The Amabere Caves and Crater Lakes

Below is a brisk slide show of our visit to the Amabere caves and crater lakes.

Our friendly guide, Apollo, introduced us to the privately owned estate that was previously untouched due to local superstition. Locals believed that evil spirits lurked within the caves until the owner, Yasamu Lubombora, bravely claimed it and developed it into a productive farm and ranch, and now a popular tourism destination.

We crossed several paddocks of grazing land as he unveiled this intriguing story that weaved from myth to science with the dexterity of masterful piece of non-fiction. Listen to the tales, according to Apollo: Amabere Tales #1, Amabere Tales #2, Amabere Tales #3.

In order to reach the caves, we needed to wade through some dense, unspoilt woodland with, however, a beekeeper hive.

Apollo announced a smell of boiled rice that he explained is the smell of a snake and in the same breath showed us a plant that can remedy snake bites ( oh, what a relief!).

We descended into the muddy exterior of the caves. They are the only caves in Uganda with the right combination of water flow and limestone presence to form stalactites and stalagmites. This makes them very well known in the country.

The waterfall of this stream, which flows too fast to allow these formations to happen (and even faster in the rainy season), gushed as if from nowhere under thick bush into a clear pool.

In fact, in the rainy season it would have been impossible to stand on the stepping stones keeping me above the splash pool. They would have been submerged!

The Breasts of Nyinamwiru, the curious name for stalactites whose crystallisation ceased a long time ago.

Some inactive stalactites still dripping groundwater into a pool below.

This harmless bush used for fencing farmland, has a poisonous sap within.

Mature bamboo forest.

We did a 2 hour walk across a series of crater lakes, some summiting at about 1,500m. We observed the scenery of numerous crater lakes, farms and commercial pine forests.