The Epic Drive to Sipi Falls, Much Hiking, and Coffeeeeee :)

Shandraki playing with my camera

Here are the photos from the football tournament…

Football tournament

Signs at the school where the tournament was:

Parents We Want U Alive

AIDS has no medicine

My English class  :)

Lorenzo (an Italian volunteer that Paul lives next to) had his birthday party the night I stayed in Jinja before leaving for Sipi.

Waiting for pasta and CAKE!

Innocent and Jordan enjoying chocolate cake and nutella.

Sipi Falls was amazing!! The ride there was something to write home about, took about 6-7hrs and it was only supposed to be 3 or so. The taxi (matatu) we took from Jinja to Mbale (99km or 1 ½ hours) decided to stop pretty frequently to let people off and on so that added a lot of time. Finally we made it to Mbale around 5:30pm and we had about another hour and a half (so we were told) until we arrived to Sipi. After much debate and discussion with the taxi drivers and conductors we agreed on 4,000ugx as the price for each of us. 

A rainbow on the drive to Sipi!

We go in the taxi and thought we were on our way - - we were wrong… we then went to the taxi park and sat there for another 30min while the van filled up. So finally we were on our way and good because it was becoming dusk. We get to the bottom of this huge hill and see a sign for the place we booked for the night “Sipi River Lodge – 12km” We were so close… but out taxi decided to tell us that it wasn’t 4,000ugx its more than that and also, he wasn’t going to take us up the hill. So as we are parked on the bottom of this huge hill 12km away from our destination, our driver flags down a random private car that’s headed up the hill. A few words are exchanged and then the driver tells us to get out and that we are going with this car. So the five of us (Ethan, Sarah, Cory, Tom, and I) pile into this tiny beat up car with 4 locals, only 1 spoke English. We put our luggage in the back of the car where Ethan and Sarah had to sit. The latch didn’t shut all the way so we had to hold their hands so they didn’t fall out of the back and roll down the hill. About half way up the hill we drop off the only guy who spoke English and continued. For some reason the driver decided to stop again and talk to people on the street. It was now dark and locals surrounded the car. It was a bit uncomfortable but I just locked my door. When the driver tried to start the car it wouldn’t start – we sat there for another 15min trying to figure out the problem and soon enough they added some gasoline and we were putting up the hill again.

Sarah and Ethan hanging on for dear life.

Finally – Sipi River Lodge!!! We made it! Just in time for a hot dinner too. This lodge was backyard to the second of three waterfalls called Sipi Falls. 

That was our cabin the first night!

Thursday morning (14) we decided to do the hike to all three waterfalls before lunch.

The hike was beautiful….

Sipi River Lodge has their own garden/farm where they get
the majority of the food they serve from!

Sarah, Ethan, Tom, Me and Cory ready for our hike!

Awesome cave behind the 2nd water fall!

Neat slug...made me miss banana slugs and Nor Cal.

View while hiking...

Sipi Falls # 2

epic

Little creek/stream that Cory and Tom jumped into for a swim!

There was TONS of cabbage on this hike. Everywhere!

Sipi Falls #3

Just part of the hike!

The largest of the 3 waterfalls - Sipi Falls #1

I'm touching the waterfall!

The hike took nearly 4 hours and was very challenging. I felt like I was training for Mt. Kilimanjaro. Which reminded me that I needed to start running soon because I start that climb August 19th. 

In the afternoon I was going to go abseiling off the largest of the three falls. But unfortunetly it began to down pour (which apparently it does nearly every afternoon) so I had to cancel my abseiling. We changed logging that night and moved to the Crows Nest which was 1/10 of the price…but for good reason.

View from Crows Nest...not bad!

Our dorm for the second night

Friday morning (15) we scheduled a Coffee Tour/Coffee Safari and headed out early to learn all about the process of planting, growing, harvesting, roasting and drinking coffee! It was a blast!!

A baby goat!

First you have to plant the coffee seed. Then after 40 days it will start to sprout. Around that time you have to transport it into a little plastic bag type of pot so that it stays healthy and holds moisture.

Coffee seeds

After another 4-6 months they will become larger and ready to transplant into the plantation.

Ready for transplant!

We each got to plant out own coffee plant and name it after ourselves.

Antonia and Antonia the coffee plant.

 Once they are planted into soil, it will take 3 years for them to grow and be able to be harvested. So they told me to come back in 3 years and I could harvest Antonia for coffee.

This is what a ripe coffee bean looks like on the plant! CRAZY!

 Once the 3 year mark hits and they are able to be harvested, they continue to produce coffee beans for FORTY years!! After they become too old you cut them at an angle and another coffee plant will grow from it.

This one was just cut and another plant is
growing.

 We took out red coffee beans and put them through this machine to strip off the outside (red part) so that we were left with the white beans. Those beans are surprisingly sticky.

The beans are then washed and dried in the sun.

This is what the beans look like once they are washed and dried.

 But they still aren't ready to be coffee. We had to pound them and get all the loose particles/skin off of them before we roasted them.

Pounding away!

Our guide Tony getting all the unwanted particles
off the beans.

Time to roast them!

 I thought roasting took at least and hour... but no! It only took about 5-7min!

I love coffee!!

 Now we had to pound the roasted coffee so we could taste our coffee!!

 A cup of coffee at starbucks - ~$4
A cup of Ugandan coffee that you made yourself - priceless :)

It was one of the best cups I've ever had!

The ride back from Sipi was much much shorter than the one there. I made it back to Jinja Friday (15) around 5pm. Paul was on the river so I waited in town for him. The rest of the weekend was nice and relaxing. I was able to go rafting again on Saturday and enjoyed every second of it!

I headed back to Ndejje Sunday (17) afternoon and slept very good. 4 weeks left! Time to get to work. This week I am going to try many new things with the students. My Dad sent me some pencils so I'm going to use that as an intensive to do well also. I have to work on lesson plans and homework for the week.