Murchison Falls Safari

This past week we made a trip up to Murchison Falls Game Park, with an overnight stopover at Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, to show Mom some of the beautiful sights in Uganda and take a break from our busy schedule. 

It was an easy trek into the bush to get a great view of three of the twelve rhinos living in this sanctuary.  Even seniors could do it!

Up at Murchison Falls we were able to see a such a variety of animals both on the game drives and the boat launch up the Nile River to the base of the falls.  The large group of giraffes in the early morning sunlight was majestic, and we had a very unexpected viewing of a mother spotted hyena and two cubs loping down the road in front of us.

Park was teeming with a large variety of antelopes, as well as the ubiquitous warthogs and baboons.

There are always amazing sightings of elephants, hippos and crocodiles along the shore of the Nile…

In the final few minutes of our last evening game drive, as dusk was settling in, we saw a female lion down by the water drinking and then walking through the grass and crossing the track in front of us.  A great end to a wonderful trip!

Mom’s ‘Working Holiday’

Arleen’s 82 year old mother had been to Uganda twice in the past 15 years, spending time at our project in Kibaale and enjoying some of the sights and adventures in East Africa.  When we moved to the Timothy Centre over two years ago, she started thinking that maybe it was time for another visit to see our new home and work. 

So when we returned to Uganda in January after our Christmas break, both Mom and her friend, Eleanor (the mother of our director, Ken) made the trip with us.  Two adventurous seniors braved the long journey …

Since arriving at Timothy Centre, we’ve kept Mom busy with all sorts of jobs like cleaning the facilities before the arrival of all the teachers for our teacher training course,

organising student notes for teacher training,

keeping track of student assignments submitted and all sorts of other things to keep things running smoothly. (I guess years of raising a family is good experience for that!)

We had been storing bags and bags of strawberries from our farm strawberry patch in our guest house freezer, and one of Mom’s specialities ‘just happens’ to be jam-making!  So…there have been a few days of cooking jam that we are able to sell as one of income generating projects.

We have also made a visit to a local babies’ home to donate some hand knit baby sweaters and blankets…and give some babies some “Grandma loving”.

Of course, we have allowed her a bit of time to just relax and enjoy the beautiful surroundings here at TC and on excursions to the city…well deserved rest!  

Age is no barrier to serving.  Mom is sure a great example of that :)