Henrietta's Visit to Murchison Falls in Uganda

The moment that thrilled me the most when I went to Uganda was taking a boat up the Nile to the Murchison Falls. Having devoured endless books on the great African explorers and watched all the films, I honestly felt like a current day Samuel Baker in the female form or Katharine Hepburn about to go onto the set of the African Queen! We climbed on our launch at the Nile safari camp and set off up river. I was so excited to be finally chugging up this mighty river, which at this point is a big broad sweep of water and here known as the Albert Nile.

Naturally we saw no other travellers and the whole experience felt truly adventurous. Our guide, who was supremely knowledgeable about the birds, had an old moth eaten Roberts bird book and we resolved to send him an updated version when we got home (which we did) however whether he ever got it or not, we will never know… I hope so. We were lucky enough to see the rare shoebill stork which was completely thrilling and numerous huge Nile crocs wallowing on the bank.

The Falls themselves shoot through a very narrow ravine creating the most powerful single concentration of water in the world and as our small launch bobbed about in the swirling water below, I knew I had just experienced one of my ‘must see in Africa in my lifetime’ moments.