I Have a Chaco in My Hand! I Have a Headlamp!

 I promise I'll try to use my words later and actually write a post about what's been going. For now, here are some pictures of the safari I went on a few weeks ago. Unfortunately, we didn't have power at our house before we left and so my camera didn't get charged so I don't have nearly as many as I wanted. Either way, it was so fun to spend the weekend with the girls I've been living with. We laughed so much and got to experience some amazing things. 

We spent the first night at a hostel in Kampala. It was kind of stressful and we were the biggest group of  American idiots you've ever seen but it was still a good time. 

The first day we went rhino trekking. No one informed us that we would need closed toed shoes and long pants... we all went in our shorts and chacos. good times. We were also instructed to climb the nearest tree should a rhino decide to attack. Those tree are tiny little things. So all around, we were feeling pretty safe. 

We drove four hours out to the animal reserve and it was almost like driving through the Lion King movie. It was so  insanely pretty. This picture doesn't get even close to doing it justice. 

The second morning we went on a game drive and we saw tons of giraffes!  At one point there were probably thirty of them surrounding our van.

These are the hippos. They were really not that exciting but for some reason we couldn't stop looking at them.  You can't even really tell what they are in the pictures because they are all just clumped together. They don't even hardly move but they're just awesome for some reason! And you know I was singing "I like em big. I like em chunkay!" the entire time. 

So I was sitting on top of the van as we were driving and I spotted this little guy. I don't know how  I saw him. When I told the driver to stop, Dumbo got all angry and started trying to attack me and I'm telling you what, if he decided to kill, I was going to be the first one gone. Luckily he just kinda kicked and flailed himself in my direction and then moved on. It was the most terrifying and thrilling experience the whole time. It was awesome. 

This is everyone else being sheltered from the raging elephants while I sat out in the open to be demolished. So good, though.

Little tiny village in the middle of nowhere. Literally. There is absolutely nothing for miles.  I'm amazed by these people.

After the game drive we took a ferry ride up the Nile to Murchison Falls. It was so beautiful. There were elephants and crocodiles and birds everywhere along the way.

Nile Crocodile.

Murchison Falls

One of the grass huts that we stayed in. It was so sweet.

On the last day we went chimp trekking. You really do need close toed shoes for this one but all of the Ugandans prayed for us and then we were ok. You pretty much just go walking through the jungle looking for chimps. At first they were just up in the trees and we could hardly see them but then they started coming down around us! There were probably six of them just a few feet away from us! I was just in shock the whole time because they were so close. 

I know this one is far away and you can barely see him.He was the first one we saw and I got so excited and took one picture of him and then my camera died. I promise we saw way more and they were way closer. We even saw a baby one swinging through the trees. It was such an awesome thing to see in real life.

 I also saw, but don't have good pictures of, lions, kob, warthogs, baboons, weird little antelope guys that I don't remember their name and I think that's all. We were super lucky because we got to see some of everything. The lions were a huge surprise and it was so cool. They were just sitting in their dens but supposedly they had been "matin out in the open" and that lioness "had four legs. but the lion only has three legs". That's what the nice lady from Alabama told us, anyway.

So, the safari was a huge success! We seriously laughed so much and I got so much closer to the girls. It was really fun to get away from Lugazi and get to see other parts of Uganda. I thought the safari would be kinda lame. Sort of like just looking at animals at the zoo but it's really not. It's sweet because you're just looking at the rhino and then all the sudden your guide is freaking out and telling you to run the other direction and you freak out and realize that you're actually just in the wild with these huge, awesome animals. It's sweet. I wish I could do it again. I don't want you to be jealous. But seriously, it was so great.