And the weather was fair for a boat trip:

Somehow I have managed to luck out in my site placement and live in a wonderful town called Rubengera. What makes this town so much more ideal is it's proximity to Kibuye and Lake Kivu, a mere 20 minutes crammed into a mutatu. Kibuye is easily called a resort/tourist town, boasting some of the nicer hotels, a post office, chocolate, and boats for hire. It just so happened that this past weekend was another perfect one in Rwanda, so a few friends and I decided to take up on the tempting offer of a relaxing afternoon and head for Napoleon Island. As my friends had already rented a boat, they were familiar with one of the drivers and as we approached the dock, we were greeted by a group that seemed eager to take us. We climbed in exaggerated canoe style boat and set off. After a minute, we happen to turn back to shore, only to see Evariste, the driver we were meant to go with standing, waving his arms. Wrong boat, ooops. We rectified the mistake and headed out again with only a minor hiccup when we stopped to give another boat gas and had a little trouble starting our own back up again.

The island proved to be that, a large land mass in the middle of the lake, inhabited by bats, cows, and lots of prickly bushes. Unfortunately, we had an up close and personal encounter with said prickly bushes when we attempted to dock at a rocky outcropping by cutting the engine and being unable to get it running again when we drifted further than planned. Nta kibazo. After an hour or so of glorious swimming we were ready to leave. We piled back in the boat, valiantly pushed away from our anchoring tree, and attempted to start the motor. No go. Several attempts and a sweaty driver later we found ourselves back among the prickly bushes. Thankfully another boat was touring the area so they gave us a tow out of the brush. We had a quick game of switch drivers and vigorously attempt to start the motor while knocking against the other boat for half an hour before our motor finally caught.

Somehow during this time, the usually calm lake had decided it wanted to imitate the ocean, and the 4 foot waves had a grand ole time with our 4 foot high boat. Multiple near capsizings encouraged many of us to gather our life jackets, current possessions, and sanity in our arms and hold on tight. With only a stall in the middle of our trek back, a rapidly leaking boat, and numerous wild rockings, we made it safely back and I finally stopped laughing.