Having left Kampala in Uganda with our new tyres we felt relieved at being
>back on the bikes after almost a week of sitting around and waiting.  We
>kicked off with a big days riding to the west of Uganda namely a town
>called Fort Portal. This was merely a nights stopover to get to our next
>major destination of Kiboro in the South West as we had blagged ourselves
>onto a gorilla trek which is a must do. We had been told that the waiting
>list was up to 6 months and couldn't believe our luck when we got offered a
>slot in just a few days.  After reaching our hotel having ridden about
>80K's up a dirt track mountain pass we were ready for an early night and
>booked ourselves a taxi to collect us at 6am the following morning.
>
>We were off to the Bwindi National Park, a tropiocal rain forest that's
>extremely dense and mountainous and which borders The Democratic Republic
>of Congo and Rwanda.  Both of these countries along with Uganda are home to
>the VERY rare Mountain Gorillas.  There are only 706 left in Africa and the
>opportunity to see them first hand in their natural habitat was too good to
>miss even if it did cost us $360 each.  As we waited at the trek office
>high up the mountain for another 4 people to arrive, we saw our friends
>from Australia Kevin and Sara who travelled with us from Egypt to Sudan
>walk out of the fog, (It really was gorillas in the mist) Sorry Guys!  They
>amazingly had booked onto the same trek as ourselves and we had not seen
>them for nearly 2 months.
>
>The trackers had left very early to search out the gorillas and we left
>about an hour after them.  Eventually they were found and after over 3
>hours hiking through some of the steepest and toughest terrain we were in
>sight of them.  We had been told the protocal  that we could not get closer
>than 7 meters to them.  The group we saw consisted of about 18 gorillas
>with 2 silverbacks.  As we hacked our way through the vegitation and
>undergrowth they came into sight about 20 meters away and what a
>sight....... The gorillas were initially shy but as we were able to
>manouvre into position they became  more relaxed with our presence and just
>allowed us to video and photograph quite happily.  The climax after an hour
>was walking up a track and suddenly finding we were being followed by the
>gorillas who wanted to pass and walked about 1.5 meters away from us.  It's
>scary stuff when you know a 300Ib gorilla is that close and who's
>temprament can turn at any second.  A great experience that was worth every
>dollar we spent!!
>
>The next day we were off early as we only had 8K's to the Rwandan border
>which was a fast process to get through.  We did another 150K's to the
>capital Kigali through some amazing roads and scenery.  Every inch of
>Rwanda is cultivated for farming and there is not a spare piece of land to
>be seen.  Most of you probably remember the Genocide of 94' between the
>Hutus and Tootsies.  Well this country is now one of the most advanced in
>Africa with a thriving economy and total peace.  Once we got to Kigali
>Martin & I decided to visit the genocide memorial as many overlanders we
>had met on our way through Africa said it really was worth going to.  It
>didn't disapoint...... The scale of what happened there is mind blowing and
>just to give you an idea the memorial is built at the mass graves sight
>where there are 250,000 bodies burried but they have only been able to
>identify 20,000 and a plaque is enscribed with the names.  We were both
>shell shocked by these stats.
>
>We only stayed in Rwanda for a few days but found it to be a great country.
>  The only downside was everytime we stopped on the bikes we would get
>mobbed.  For some reason it was even worse than we had experienced in other
>countries and we thought they were bad.
>
>On our way out of Rwanda and into to Tanzania we experienced another fast
>border crossing and couldn't believe how efficent they were compared to our
>experiences in the north of Africa.  Immediately the landscape changed to
>baron plains of uncultivated land.   We stopped at a midtown called Kahama
>at a cheap motel and for some reason i noticed that all the waitresses had
>attitude and none of them smiled.  No matter how polite we were they were
>all miserable and somewhat aggressive..... But then i've never understood
>the female gender as they are quite happy to pour boiling hot wax over
>there legs and inner thighs then yank the hair out by the root but won't
>touch a spider,,,,nuff said!
