CANOTAGE SUR LE LAC

Canoeing is a very popular activity. Most hotels offer canoe and kayak rentals - by the hour or by the day, with or without a guide - as well as cruises. You're sure to catch a glimpse of an otter as you cruise from island to island on Lake Bunyonyi. By day, you can enjoy lunch on islands such as Bushara, Itambira and Njuyera. You may come across schoolchildren canoeing back to school from Bwama Island, the largest island on the lake, where you can moor to discover some of the remains of the former leprosarium (founded at the turn of the 1920s and 1930s by British missionary Dr Leonard Sharp) and buy a few souvenirs from the handicraft store. Let us tell you the story of Akampene Island, also known as Punishment Island, where, until the middle of the ^20th century, the Bakiga sent young girls who became pregnant before marriage as penitents, until they starved to death or drowned trying to escape (unless they were rescued at night by local peasants eager to take a wife without paying a dowry). Or the legend of Bucuranuka, the island that turned upside down, the victim of a curse cast by a woman who had been refused a sip of home-brewed beer by the local revelers... For a guided tour of the lake's islands aboard a speedboat, expect to pay between US$25 and US$60/boat (1 to 3 hours).