RAINFOREST, JINGA SATURDAY FEBRUARY 23rd
Up at 7am to drop Bri and Deniece down to have their hair African braided – supposedly 10 hours maximum. We went to the hair salon and then had to go next door to choose the colour of the fake hair they were going to braid and intertwine into Bri and Denieces hown hair. At 6pm we were heading out for dinner at the restaurant up in the Rainforest on the way to Jinja, just Danielle, Shannon, Deane and I. Bri and Deniece were still not home so we called in to see if they were nearly finished, 1 more hour for Bri and then they were going to get a boda boda home from Mukono.
We headed for the rainforest, 45 minutes from Mukono on the road to Jinga, this big flash sign down this little side road through huts and village, then up a narrowish dirt road, to the guard at the watchpost (the safety arm is up until you arrive and then they put it down so that you cant go through and the guard comes out, bit back to front we thought!! Once you are past the guard you suddenly arrive in this large carpark, still no sign of what to expect, then all of a sudden you walk down a path and around a corner and there is this huge entrance, restaurant and open air two storey structure, all timber AMAZING, we went for a walk through the resort and checked out the swimming pool (where the monkeys usually swing from tree to tree but it was a little late and getting dark) and we looked at the accommodation – private wooden chalets in the forest hidden away – awesome , may have to con Deane into going back there – bit pricy tho.
We headed back for the restaurant and were given the prime spot right in front of this large open concrete pit with a log fire – it was so cool and then we had a 5 course meal – 30,000 ushillings – approx NZ$25 each. Awesome place and a very enjoyable night.
On the way home we didn’t think to stop in at the salon to see if the girls were finished and just headed home through the village and a large pack of about 12 dogs scavenging along the road to the watchmans guard hut on the edge of our property.
Got in and to our horror Bri and Deniece were still not home, we phoned and Deniece had just put Bri on a boda boda home with Anthony at 11.30pm!!!!!!! We were really freaking out so Deane got in the vehicle and as he got the watchmans hut up the road comes this boda with Bri and an Ugandan – obviously they had just rode through the pack of dogs, and NO Anthony in sight. Anthony’s boda boda had needed fuel so had stopped while Bri’s boda driver had just taken off!! SO SCARY and God was really protecting Briana, cos she could’ve ended up anywhere in Uganda, we felt really shocked at what could’ve been the consequences!! Before leaving NZ we had said we would not let Briana out of our sight at anytime and we felt SO irresponsible for having let this happen.
