accidental lions, playing in Lira

After another very silent night in Kidepo we enjoyed a nice breakfast. We said good bye to our new friends from Germany before we left the great valley. It was again a long drive back from the remote area to Lira, which is located about 100 km from the village where I had lived. On the way out of the valley we met the lioness and her puppies again on the street just in front of us. We stopped to not disturb then and watched them for quite a while. It was really amazing to see them from so close. After a while they even headed towards us. The small guys were fooling around all the time, jumping on their mum and chasing each other. Unfortunately two other cars from a gorilla tours came from behind and when they saw the lions they overtook and stopped their cars right in front of us which was very rude. Not only did they drive too close to the lions but also did they block our view. I got a bit annoyed and waved my hands about when the driver obviously realised that his behaviour was not really gentleman like. He then started his car again and parked it somewhere alongside the road to clear our view. As they drove a bit too close to the lions they decided to leave the place. We had to go anyway and continued our drive.

We stopped for an early lunch in Kitgum and then drove directly to Lira. We wanted to visit the orphanage again as we had decided to donate the magic game box to this wonderful place. We had instructed the staff how to use the games and played with the kids a few days ago but we had to bring the box back home that day as we had promised the kids in Chopalwor (where I had lived) to come and play one more time before I would leave the farm which we did before we started our safari. So we brought the box back to the orphanage in Lira to hand it over to the staff. After checking in at the hotel Nelson drove us to the orphanage where some kids already expected us. We chatted with the staff for a while and – of course – unpacked the box to repeat some of the instructions and play with the kids again. We had a lot of fun and I’ve learned some tricks with the Diabolo. As it got dark we asked everyone to bring back the games and showed the staff how to pack the games into the magic box. Then we handed it over to the chief matron of the orphanage. Then we had to leave and say good bye to the staff and the kids. They all hugged and thanked us for the games. We then had to hurry to the hotel for a quick shower as the project leader of the orphanage had invited us for supper at his home very close to the hotel. Claudia also came to Lira with John and Fortune to do some business and say good bye to us and joined us also for supper. Urs, who invited us, drew a sketch so that we would find his home easily, but we failed completely. We were massively late even though Nelsons brother, who lived in Lira,  tried to guide us to the right place via phone. As we didn’t find it, he even came along and to guide us to the place where we finally got to meet Urs and his wife Ursula who had prepared a nice supper for us. After a very nice evening we left at around midnight and went back to the hotel, which was actually only 5 minutes away from their place. I was happy to get to bed. It was a bit of a noisy place though but at least a bed.

Thank you very much, Urs & Ursula from God Helps Uganda, Lira!


what a nice surprise – on our way out of the Kidepo Valley we met the lioness and
her puppies again


In the evening we brought the magic game box to the orphanage and played with
the kids and staff again