The Final Hours: 1st September

After a day on the road (travelling back from the National Park out in the west) we landed back at White Crest tours HQ in Kampala on the evening of the 31st.

In the morning we woke up to our final day in Uganda; we bade farewell to Simon Peter and the unsung heroes of our trip, our three stalwart drivers: Bernard, Alex and Reagan. While many of us seemed to always be tired, we really had no right to grumble when the three of them had been driving for hours on end each day without complaint. A huge thanks must go to all of them.

With a couple of hours to spare before we needed to make it to Entebbe airport, the vast majority of the group headed to the botanical gardens in Kampala, where we were given a tour. The rainforest section of the gardens were used to film the 1940s Tarzan films featuring Johnny Weissmuller. We saw a large variety of trees and flowers, as well as quite a few enormous spiders which we were careful to avoid.

Meanwhile, Trevor and Karen visited the church where Trevor was baptised! For those who don’t know Trevor, he spent the first few years of his life in Uganda, as his father worked as an engineer there.

We reached the airport in plenty of time and endured what felt like endless security checks. I’m disappointed to report that although the departure lounge has a certain 1970s charm, there wasn’t much there to occupy our time, with just a cafe/restaurant, book shop and a few identical duty free shops. However, eating lunch at the cafe meant that we were able to savour (or not) our last traditional Ugandan meal before returning to a more expansive western menu.

We all tried to catch some sleep on the floor in Doha airport during our layover, with some having more success than others.

Once back at Gatwick and while waiting for our bags (luckily none were lost this time!) we said our goodbyes to each other after what was an amazing and unforgettable trip.

Thank you all very much for following the blog!

Lydia, Henry, Sam and Freddie.