Plans for 2011

We are off to Cornwall very soon for a trip with Spike and Chewy and a couple of friends of ours and their dog. We haven't been to Cornwall for a very long time, so we are looking forward to going back. We will hopefully fit in a trip down to Lands End while we are there.

We still have plans for an overseas trip as well this year, most likely in October. Still no concrete plans on the destination, we're going to leave it fairly last minute and see if we get a good deal.

We will be going to two Christenings this year and there will be visits to both our families.

Steph has nearly got round to transferring her APS films of Malaysia and Thailand onto disc, so those trips and photos will hopefully be appearing on the blog soon.

We'll be back soon with our trip report on Cornwall.

Good Bye Africa

We have now come to the end of our trip to Uganda. In Kampala we stayed at Le Petit Village hotel. It was a lovely little bit of luxury after our trip, we intended to use the pool but never got round to it. The room was lovely and the hotels restaurant was very good. We met a friendly Texan, who told us about the hotels he had in a couple of countries.

Kampala is a very busy city and there is so much to look at. Newcastle United were playing Sunderland, so we left the hotel to find a bar that was playing the game. We found a little one with a few locals in it who were all pleased to watch the game. They all became fans of Newcastle to support Andy. Luckily Newcastle won, so there was lots of cheering. We bought a round of drinks for our new friends to celebrate the win.

Our trip through the airport was hassle free, we were searched outside the airport and inside, but no difficulties. This is when we saw all the Americans with their huge drums, so we had absolutely no worries about ours. The wait for boarding seemed so long and it was very humid and stuffy. We were relieved when we could finally board. A very lucky passenger near us on the plane was upgraded to first class because he knew one of the cabin crew.

We had a great trip to Uganda and it was a very good choice for our introduction to Africa. We would definitely recommend a trip to Uganda. Very friendly people, great professional service from African Jungles Safaris, amazing animals and an all round enjoyable trip.

We stayed at Le Petit Village, $170 for a double suite

You Learn Something New Everyday

Our next stop on our tour of Kampala was the Bahai Temple. The Bahai faith was a new one to us, we hadn't heard of it before. The temple was high on a hill overlooking the city surrounded by very neat and peaceful gardens. We were introduced to some followers who explained their faith to us. From what we understood, the Bahai faith is about understanding others and their faiths. There is no preacher and every Sunday, the congregation take it in turns to read from the different and numerous Holy books of the world. The temple itself was very calming and peaceful, no talking or photos allowed inside.

We did feel the peace of the place and it was very welcoming. The faith itself did come across as trying to understand others, which we agreed was a good thing and maybe the world needs a lot more of that.

After the pleasant visit to the temple, our next stop was the Kings Palace, well one of them, more his summer home for parties!

We weren't allowed inside, but were allowed to explore the grounds. A member of the palace staff showed us around and told us the history of the place and some facts about the Ugandan Royal family. Steph had to put a sarong around her trousers because any female on the Kings property can automatically be taken as his wife and the Queen never wears trousers! It doesn't matter if you're already married either! From the hill the palace is on we could see a Mosque that was funded by Gadaffi and a huge man-made lake, created by 200 men in 2 weeks!

Around the grounds were lots of car parts. Turns out the parts belonged to many classic cars including Bentleys and Rolls Royce which were destroyed in an uprising in the 1950's.

We were taken to a tunnel built into the ground. Turns out it was Idi Amin's torture chamber which was originally built as a gun store. The place used to be fully electrified when it was the torture chamber. A layer of water below the cells was also electrified. They are not sure how many people died, but it was a lot. They think some of the bodies might be at the bottom of the man-made lake. It was a very sad place and horrifying to hear the stories.

We bought a traditional picture off a local artist at the palace and were then showed around a small photo gallery of the Royal family. All in all, it was a very interesting little visit.

We finished off our day with a pizza for lunch and then returned to our hotel.