The journey across Burundi continues. On the road less travelled from Gitega to Rutana.
The bus from Bujumbura had arrived in the centre of town but I had to ask about the main bus station.
The bus terminal in Gitega is about 2½ miles out of the town. I walked there the day before.
As well as the travelling, blazing the trail, and getting the blog posts out, I’m also updating and editing Google Maps as I go. Here is the bus station/taxi park in Gitega (Sometimes Google Maps accepts my edits, sometimes not).
I was hoping that there’d be a bus, but my heart sank when I learnt that I’d need to take a shared taxi.
Flashbacks to my time in West Africa, where every time you needed to go anywhere, you had to wait 4, 5, or 6 hours for enough people before the shared taxi would depart.
It kinda put me in a bad mood.
So my idea was to get to a town with a hotel that was as close as possible to the Source du Nil, the southernmost source of the River Nile and I identified the town of Rutana, 70 km south of Gitega as the place from where I could most likely get to the source relatively easy.
Google Maps, my Go-To source when trying to organise things in many places, showed quite a few hotels. A town with quite a few hotels meant it was a fair size. And that meant people. And the more people there were, the more transport options there would be.
And I was fully aware that the Source du Nil was in the middle of nowhere. But getting there from Rutana would be much cheaper than trying to get there from Bujumbura.
Up at the crack of dawn, I rode a boda-boda (motorcycle taxi) to the Gitega bus station (2000 BFr 50 cents US).
I was directed to a shared taxi. Right-hand drive cars, imported from Japan, but they drive on the right here, not on the left like in Japan and the UK.
So there is some chaos. There is no pecking order. There can be several cars heading to the same place. Each one is waiting for four people (better than in West Africa, where you need seven or more).
Of course, I am the only Mzungu here. Everyone knows where I want to go. My bags were in the front seat. Three more people are needed.
After a time, my bags are taken and I am led to another vehicle that’s ready to go.
Of course, the drivers start arguing. The other guy is stealing from me.
The fare should be 10,000 BFr. My new driver said it was 15,000, and he was pissed because the others were telling me to pay only 10,000.
1 USD is, on the black market, 4,000 Burundi Francs. It’s cheap here. Am not sure if they are making any profit.
So for 70 km, he gets four passengers, each paying just 10,000 (2.50 USD). He gets just 10 USD for the trip.
We set off at 7.20 am. The endless wait that I had been dreading didn’t materialise.
The road is paved, with a few potholes, but nothing like Madagascar. The driver doesn’t even slow down. By 8.45, I am in Rutana, where I get a room at the first hotel I see, the Arkador Lodge, it’s just off the main road, up the hill to the small village centre.
