The Highlights of Uganda

Upon arrival at Entebbe International Airport, meet your Travulous representative and transfer to your accommodation for check-in.

Spend the rest of your day at leisure enjoying some of Entebbe’s sites or relaxing at your accommodation.

Meals: All meals at own arrangement.

Overnight: Accommodation options

Optional Activities: Ngamba Island Chimpanzee Sanctuary, Lake Victoria sunset boat cruise, birdwatching in Mabamba papyrus swamp, Entebbe Botanical Gardens nature walk, visit to Uganda Wildlife Conservation Education Centre (UWEC).

After breakfast, meet your Travulous guide and transfer to your accommodation in Murchison Falls National Park. Murchison Falls sits on the shore of Lake Albert, and is Uganda’s largest National Park.

The park is home to a range of wildlife including lion, leopard, hyena, elephant, hippo, buffalo, giraffe, hartebeest, chimpanzee and over 460 bird species, including numerous raptors and the shoebill stork.

The national park is also home to the famous Murchison Falls, known locally as Kabalega or Kabarega Falls. Located on the course of the mighty Nile River, the water surges through a narrow gap over a massive drop.

Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner included.

Overnight: Accommodation options

After breakfast, embark on a morning game drive in search of elephant, lion, leopard, buffalo, giraffe, hartebeest, oribi, bushbuck, reedbuck and hyena.

After lunch, depart on a scenic boat trip to the base of Murchison Falls, the centerpiece of the park, where the mighty Nile River thunders its way through a 6 meter gap forming a 45 meter high waterfall, before flowing into Lake Albert. The falls are named after Sir Roderick Murchison, the president of the British Geographical Society in 1864.

The boat ride typically last for 3 - 4 hours and stops very close to the 'devil's cauldron', an ideal spot to take pictures of the majestic falls. Keep a lookout for the breathtaking rainbows.

Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner included.

Overnight: Accommodation options

Enjoy another day in Murchison Falls National Park, with full day game viewing activities including early morning and late afternoon game drives.

Murchison Falls National Park is Uganda’s oldest conservation area, first gazetted as a game reserve in 1926 and home to 76 species of mammals and 451 birds.

The Victoria Nile provides one of Uganda's most remarkable wildlife spectacles, with great opportunities to spot hippos, elephants and shoebills. Visitors to the riverbanks include elephants, giraffes and buffaloes; while hippos, Nile crocodiles and aquatic birds are permanent residents.

Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner included.

Overnight: Accommodation options

After breakfast, depart for Kibale National Park, one of Africa's greatest rainforest reserves, famous for its variety of primates and bird populations. Travel through a breath-taking landscape that forms the Albertine western Rift Valley.

Kibale National Park contains one of the most varied tracts of tropical forest in Uganda. Forest cover, interspersed with patches of grassland and swamp, dominates the northern and central parts of the park on an elevated plateau.

Spend the remainder of the afternoon at leisure enjoying your accommodation’s facilities. Alternatively, enjoy a visit to Bigodi Wetland Sanctuary, keeping a lookout for primates, birds and butterflies.

Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner included.

Overnight: Accommodation options

After an early breakfast, transfer to the park headquarters for chimpanzee tracking.

Home to 13 primate species, Kibale Forest contains one of Africa's largest concentrations of primates, including chimpanzees, colobus and vervet monkeys, and over 320 species of birds.

Kibale’s most popular activity is the Kanyanchu Primate Walk, where 13 species of primates can be found. Kanyanchu’s chimps have been tracked since 1993 and the chances of locating them are excellent. Guided walks start at 8am and 2pm and typically last an average of 3 hours. You will spend up to an hour with the chimpanzees.

Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner included.

Overnight: Accommodation options

Today you proceed to Queen Elizabeth National Park, Uganda's second largest and most popular savannah parks, and the best place to see lions in the country.

With one of the highest biodiversity ratings of any game park in Africa, the park’s ecosystems which includes lakes and wetlands, sprawling savanna and forests, make it the ideal habitat for big game, 10 primate species including chimpanzees, and over 600 species of birds.

After lunch, embark on an afternoon game drive, keeping a lookout for the rare Ugandan cob, along with lion, leopard, elephant and great herds of buffalo.

Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner included.

Overnight: Accommodation options

After breakfast, depart for an early morning game drive in search of four of the Big Five, namely lion, leopard, elephant and buffalo, in addition to hyena, jackal and various antelope species.

Return to your accommodation for lunch, after which you embark on a 2 hour scenic cruise along the Kazinga Channel, one of the most relaxing ways to enjoy a wildlife safari in Queen Elizabeth National Park. Keep a lookout for elephant, hippo, buffalo, crocodile and water birds, along with storks, caimans, monitor lizards, fish eagles and weaver birds.

Alternatively, you have the opportunity to meet the local community and enjoy storytelling, music and dance.

Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner included.

Overnight: Accommodation options

After breakfast, set off for the Ishasha sector of Queen Elizabeth National Park. The Ishasha plains are little visited by tourists and hence are an ideal location for game drives.

Set against the backdrop of the Rwenzori Mountains, the park’s magnificent Ishasha plains are home to fig trees which hide the park’s famous tree climbing lions, ready to pounce on unsuspecting Ugandan kob. A rare and remarkable sight, it is one of the few places in Africa where when your guide shouts ‘lion’, you should definitely look up!

After lunch at your accommodation, head out on a game drive, keeping a lookout for lions, buffalo, elephant, hippo and antelope.

Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner included.

Overnight: Accommodation options

Today you transfer to Bwindi Impenetrable Forest National Park, one of UNESCO’s world heritage sites. The national park is also home to one of Uganda's oldest and most biologically diverse rainforests, protecting roughly half of the world’s population of mountain gorillas, including several habituated groups for tourists to visit. The park also offers some of the finest montane forest birding in Africa.

Spend the rest of the day at leisure enjoying your accommodation's facilities, followed by dinner in the evening.

Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner included.

Overnight: Accommodation options

After an early breakfast, depart for mountain gorilla tracking in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest National Park.

The activity starts with a briefing at 8am at the park headquarters. After the briefing you depart with the guide and rangers to find the mountain gorillas. The time spent tracking gorillas in Uganda depends and varies from half an hour to eight hours depending on the gorilla movements.

Although the hike can be physically demanding, the beauty of the forest and its inhabitants is a fascinating and very rewarding experience. Once the gorilla families have been found, your visit with these great apes lasts for one magical hour.

Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner included.

Overnight: Accommodation options

Today you have the option to go on a second gorilla trek in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest National Park.

Though the National Park is best known for its outstanding gorilla tracking, it also provides refuge to forest elephant, chimpanzee, monkeys and various small antelope. Bwindi is also home to around 350 bird species, of which 23 are endemic to the Albertine Rift and at least 14 are found nowhere else in Uganda.

After your gorilla trek you return to your accommodation. Spend the rest of the afternoon at leisure enjoying the facilities, followed by dinner in the evening.

Meals: Breakfast, lunch and dinner included.

Overnight: Accommodation options

After breakfast, there is time for a guided forest walk, before departing for Entebbe airport and your homebound flight.

Meals: Breakfast included, lunch and dinner at own arrangement. 

Alternatively, consider extending this trip by adding one of our Extension Ideas (see below) to this program.