Rwanda and Uganda: Gorillas, Bwindi and the Kazinga Channel

1. Jour 1 : Arrive in Kigali

   Kigali International Airport to your hotel in Kigali

   • Environ 30 min de route
   • Welcome dinner
   • Nuit : Kigali
   Détail du jour 1

   Fly into Kigali International Airport (KGL), about 10 km east of the city centre, where a driver meets you in arrivals for the short ride to your hotel. Arrive when you like: nothing is planned before the evening. Kigali spreads over a series of green ridges at about 1,500 m, so the air is mild. Plastic bags have been banned in Rwanda since 2008, so leave them out of your luggage. If you land early, walk to a cafe for a cup of Rwandan coffee or simply rest off the long flight. At about 6 pm your See Sight Tours guide meets the group for a briefing on the days ahead: what to wear on the trek, how gorilla families are assigned, and what the border day involves. Then we sit down together to a welcome dinner at a local restaurant, a first taste of brochettes, isombe (pounded cassava leaves) and plantain.

   Compris

   • Pick-up at Kigali International Airport (KGL)
   • Welcome briefing with your guide
   • Welcome dinner

   Temps libre : Free until the evening briefing

   

2. Jour 2 : The memorial, then north to the volcanoes

   Kigali to the Kigali Genocide Memorial, then Musanze and Kinigi

   • Environ 2.5 h de route
   • Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
   • Nuit : Musanze
   Détail du jour 2

   We reach the Kigali Genocide Memorial at Gisozi when it opens at about 9 am, usually before the busiest hours. More than 250,000 victims of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi are buried here, and the exhibition explains how it was planned, how it unfolded in about a hundred days, and how the country has lived with it since. We give it about two hours with an audio guide, through the galleries, the children's room and the gardens. It is hard going, and your guide leaves time afterwards for questions or quiet. Lunch is a sit-down meal in Kigali at about 11:30 am before we drive about two and a half hours north through terraced hills to Musanze, the town formerly called Ruhengeri, at about 1,850 m, as the chain of Virunga volcanoes fills the skyline. At about 3:30 pm we visit the Ellen DeGeneres Campus of the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund at Kinigi, near the park headquarters, to learn how researchers follow and protect the gorillas before you meet them tomorrow.

   Compris

   • Kigali Genocide Memorial with an audio guide
   • Sit-down lunch in Kigali
   • Ellen DeGeneres Campus of the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund, Kinigi
   • Dinner at the hotel

   Activité : The memorial is a sombre visit. Modest dress is respectful, and photographs are not allowed inside the exhibition. It opens only 1 pm to 5 pm on the last Saturday of each month and can close at short notice; dated departures avoid that Saturday, and a closure moves the visit to another slot in Kigali.

   

3. Jour 3 : Mountain gorillas in Volcanoes National Park

   Musanze to the park headquarters at Kinigi, then on foot into the park

   • Environ 1.5 h de route
   • Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
   • Nuit : Musanze
   Détail du jour 3

   This is the one early start of the trip. We leave at about 6:15 am for the park headquarters at Kinigi, where rangers brief every trekker at 7 am and assign each party of up to eight visitors to one habituated gorilla family. Our group of up to 12 is split across two families. Tell your guide if you would like a shorter walk, and the rangers will try to match you to a family nearer the park edge, though nothing is certain. From the trailhead we walk up through potato fields to the stone park wall, then into bamboo and nettles on the slopes of the volcanoes at about 2,500 to 3,000 m. Reaching the family can take under an hour or more than four. Once with them you have one hour, keeping about seven metres away, while they feed, groom and play under the silverback's eye. Each guest has a porter for the day pack and a steady hand on muddy slopes. Lunch is packed because return times vary, and the afternoon is free at the hotel.

   Compris

   • Mountain gorilla trek in Volcanoes National Park with park rangers and trackers (permit billed at cost, see exclusions)
   • A porter for each guest
   • Packed lunch
   • Dinner at the hotel

   Option plus facile : Ask at the briefing for a family closer to the park edge; walks to these are often shorter, though the rangers cannot promise it.

   Temps libre : Afternoon free after the trek

   Activité : From under an hour to more than four hours each way on steep, muddy ground at up to about 3,000 m. Wear waterproof boots, long sleeves, trousers tucked into socks and gloves for the nettles. You cannot trek with a cold or flu.