>
>As we headed towards Arusha in search of Safari we had to deal with some
>tough roads that consisted of corrugations and deep sand and riding in deep
>ruts caused by the lorries.  This was again testing our riding skills to
>the limit and as i was riding point with Martin in pursuit we came to a
>point in the road that split into two.  I made a decision to go left which
>turned out to be the wrong one as we approached a large area of deep deep
>sand.  I opened the gas and hung on for dear life as the bike swung from
>side to side and did everything it could to throw me off.  I barely made it
>through but was relieved i did.  As i turned around to see how Martin was
>doing i saw this great big plume of sand.  Martin riding behind me was at a
>disadvantage and could not see through the sand i had kicked up.  He took
>the mother of all wipe outs and look liked he and the bike had been
>completely sand blasted.   No damage thankfully and we were on our way.
>
>After a 2 full days of dirt roads we arrived in Arusha.  Every hotel was
>booked and after riding round the city for what seemed ages in 30 plus
>degrees we settled on a less than palatial hotel at $30 USD per night. 
>Well above our budget but we were beyond caring.  Arusha is lacking in beer
>venues and night life so our priority was to book on to a safari ASAP. 
>After some extensive research.... well we called 3 companies and visited
>the tourist board, we settled for the chepest option.  Our first mistake!
>The Great Masaai safari co. were our chosen guides and having sorted all
>the finances we headed out first thing in the morning with our fellow
>safari hunters who were from Israel.  Etaya a great guy who had more camera
>equipent than David Bailey that took up most of the space in the Land Rover
>and Ehoud and Limore also from Israel who had the joys of spending 5 days
>with us for their honeymoon.  Our driver and guide was Abshallom a 50+ year
>old local farmer and our cook was Luca.  This guy can produce amazing meals
>in the most primitive conditions.
>
>Our first days safari was spent in Lake Manyara which was a light
>introduction to the complete safari experience.  We saw a few smaller
>animals then hit camp and had dinner with our Israeli friends.  After
>debating wether the food they were being served was Kocha i think they were
>beginning to have second thougts about having us as company on their
>honeymoon.
>
>The next day was supposed to be an early start to the Serengeti but our
>guide and cook were not the fastest team in the world and ended up taking 2
>hours to get going.  It suddenly dawned on us that we had the oldest,
>noisiest clapped out safari vehicle in Tanzania.  Every vehicle that passed
>us (I would like to say we passed them but sadly we didn't) was fully
>kitted out with 2 spare wheels and didn't veer from side to side at the
>slightest turn of the wheel.   As we only had 1 spare the inevitable
>happened and we got a puncture.  Now getting another puncture in the middle
>of the Serengeti would not be much fun so our only option was to spend half
>of our time getting the punctured tyre repaired.
>
>Our aim was to view the big 5 in Serengeti and in particular the Cheetah as
>these are so difficult to see.  Amazingly we saw a few vehicles gathered
>looking at something so we tail-arsed it over to see that there were 2
>cheetahs in a tree.  Eventually they came down and walked parrallel with
>the vehicles.  Martin turned round and counted over 30 vehicles watching
>these cheetahs and as they moved slowly forward is was like the whacky
>races trying to jostle for position to get that all important photograph. 
>Human vulchers is the only way to describe it!!!
>
>Abshallom our guide drove us to a hippo pool that consisted of at least 70
>hippos all huddled together.  Not exactly exciting to watch when they just
>laze in the water doing nothging.  It was at this point that our guide's
>safari etiquette went AWOL as he said watch this and proceeded to chuck a
>rock into the middle of the sleeping hippos......well you have never seen
>anything like it. These things try to climb on each others backs out of the
>water and all hell breaks loose.  We were in hysterics and having seen the
>reaction went on a stone collecting mission and started firing these into
>the hippo pool from all angles.  70+ pissed off hippos is a great sight. 
>We then spotted a huge croc on the lake and chucked a few stones at him
>hitting it right on the nose... It didn't flinch. Now that was a man croc
>if ever i saw one!!!!