Commuting From Kampala to Nairobi by Bus

After seeing all there was to Kampala and being tired of the traffic congested city, taking the Kampala to Nairobi Bus was another inevitable one. I decided it was time to leave for Nairobi. My decision being a spontaneous one, it was difficult to get a seat on a Kampala to Nairobi Bus.

It was the holidays so there were a lot of people traveling. I had to hop from park to park on a boda boda looking for that bus with the extra seat to convey me to Nairobi. I would have preferred Modern Coast bus company but tickets were sold out. After a couple of stops I decided to head to Nairobi with another transportation company called BusCar.

After a bit of hassle and almost being sure that I was not going to be headed from Kampala to Nairobi by Bus Car, I was relieved to finally be on my way. I had gotten on the bus and an elderly lady was seated on the seat assigned on my ticket. I politely told her that the seat was mine but she had refused showing me the same seat number on her ticket. For a split sec, I thought I might have been defrauded and my ticket was probably fake since I bought it in a rush.

The issue was later sorted after realizing that although we had the same seat number, her bus was to leave at a different time. She  excused me and left for her bus. The thought of having to stay one more day in Kampala was dreadful. I took some pictures, actually the bus helpers were eager to assist with taking pictures, got unsolicited advise from a couple to be careful with my stuff and we were bound for Nairobi on the Kampala to Nairobi bus.

The Kampala to Nairobi Bus costed me 70,000 Ugandan Shillings. We took off from the Kisimu bus park at about 4:40pm and as usual getting out of kampala was tough as a result of traffic. I however made friends, two lovely ladies, one who was local to Kampala and was visiting family in Nairobi, the other who was working in Kampala and was headed to Mombasa for the holidays, we talked about life and work in East Africa, my travels and later took a nap. We got to the border called the Busia one stop border located in Busia at about 11pm.

It was not seamless here like the Kigali to Kampala border and I was irritated, so like the name says the Busia One Stop border houses both the Ugandan and the Kenyan Immigration. The lady who stamped me out after doing her job made an offensive remark, “what are Nigerians doing here, there was also one Nigerian I stamped out few days ago” she said. I then had to deal with a Kenyan immigration officer who found it hard to believe that I was traveling alone and exploring East Africa just because I love traveling. I finally did my bio-metrics got stamped and moved along.

The cheap food I bought at the border made up for the untoward comment. There’s a variety of street food and fruits to buy and munch on. There were also merchants who change money and I converted my remaining Ugandan Shillings and some dollars to Kenyan Shillings. I also had the best chicken and fries I’ve ever had in my life ?

I probably felt that way because I was freaking hungry and hadn’t taken anything all day. The Kigali to Nairobi Bus had a charging port so I was never bored, I kept myself busy with my phone and whenever I felt sleepy I stashed it away underneath my luggage ☺️.

I woke up to the bus pulling up on a weird-looking street in Nairobi. The street is called Accra street and that’s where a lot of bus companies are located.  This part of town did not give me a good first impression vibe but I remained optimistic and my stay in Nairobi wasn’t bad at all.

If you found this post useful, I would really love that you take out few minutes to nominate me in Category 13 Best Travel Blog (www.findingae.com) and Category 14 Young tourism personality of the year (Anu Eunice) for the Nigerian Tourism Awards. Voting closes on 15TH August 2019 and it would really mean a lot and definitely motivate me to continue doing this.