Featherings by Vernon R. L. Head

Author:Vernon R. L. Head
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781431426218
Publisher: Jacana Media
Published: 2017-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

Adventures in the search for the Karamoja Apalis

By Adam Riley

THE CROWDED MATATU (local minibus taxi) rolled onto the dusty streets of Masindi. I had been wedged in the back row for the last four hours and although my butt was throbbing with pins-and-needles, my mind was racing on what my next move should be… I had a dreadful foreboding that my Uganda trip would be spent on public transport like this, bumping from town to town, trying to find my companions.

My friends Jon and Shez Rossouw and Marco Sacchi were contracted to compile a bird-finding guide to Uganda and had already been in the country for a couple of months. Inspired by my earlier visit, they had invited me to join them for a few weeks. Just as I was leaving, my terminally ill father had sadly passed away and I wasn’t able to fly on the date I was scheduled to meet them. Being 1998 and pre internet and cellphone days, I was unable to contact them. A few weeks later I decided to head up anyway. All I knew was the name of the hotel they had used in Kampala and that they had a vehicle and driver provided by the Uganda Tourism Board.

Once I arrived, I bummed a lift late at night from Entebbe airport with some Irish ex-pats who dropped me off at the seediest hotel I had ever had the misfortune to frequent. Here I was informed that my buddies hadn’t checked in for many weeks. Frustrated and exhausted I barely recall climbing into bed before leaping out in disgust as I hit a wet patch in the middle of the mattress that could only have been caused by something unsavoury… Needless to say, I spent the rest of the night on the floor in my sleeping bag!

The next morning I made my way to the Uganda Tourism Board offices and was told that the last contact with my friends was a week earlier when the group was in Murchison Falls National Park. This massive park, straddling the Nile, has several campsites and lodges and is nearly 100 km from the nearest town, Masindi. Off I went. Just as my matatu was pulling into the taxi rank, one of the luckiest coincidences in my life occurred.

It turned out my friends left Murchison Falls days earlier. They had been birding in Budongo Forest (where I would never have found them), and were about to head south. However, Marco was suffering from a bad headache so they detoured into Masindi to visit a pharmacy.

Lo and behold, my matatu parked right next to them! Peering forlornly out of the dusty square inch of window that I was privy to, I spotted Shez’s bright red hair just as she climbed into an old Land Rover! They were about to pull out when they were distracted by a crazy mzungu (Swahili term for a white man), screaming and waving his arms in a frenzy, as he clambered over locals to scramble out of a taxi…

Reunited, the next few weeks were jam-packed with birding adventures.

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