<P> Above Khartoum, the Nile is also known as the White Nile, a term also used in a limited sense to describe the section between Lake No and Khartoum . At Khartoum the river is joined by the Blue Nile . The White Nile starts in equatorial East Africa, and the Blue Nile begins in Ethiopia . Both branches are on the western flanks of the East African Rift . </P> <P> The drainage basin of the Nile covers 3,254,555 square kilometers (1,256,591 sq mi), about 10% of the area of Africa . The Nile basin is complex, and because of this, the discharge at any given point along the mainstem depends on many factors including weather, diversions, evaporation and evapotranspiration, and groundwater flow . </P> <P> The source of the Nile is sometimes considered to be Lake Victoria, but the lake has feeder rivers of considerable size . The Kagera River, which flows into Lake Victoria near the Tanzanian town of Bukoba, is the longest feeder, although sources do not agree on which is the longest tributary of the Kagera and hence the most distant source of the Nile itself . It is either the Ruvyironza, which emerges in Bururi Province, Burundi, or the Nyabarongo, which flows from Nyungwe Forest in Rwanda . The two feeder rivers meet near Rusumo Falls on the Rwanda - Tanzania border . </P> <P> In 2010, an exploration party went to a place described as the source of the Rukarara tributary, and by hacking a path up steep jungle - choked mountain slopes in the Nyungwe forest found (in the dry season) an appreciable incoming surface flow for many kilometres upstream, and found a new source, giving the Nile a length of 6,758 km (4,199 mi). </P>

Where does the water from the nile come from