The saying goes that it's the journey that counts and not the final destination - and that is what I had to chant to myself this weekend as we had yet another breakdown, this time not my car, but my housemate's. As my car was suffereing from a dodgy battery, we decided not to take any chances and go in Romy's car. All was going very well until we started to hear a funny rattling noise. However, we breathed a sigh of relief when we discovered that the rattle was actually coming from an empty can of pop in the drink holder. So, I feel that I have already told this sorry story before, but about 3 hours into the journey the car comes to a sudden stop. We get out and do our best girly efforts to figure out what might be wrong (although in fairness I do believe that I will leave this country as a fully qualified mechanic) and only a few minutes later a car draws up to help us. Two men introduce themselves as Kenneth and Akim. They have a look with us, while a curious crowd of local kids gather to see what is going on. We quickly figure out that the temp guage had broken and the car was running dry and overheating, so a girl is sent off in search of water. We poured in a full jerrycan and then notice that the rubber tube has a big rip in it, so all the water was being lost. So Kenneth drove to the nearest town and came back with a mechanic, who quickly solved the problem.
So we bid our farewells to our knights in shining armour and set off again. All went well for about, well 5 minutes, then we were almost being choked by noxious fumes from the exhaust. And this tim it was starting to rain. The next minute, my phone rang and it was Kenneth calling to enquire how we were getting on. Not good, came the reply but I thought I could ask him for the mechanic's number. He went one better than that and also came along and waited with us while we diagnosed the problem. The prognosis was not good, so we decided to knock our plans on the head and stay in the nearest town of Tororo. We were taken to the garage and then they dropped us at a hotel, according to the guidebook it was the best in town. Well, am sure it was, but it drew a striking resemblence to a hospital to me and we later decided it may have once been a looney bin when we found that cutlery was a scarce resource. Maybe the only guests are people who are heading to Mount Elgon and never quite make it. Maybe they want to save anybody from doing themselves an injury with any sharp eating utensils following exasperating journeys through Uganda, heaven only knows. Later that evening we were joined by Kenneth and Akim, who were really sweet and even wanted to pay for our dinners, although we insisted on it being our shout, since we would probably still have been stranded by the roadside, had they not shown up to help.
The follwing day, we had hoped to get the car fixed up and continue to Sipi Falls, but when we got to the mechanics we found they had taken the engine to bits and were talking abolut a very labour intensive and costly job. So now we had to get ourselves back to Kampala. Our rescuers continued to help us and organised a recovery vehicle to take us and the car back to Kampala. We nearly died when we saw it - it was one of the trucks that are normally jam packed with cows taking their final journeys to meet their makers. However, being our only option, we gratefully accepted it. A few hours later we made it back home. So maybe we will make it to Sipi Falls another time, but it proves that sometimes the journey is more important, as we were so lucky to meet people who were more than willing to help us out in our hour of need.
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