Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Seeing the shore for the first time came as an incredible relief. It was everything I had
imagined, and as I stood listening to the gentle sound of the water and the insects that
buzzed around its shallows, I got to thinking about what it must have felt like for John
Hanning Speke, the first European to 'discover' it. Speke and his fellow explorer, Richard
Burton, had been on an expedition to locate the Source of the Nile when they reached this
great water's southernmost shore and named it after the reigning monarch. What they had
discovered was one of the biggest freshwater lakes in the world, second only to Lake Su-
perior in the United States, with more than 26,000 square miles of water. To me, as to them,
Lake Victoria seemed a vast inland sea - and I was left in no doubt as to why, for many
years, it was considered the true source of the Nile. The Nile is, in fact, the only river to
drain out of the lake - all the water here would travel down that conduit, out to the sea.
John Hanning Speke was an officer in the British Indian Army, born in Devon in 1827.
He was twenty-seven years old when he first came to Africa, joining an expedition into
Somalia led by Burton, an explorer already famous for his African endeavours. Burton was
a scant six years older than Speke but already a seasoned campaigner by the time they met.
The legends about Burton were many and vast; if ever there was a true polymath it was
Burton, who - as well as being a geographer and explorer - was also known for his writ-
ing, including poetry, and for his amazing capacity to absorb and retain languages. Some
sources claim he was fluent in as many as twenty-nine tongues. Speke and Burton's ex-
pedition into Somalia, in 1854, was disastrous and very nearly got both of them killed; at-
tacked by indigenous tribesmen, Speke found himself captured and stabbed several times
by spears, while Burton escaped with a javelin skewering both cheeks. But their dances
with death hardly deterred the two explorers and they returned to Africa together in 1856,
consumed by their desire to be the first to locate the source of the Nile. This trip was no
less arduous. Both men became stricken with tropical diseases and, when Burton was too
sick to carry on, Speke followed rumours of a great body of water. It was then that he first
set eyes on the lake in front of me now.
Matthias asked me how it felt to be here, and the truth is I could not find the words to
express what I felt. I'd arrived at the first major milestone in this journey, reaching a body
of water that was vital to the explorers of old, and perhaps for the first time I felt like I was
truly walking in their footsteps.
'Now, Mr Tembula,' said Matthias, 'you can begin your journey properly.'
'Properly?'
'You know, Lev, those hundred miles you've just done?'
'Five hundred,' I corrected him.
'Well, it was nice, but you could have saved your legs. Here in Uganda, we know the
truth. The real source of the Nile is here, at Jinja, like your Speke used to say.'
