Lake Bunyonyi

Lake Bunyonyi is located seven kilometers from the town of Kabale, in the district of Kabale, Uganda. He is 25 miles long and seven miles wide and covers an area of ​​6100 hectares. The lake is located 1950 meters above sea level and is surrounded by hills, which are rich from 2200 to 2478 meters and highly cultured.

Geography

The 29 islands are concentrated in the central part of the lake. These islands are few dwellers, and are mainly used for tourist purposes and a primary and a secondary school used. The data on the maximum depth of the lake varies from 44 up to 900 meters in some places. If this is true, is the Lake Bunyonyi is the second deepest in Africa. The temperature on the surface rises up to 25 degrees Celsius.

Beginning of the 20th century were exposed to fish in the lake, and in the 1930s, fishing has been commercialized. Unfortunately, died almost all of the fish stock. Subsistence fishing still takes place but ..

About 200 bird species have been recorded here. Bunyonyi means " place of many little birds ". Lake Bunyonyi is one of the few in Africa, where you can swim safely - there is no schistosomiasis.

The main center of the lake is the village Bufuka. The residents of the area belong to the Bakiga and the Batwa tribe.

Main islands

Akampene - Island of punishment

The Bakiga leaving unmarried pregnant girls on this tiny island with only one tree from starvation ( those who tried to swim to the mainland, mostly drowned, as few people were able to swim ). They did this in order to educate the rest of the women and teach them not to commit the same mistake. A man who had no cows to pay the price of the bride was able to pick up the girls on the island. This practice was abandoned only in the first half of the 20th century.

Bushara Island

On this island there is the Lake Bunyonyi Development Company, an organization with strong ties to the Church of Uganda, the main church in the area. Use tourism to generate funds for several development projects in the area of the lake.

A special feature of this island is the forest. A demonstration of the most remarkable property of the eucalyptus tree: the extremely rapid growth. The hills around the lake were originally forested strong, but overpopulation has led to the deforestation of more land for agricultural purposes to obtain. Eucalyptus was imported to improve the situation. But eucalyptus trees have a negative effect: they deprive the soil of all nutrients, and left him so drained.

Bwama and Njuyeera ( Sharps Island)

1921 was the Scottish missionary Leonard Sharp in this part of Uganda and founded a few years later a leprosy treatment center on the Bwama Island. Residents were sent away and a church and medical facilities were built, while Sharp settled on the Njuyeera Island. Suspected cases were sent here from all over East Africa, and at its peak, the hospital was one of 5,000 patients. The aim was to isolate those and thereby stop the spread of the disease. Only as a remedy for leprosy was found in the 1980s, the patients were able to leave the island.

The buildings of the hospital now serve as boarding a high school that draws students from across the region on the island. There is also a primary school, but no village on the island.

Bucuranuka - upside-down - island

According to legend this island many people brought death. Approximately 20 men were brewing here once pombe, a millet beer. An old woman walked past them and asked for some beer. Mistakenly they thought the woman would be a beggar who knew her, you refused the beer, and sent them away. The old woman was surprised and asked her to at least be brought to the mainland. The men replied, "Good, because we have had enough of you." They selected a boy to bring the old woman across the lake. When the two reached the mainland and the boy was about to go back to the island on its head. All died, only a few chickens flew away and survived.