17th January - Siri Falls

Mum and I both needed waking up this morning as didn’t wake up naturally.  Chris mentioned that he hadn’t been able to switch off the bathroom fan last night and it was only this morning that I discovered that the “fan”, was, in fact, the roaring waterfalls!

Goat off to market...

We were served a massive breakfast that we couldn’t do full justice to.  After checking out, we had a 4 hour journey to Mount Elgon.  I sat in the front seat today which gives you a better view.  It was a fascinating journey as we passed though small villages and a couple of large and very busy towns near the Kenyan border.  Life seems chaotic and rather frantic with people, motorcycles and bicycles all jostling for space - the latter two piled up with pineapples, dried papyrus for thatching, cabbages, jack fruit, bundles of firewood, sacks of charcoal or rice and even a goat off to market.

We also drove through a huge agricultural area with sugar cane plantation and factories, as well as more modest market gardens with bananas, maize and cabbage and also areas of swamp and low lying rice paddies.

Bananas off to market - each hand weighs 20kg!

Sipi Falls

We got to our lodge around lunch time and after a delicious meal, we were ready for the afternoon activity.  We were down for the 3 hour waterfall trek, but because of “Mama’s” age, it was decided to cut it to 1.5 hours and just do the waterfall by the hotel by walking to the base of it and then scrambling 100 metres up the hillside using ladders in places!!  We set off but when Mum realised what she’d let herself in for, she changed her mind so we decided just to walk to the base of the waterfall and then return to the lodge and get Shindishi to drive us to the other waterfalls!!  A much better plan as it’s hot and humid and a bit muddy and slippery underfoot.

We passed through lush vegetation as we walked to the 1st waterfall which is 67 metres.  high.  We admired various plants including a stunning double white flowered Brugmansia as well as Plectranthus barbatus and also some lovely butterflies.  The falls were very impressive close up and we even walked behind them and could just see our rooms through the veil of water.

A local lad joined us at the end of the walk and produced a female chameleon for us to admire which turned out to be his pet.  Both Chris and I held it on our hands which was a weird feeling as I don’t really like reptiles and thought I was very brave.  Inevitably, he wanted some money so we gave him a token as a thank you.

The 2nd waterfall

The final waterfall

We then drove to the next falls which were 100 metres tall and ran over the central part of a very spectacular sheer cliff which you could abseil down if you felt so inclined.  Our last waterfall was 80 metres high and required a short, slightly muddy walk uphill.  Our guide, Paul, was very caring and held Mum’s hand the whole time, which thrilled her no end!

We got back to the lodge at about 4.30pm and Paul was very keen to then take us on a bird spotting walk, but we declined as wanted some free time to chill - there’s not much time for that on this trip....or hasn’t been so far!!