Day 31: Sun 2nd March: Move to Akagera Lodge.

We arrive at our campsite around 17h00 and shock! Horror! One filthy long-drop toilet and no water whatsoever which means no hand-basins or showers. Ugh!! The road to get here has been horrendous so there is no way we can go back to the lodge or find another site. Especially irritating is that we have had to pay $220 for these two days of camping in this park.

The site itself is on top of the escarpment with magnificent views so that will have to make up for the lack of facilities (but doesn't really - Ed). There are already a number of campers and they keep on coming. In the end there were at least 30 of us perched up there but the campfires were burning and the singing started. We go to bed and in the middle of the night my stomach starts bubble and squeak! Unfortunately I am more afraid of the buffalo than the filthy toilet so I make my choice. This is not what I need, but by morning there are a couple of us looking rather weary and other campers are asking if we have Immodium for them. We are supposed to spend another night here so Simon takes pity on me and we re-locate to the lodge. Being a Yorkshireman of course he goes back to the office and demands a refund of his camping fee as the campsite is 'uninhabitable'!

Once again we feel great empathy with the staff in the National Park. It looks like they are paid very little and although the entrance gate, office and visitor's centre is impressive, the rest of the facilities and the roads are extremely run-down and the poor staff are just trying to get by. One game ranger proudly tells us that they plan to re-introduce lion to this park this year and rhino the following year as they have all been poached. All good and well but we think they'll just be poached again.

This is a beautiful place with stunning lakes in the distance and we find a hippo out of the water when we go down to a lake, but it is overrun with Tsetse Fly which are just impossible to live with. At sundown they disappear and the mosquito's get on shift. Tsetse Fly can give you sleeping sickness so they are really not to be messed with - and the bites are damned sore!!

We will enjoy the rest of the day in the lodge and set off for Kigali tomorrow morning to meet up with our (extremely hardy) fellow-travellers.