   

4. Jour 4 : Across the border to Lake Bunyonyi

   Musanze to the Cyanika border, then Kisoro, Kabale and Lake Bunyonyi

   • Environ 3.5 h de route
   • Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
   • Nuit : Lake Bunyonyi
   Détail du jour 4

   After breakfast we drive about 25 km west along the foot of the volcanoes to the Cyanika border. Leaving Rwanda and entering Uganda usually takes about an hour, so keep your passport, visa and yellow fever certificate handy. Clocks go forward one hour, and from here traffic keeps to the left. On the Ugandan side our 4x4 safari vehicle and driver take over. We pass through Kisoro, then climb the winding road over the Kanaba Gap towards Kabale and stop for a sit-down lunch on the way. By mid-afternoon we reach our lodge on Lake Bunyonyi, a long, many-armed lake at about 1,960 m dotted with small islands and ringed by terraced hills. In the late afternoon a local guide takes us by boat among the islands, past tiny Akampene, Punishment Island, telling their stories as the light goes. With about an hour at the border on top of 3.5 hours of road, the day runs to about 4.5 hours door to door, a little over our cap; the formalities cannot be shortened, and lunch breaks the drive. We stop here so the border and the road to Bwindi are two days rather than one long one.

   Compris

   • Cyanika border crossing with your guide
   • Sit-down lunch on the way
   • Late-afternoon boat trip among the islands of Lake Bunyonyi with a local guide
   • Dinner at the lodge

   Temps libre : Time at the lodge before the boat

   Activité : About 3.5 hours of driving plus about an hour at the border.

   

5. Jour 5 : To Buhoma, on the edge of Bwindi

   Lake Bunyonyi to Kabale, then north through Kanungu district to Buhoma

   • Environ 4 h de route
   • Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
   • Nuit : Bwindi (Buhoma)
   Détail du jour 5

   Mist often sits on the lake at first light, and if you are up early you can paddle out in a dugout canoe before breakfast. We leave at about 9 am and drive about four hours north to Buhoma, the gateway to the northern sector of Bwindi Impenetrable National Park. The road runs through Kabale, then over ridges of tea, bananas and patchwork farms in Kanungu district; the last stretch is unpaved and slow, so we take a break halfway. Lunch is at our lodge on arrival. Bwindi has been a UNESCO World Heritage site since 1994, a steep, ancient rainforest at roughly 1,200 to 2,600 m that holds close to half of the world's mountain gorillas. In the late afternoon a community guide walks us through Buhoma village and its small farms; we confirm the stops with your final itinerary. Dinner is at the lodge, with the sounds of the forest just beyond the garden.

   Compris

   • Buhoma community walk with a local guide
   • Lunch and dinner at the lodge

   Activités en option

   • Early canoe on Lake Bunyonyi before breakfast

   Option plus active : Paddle a dugout canoe on Lake Bunyonyi at first light (arranged locally, small fee).

   Activité : About 4 hours on the road, the last part unpaved, with a stop halfway. The village walk is gentle, about 2 hours.

6. Jour 6 : Bwindi: a second trek or the forest on foot

   Buhoma and Bwindi Impenetrable National Park

   • Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
   • Nuit : Bwindi (Buhoma)
   Détail du jour 6

   This day is built around a choice you make when you book. If you want a second hour with gorillas, we buy you a Uganda permit and you trek from Buhoma after an early briefing with Uganda Wildlife Authority rangers. Treks here are often steeper and wetter than in Rwanda, through thick forest with a cut path, and the porter we include covers this trek too. Everyone else joins the included plan: a ranger-led walk of about three hours on the waterfall trail along the Munyaga River, through tree ferns and tall forest, looking for black-and-white colobus, red-tailed and L'Hoest's monkeys, butterflies and some of Bwindi's many birds, with the forest at its liveliest in the morning. Both groups meet for lunch at the lodge. The afternoon is free: sit on the deck, sleep, or walk back to the village. Your guide is there for anyone who wants to talk through the trek, and the group comes together again for dinner.

   Compris

   • Ranger-led waterfall forest walk in Bwindi Impenetrable National Park, park fee included
   • All meals at the lodge

   Activités en option

   • Second gorilla trek in Bwindi (Uganda permit bought at booking)

   Option plus facile : Skip the forest walk and spend the day at the lodge.

   Option plus active : A second gorilla trek from Buhoma, with a porter included.

   Temps libre : Afternoon free

   Activité : The forest walk is about 3 hours on a muddy, uneven trail. A Bwindi trek can take from 1 to more than 6 hours in all.

