We were back to the usual early starts today, up for 6.30am breakfast (scrumptious and more than adequate scrambles eggs with baked rams, provided by Team Adequate) and a 7am departure. This time it wasn't raining, so we redid our equator photos before hopping on the truck.
After a few hours driving around the outskirts of Kampala, we stopped at a supposedly huge (don't worry, there's a map inside!), and decidedly empty shopping centre. It was actually quite spooky to be in a shopping centre without anyone else being there. Everyone stocked up on supplies, then we made the final push before our final destination of the Nile River Explorers camp at Bujagali Falls, about a 20 minute drive downriver from the source of the Nile at Jinja. Bujagali Falls is actually now Bujagali Lake, as three months ago, they completed a dam which has turned the Nile River into more of a lake for that section and drowned the falls.
They have a beautiful setup at the NRE camp, with a beautiful bar and cafe setup overlooking the Nile. I had a yummy falafel wrap and beer for lunch while taking in the gorgeous view. Malcolm had sold us all on going on an all you can eat, all you can eat sunset (ahem, booze) cruise which left at 5pm, so we all had some much deserved rest after a hard day on the truck before getting ready for the cruise (makeup, yay!).
Everyone went on the cruise, except for Diana and David, so the boat was overrun by Oasis passengers and crew, and two poor Danish girls who didn't quite know why they'd gotten themselves into! The top deck of the boat was the place to be, as it was a beautiful warm evening, and the drinks started flowing. The first hour of the cruise was reasonably civilised, but the shots of vodka (yuk), gin (yuk) and rum (double yuk) soon kicked in and the party really got started. Drinking double gin and tonic with a shot of vodka, helped too. It's lucky that everyone was too busy drinking to worry too much about eating, because it was finger food provided, not an all you can eat buffet!
Everyone was having a great time having a bit of a dance party on the top deck, when without warning, Mitch appears from downstairs wearing only his jocks, and jumps overboard! Everyone just froze, then it was like there had been a silent call to abandon ship - in various states of undress, every single person jumped overboard too. You may have heard reports of the water being infested with crocs and hippos, but these claims were grossly overstated. There aren't in hippos in this section of the Nile, and it's highly likely that there weren't any crocs in the area either, as apparently they don't like deep water. That's what we've been told, anyway.
The boat pulled back into camp at 7pm, and we all piled off, soaking wet and headed for the bar. Not everyone made it to the bar straight away though, as I've heard several reports of skinny dipping! Oasis overran the bar to continue the night's festivities, and looking back its hard to believe the state we were in at such an early stage of the evening. It felt like 2am when the NRE guys played the video of that days whitewater rafting (it was only 9am). We had signed up for rafting the next day, and the video was full of people losing out against the rapids.
Lots of laughs were had, and James spent a good part of the evening freaking out the Danish girls with his drunken antics. I crawled off to bed at what felt like dawn, but was probably more like midnight.
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