me to think about how dependent I have become on connectivity.  It's not a good thing.  I need to go back to using hard copy Travel Guides as a back up.  I also need to seriously consider shifting to  global phone plan for trips. 

Today I am taking it easy.  I reorganized my gear.  I think I planned it pretty well.  The only things that cause me pause are my boots and jackets.  I skipped mountaineering boots in favor of backpacking boots.  The plastic double-boots are much more correct for glacier travel and I'll be doing a bit of that.  But only a wee bit so bringing them didn't seem practical.  And to be air I have done most of my winter mountaineering in backpacking boots anyway.  The issue with jackets is that I only brought down.  I have a good shell so should be able to keep them dry at lower elevations.  But is is still a concern.

OK, time to relax and read the novel I brought.  Tomorrow I head to Kampala and life gets fast again.