Lake Bunyonyi

     In my mind I had rated Lake Kivu a 10 out of a possible 10 (though now that I reflect on it, perhaps I should have deducted a point or two because of the probability that it will blow up one day and kill everyone and everything for miles around).  I had to create a whole new scale when I saw Lake Bunyonyi.  10 out of 10 is not enough for Lake Bunyonyi.
     They say Lake Bunyonyi is one of the deepest in all of Africa, and it is located at a high altitude in the mountains of Uganda, giving it an unusual-for-Africa moderate climate.  The mountains seem to rise right out of the lake, and there seem to be mountaintops coming right OUT of the middle of the lake, since Lake Bunyonyi has many beautiful hilly islands of all sizes.

     We arrived at our beautiful lodge overlooking the lake, and this was the view from my verandah.  I was dirty and tired after my morning of trekking, so couldn't wait to luxuriate in a nice hot shower.  I was in a somber frame of mind, because this was to be my last night in Africa, though my flight didn't leave Kigali until 8:00 p.m.  I felt sure we'd be fitting a lot into that last day.


     There was a very nice restaurant at the lodge, and I sat outside and watched the sun go down.  For those of you who have never had the chance to go to Africa, the sun goes down with very little fanfare there.  One minute it seems like daylight, and then, suddenly, it's dark.  No lingering sunsets like we enjoy during our summer nights.  I guess it has something to do with being so close to the Equator.  We were SO close to the Equator I longed to get there so I could stand with a foot in both hemispheres--I have many ambitious longings--but Moses told me it would be a long long drive.  Better to stay near the lake.   My three comrades had found somewhere else to stay, and there was an important football match on TV, so I had the evening to myself.  I used the time for consolidating my luggage and packing my bag.  I had left home with three bags but was going home with only one (a BIG one).  I went to bed early.
     So, how great is it to wake up to the sound of birdsong?  They were singing up a storm all around the lodge, and I threw the curtains open like a model in an air freshener commercial.  Can you BELIEVE that the morning peace was disrupted by the sound, of all things, a jet ski?  I decided to take it philosophically since it was sunny and otherwise calm outside, and the lake looked even lovelier than the day before.  I had a quick coffee because this was the morning we were scheduled to go on a boat tour of Lake Bunyonyi!

     The little port where we caught our boat was one happening place.  There were many boats that had brought crops into the town and there were many boats waiting to take people out of town, some going to Congo, with which Uganda shares the lake.  Some of these boats were ridiculously over-crowded, and I gather boating disasters are not unusual there.There weren't many tourists around, so Jackie and I got a whole big boat to ourselves and our guide and the guy who was steering. 

Our guide told us to call him "George," but that was not his name.  He knew we didn't have a chance at being able to even pronounce, much less remember, his given name.  So "George" he was. 
     The thing I remember most from our tour was George's description of three of the islands.  The first was a former leper colony.  At one time, about 7000 lepers lived on the island--almost every leper found in sub-Saharan Africa.  A Belgian doctor founded it, apparently, and his house was on a nearby small island. 
     The lepers' island was very beautiful, and I found myself thinking "well, if one had to be a leper, I guess this would be as good a place

to be as anyplace in the world."  With the advent of effective antibiotics, Africa ran out of lepers, apparently, or at least ones that required quarantine, and the buildings on the island were converted to a secondary school, which draws from students from all around the lake.  Our George was an alum---and proud of it.  My irreverent mind got to thinking of what the high school mascot would be in such a place, and what sorts of cheers they would shout at games:  "Go Lepers Go!"  My irreverent mind should just shut up and mind its own business. 
      An even sadder island--and a very very small one at that--was called Punishment Island.  Apparently until surprisingly recently, girls who disgraced their families by becoming pregnant were taken out to this island to die, either by starvation or by drowning.  George explained that the value

of girls is how much a man is willing to pay her family for her, and no man would pay for a woman who had already been pregnant.  Naturally I was outraged and demanded of poor George "What about the boys?"  George said of course there was no punishment for the boys, because "sons are gods to their families."  Oh.  Even I knew better than to pursue the matter any further.


      My favorite island was Upside Down Island.  George told us that legend had it that at one time there was a very productive still on that island

and that, not surprisingly, people from around the lake enjoyed gathering there and partying.  They had a lot of boisterous fun, which attracted the attention of a witch, who wanted nothing more than to join in the fun.  However, when she approached ,the revellers, the party-ers chased her away, wanting nothing to do with the witch.  The witch was hurt and, as my mother liked to say, "irked."  So she did what anybody would do under the circumstances:  she put a curse on the island and turned it upside down, thereby drowning all the revellers.  There's got to be a moral to that story.
     I wish we'd had more time to see more of Lake Bunyonyi, but we had to cut our delightful trip short.   When we got back to shore, I saw two things I'd like to share.

I'd seen many of these flamboyant black and white birds in Rwanda and Uganda, but this is the first one I saw that sat around long enough for me to get a decent picture.  I asked Moses what kind of bird it was, and he told me it was a caped crow and that it was very very common.

And this, I felt, was a fascinating place to park a bike.  
      Plus, now that I look more closely at this photo, there's that crow again!
       Well, I barely had time to catch my breath, when Moses said we MUST be getting going back to Kigali to catch my flight, so I changed into my airplane clothes and hopped into the car.