by Henry
We woke up to very wet tents from heavy condensation due the cool night air. Packing up wet tents is never fun.
On any given day, if a rider is not feeling well, or for whatever reason is unable to ride, there is always the option of hitching a ride in one of the trucks. The cab in this truck is visible with the door open. The TDA staff is very flexible. At any point, a rider can choose to ride only the morning, only the afternoon, or not at all that day. Besides our two large custom TDA trucks, there is also an SUV and a pick-up truck with a king cab available for support rides.
Today’s ride is 117 km, 2008 m elevation gain, high temperature 24° C, minimal wind.
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Last view of two of the volcanoes in the national park as we cycled out of Rwanda.
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A few kilometers down the road, we happened upon Jeff, whose chain had become incarcerated in his derailleur. Within a few minutes, Tim was on the scene to render his expert assistance, and got Jeff rolling again.
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The Rwanda to Uganda border crossing had long lines, including many locals. It took us about an hour to get through. We had to get an exit stamp in our passport for Rwanda, then go to a second line to get an entrance stamp for Uganda. This also included taking a picture, as well as being fingerprinted. This is our third country, so only seven more border crossings!
Major change in Uganda is that we now ride on the left side of the road. The Brits and Aussies are relieved. We will be riding this way for the next eight countries, all the way until we reach Cape Town. We switched our bike mirrors from left to right. It will take some getting used to.
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First view of Ugandan hills. Despite steepness, they are covered in agricultural fields. We noticed immediately that there were more motorbikes and very few bicycles, as compared to Rwanda. It was also conspicuous that many Ugandan women sported shaved heads, as did the younger girls.
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They have longhorn cattle in Uganda; slightly nerve-racking as we ride right by them on the road.
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View of Lake Bunyonyi from our lunch site. Our destination for tonight is somewhere down there. We got caught in torrential rain right before lunch, and ended up waiting out the downpour under the lunch truck canopy before resuming our ride.
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Sign as I crested the last major hill of the day.
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And moments later, down the road . . . a baboon chewing on a mango seed.
Before heading to our destination, we took a short 2 km detour into Kabale, a nearby town to get some Ugandan cash out of the ATM. The exchange is almost 4,000 Ugandan shillings to the US dollar, so now the bill denominations are quite large.
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A view of our lakeside resort, Lake Bunyonyi Overland Campground. The last 8 km were tortuous, unpaved, narrow, and very rough. 6 km of that was uphill with ridiculous grades as high as 18%. The last 2 km was downhill, but we had to brake and go very slowly to avoid crashing on the uneven dirt road.
Upon arrival, we discovered that Tim had missed a turn and ridden some distance out-of-the-way before realizing his error. So he had some extra mileage for the day. Also, Jeff had to get a support vehicle ride in the afternoon because his rear derailleur cracked and got tangled in his wheel, breaking a couple spokes. Fortunately, several of the (prepared for any contingency) riders were carrying back-up derailleurs, and the TDA mechanics were able to install a replacement derailleur for Jeff expeditiously once he was at camp.
It was a hard day of riding with challenges, and intermittent rain has been forecast for the next 5 days. For that reason, I decided to upgrade to a cottage room to avoid being rained on for at least the next 2 nights/days.
Tomorrow is a rest day by the lakeshore, then we will ride four days in a row through Uganda as we approach Entebbe.
Once again, thanks for sharing beautiful photos. Glad you upgraded…just thinking of all the camping your doing makes my bones creak.
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