Uganda, the One Country That Has All of It
Mountain gorillas in the morning, chimpanzees two days later, and the Big Five on the savannah after that.
Same Gorillas, Different Bill
Uganda and Rwanda share the same mountain gorilla population, split across a border the animals do not recognise. The permit in Uganda costs roughly half. What you pay for that saving is driving. Rwanda gets you to the gorillas in a couple of hours from the airport. Uganda takes most of a day on the road to reach Bwindi. If that is the only thing you came for, Rwanda is easier. But Uganda is not a one-animal country. Chimpanzees at Kibale, the Big Five in Queen Elizabeth and Murchison Falls, the Nile pouring through a seven-metre gap, and a lake the size of a sea. Rwanda has none of that. Come for a week, and Uganda gives you three different trips.
Four Parks, and They Do Not Repeat Each Other
Two of these fill a week. All four is a fortnight and the reason people pick Uganda over its neighbours.
Bwindi Impenetrable Forest
The gorilla park in the south west, and the name is accurate
Dense, steep, ancient forest holding around half the world's remaining mountain gorillas.
Kibale Forest
Chimpanzee country
Habituated groups are tracked on foot, and Kibale holds one of the highest primate densities anywhere, with thirteen species in the same forest.
Queen Elizabeth National Park
Savannah, crater lakes and the Kazinga Channel, where boat safaris run past hippo and buffalo
The Ishasha sector has lions that climb trees, which almost no other population does.
Murchison Falls
The Nile squeezed through a gap seven metres wide and dropped forty three metres
Big game on the plains above it and boat trips to the base of the falls.
Uganda, the outline.
The only country where gorillas, chimpanzees and the Big Five sit in one week, if you are willing to drive between them.
Nowhere Else Puts Gorillas and Chimps This Close Together
One Is Uphill and Still. The Other Is Flat and Fast.
Gorilla trekking at Bwindi is a climb. Steep, muddy, sometimes hours of it, and then an hour standing still while a family feeds a few metres away. Everything about it is slow. Chimpanzee tracking at Kibale is the opposite. The forest floor is flat, but chimps move constantly and loudly, swinging overhead and dropping down to cross in front of you. You spend the hour walking to keep up. They are two completely different experiences with the same word attached, and Uganda is one of the very few places you can do both inside a week.
Compare the Treks
The Nile Forces Itself Through a Gap You Could Jump
At Murchison, the entire Victoria Nile is funnelled into a channel about seven metres across and thrown forty-three metres down. The volume does not change. Only the space does. What comes out the other side is less a waterfall than an explosion, with permanent spray, a noise you feel in your chest, and rainbows sitting in the air all day. You can take a boat to the base and look up at it, or walk to the top of the gorge and stand directly over the point where the river disappears. Most people do both, and the walk is the one they talk about.
Driving Days Are the Price of Seeing Everything
Uganda's parks are spread out, and the roads between them are slow. Bwindi to Queen Elizabeth, Kibale to Murchison, none of it is quick, and a route that looks reasonable on a map costs real days. Two ways to handle it. Accept the driving, which many travellers enjoy, since the countryside between the parks is green, hilly and full of villages. Or fly the longer legs on light aircraft, which costs more and gives you back two or three days on a fortnight. Ten days covers gorillas plus one savannah park. Fourteen covers all four. Send us your dates and how many are travelling.
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FAQs
Questions with useful answers
June to September and December to February are the dry stretches and the easiest for trekking. The rainy months are harder underfoot but cheaper, with better permit availability.
Ten days covers the gorillas and one savannah park. Fourteen covers Bwindi, Kibale, Queen Elizabeth and Murchison Falls.
The gorillas are the same and the Uganda permit costs about half. Rwanda is quicker to reach the park and involves far less driving. Uganda gives you chimps and the Big Five as well. We will talk you through both.
Bwindi is steep, often muddy, at altitude, and can last several hours. Reasonable fitness matters and porters are worth taking. Most operations set fifteen as the minimum age.
Yes. Kibale has habituated groups tracked on foot, and it is one of the best places in Africa for it.
Malaria precautions are needed. Yellow fever usually matters for returning to India rather than entering Uganda, and it has to be arranged well ahead.