7. Jour 7 : Ishasha and north to the Kazinga Channel

   Buhoma to the Ishasha sector, then north through Queen Elizabeth National Park to the Kazinga Channel

   • Environ 4.5 h de route
   • Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
   • Nuit : Queen Elizabeth National Park
   Détail du jour 7

   We leave Bwindi after breakfast and drive about two hours north through Kihihi to the Ishasha sector in the south of Queen Elizabeth National Park. Ishasha is known for lions that rest in the branches of fig trees, a habit seen in only a few places in Africa; numbers have fallen in recent years, so a sighting is possible, not promised. We game-drive the Ishasha tracks for about two hours, among Uganda kob, topi and buffalo, then stop for a sit-down lunch in the sector. From there it is about two and a half hours north across the park to our lodge near the Kazinga Channel. This is the longest day on the road, about 4.5 hours of driving, a little over our usual cap: no shorter road links Bwindi with the north of the park, and the game drive and lunch break it in the middle. We arrive by about 5 pm, with the evening to rest.

   Compris

   • Game drive in the Ishasha sector
   • Sit-down lunch in Ishasha
   • Dinner at the lodge

   Temps libre : Evening free at the lodge

   Activité : About 4.5 hours on the road plus a 2-hour game drive, broken by lunch.

8. Jour 8 : Kasenyi at dawn, the Kazinga Channel by boat

   Queen Elizabeth National Park: the Kasenyi plains and the Kazinga Channel

   • Environ 2 h de route
   • Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
   • Nuit : Queen Elizabeth National Park
   Détail du jour 8

   We head out at about 6:30 am, with coffee, to the Kasenyi plains in the north of the park, where herds of Uganda kob graze the open grassland and lions sometimes hunt them in the early light. Elephants, buffalo, warthogs and hyenas are likely; leopards are possible. We are back at the lodge for a full breakfast by mid-morning, and the hot middle of the day is free. After lunch we take a two-hour boat trip along the Kazinga Channel, the natural channel of about 32 km that links Lake George and Lake Edward. Hippos gather in large groups along its banks, with buffalo and elephants coming down to drink, Nile crocodiles, and birds from pied kingfishers to African fish eagles, all at close range from the water. The boat is the easy, gentle end to the wildlife days, and dinner is at the lodge with the guide recapping the trip.

   Compris

   • Dawn game drive on the Kasenyi plains
   • Kazinga Channel boat trip, about 2 hours
   • All meals at the lodge

   Activités en option

   • Chimpanzee tracking in Kyambura Gorge (priced at booking)

   Option plus facile : Skip the dawn drive and join the group for the afternoon boat.

   Option plus active : Track chimpanzees in Kyambura Gorge, a forested gorge in the park, in place of the dawn drive.

   Temps libre : Middle of the day free

   Activité : Mostly seated. The Kyambura option is a steep walk down into the gorge and back.

9. Jour 9 : Fly to Entebbe and home

   Queen Elizabeth National Park to Kasese, then a domestic flight to Entebbe

   • Environ 1 h de route
   • Petit-déjeuner et repas du midi
   Détail du jour 9

   After an early breakfast we drive about an hour to the airstrip at Kasese, crossing the equator on the way, for a scheduled domestic flight to Entebbe of a little over an hour. The same journey by road takes seven to eight hours, which is how many trips end. Light aircraft take about 15 kg per person in a soft bag, so your main bag travels by road in our vehicle, which leaves the park at dawn and reaches Entebbe in the afternoon. Entebbe sits on the shore of Lake Victoria. We have lunch together there, and if you want to stretch your legs, the Entebbe Botanical Gardens, with monkeys in the old trees by the lake, are a short ride away. From mid-afternoon, once your bag arrives, a day room near the airport lets you shower and repack before the long flight; keep what you need until then in your soft bag. Your guide sees you to Entebbe International Airport (EBB). Book a flight leaving after about 7 pm; many long-haul flights leave Entebbe in the evening or overnight.

   Compris

   • Scheduled domestic flight from Kasese to Entebbe
   • Lunch in Entebbe
   • Day room near the airport
   • Drop-off at Entebbe International Airport (EBB)

   Temps libre : Afternoon free in Entebbe

   Activité : Book a flight leaving Entebbe after about 7 pm. Your main bag arrives by road in the afternoon. Flight times from Kasese are confirmed with your final itinerary.

   

Faune et météo : June to September and December to February are the drier months, with firmer trails on the trek. March to May and October to November bring heavier rain and muddy slopes, though the gorillas are there all year and Bwindi, a rainforest, can rain any day. Mornings at Musanze, Bunyonyi and Bwindi are cool; Queen Elizabeth National Park, lower down, is warm.

• Kigali1 nuit
• Musanze2 nuits
• Lake Bunyonyi1 nuit
• Bwindi (Buhoma)2 nuits
• Queen Elizabeth National Park2 nuits