On my tour to Uganda, I had a lot of fun due to the several activities I performed on my own drive long stay tour. On this tour, I observed the best five places to visit in Uganda and these included. Bwindi Impenetrable National Park for gorilla trekking holiday, Queen Elizabeth National Park for African tree climbing lions and the boat cruise along the Kazinga channel that connects the Ramsar George into Lake Edward, Rwenzori Mountain National Park for hiking to the ice Margherita, Kibale Forest National Park for the chimpanzee trekking and habituation, Murchison Fall National Park for the wildlife, boat cruise along River Nile and sightseeing and landscapes and the Source of the Nile offering the international white water rafting, bungee jumping and kayaking holidays. But before coming to Uganda, I had to organize the tour with a local Uganda Car Rental company and I arranged it based on self-drive holiday and the company offered me with suitable 4wd vehicle to take me to all these places without any hassle.
The tour was to last for 14 days and on my arrival, I was taken to Fung Fang Hotel in Kampala where I slept and very early in the morning I was taken to the source of River Nile in Jinja approximately 80km from Kampala city. We used a well tarmac road through Mabira forests and acre after acre of sugar cane fields which are said to be for an Indian known as Mehta.
Basing on the true history I got from the guides was that this is one of the longest rivers in the world, the Nile flows from south to north and is believed to originate in Lake Victoria, Uganda. Since what brought me was to tour. I wasn’t contented, I told Moses to hire a Boat that took me to the middle of the lake where the Nile is said to originate. While the boat was sailing on waters, i indulged in bird watching along the banks of the river. Some of the other activities in and around the place that I missed but also performed include a white water rafting run, a visit to the hydro-electric power plant at Bujagali Falls, bungee jumping and visiting around the Jinja town.
In the evening I was taken back to Fung Fung Hotel again in Kampala to prepare for our journey to Bwindi impenetrable national park. We did this very early in the morning, we used Kampala-Masaka road to south western Uganda. This took us 7hours on the way. We couldn’t tour the park on that day and here I slept Trekkers Tavern cottages but on the next day, I tracked the endangered mountain gorillas along the Ruhija sector and here we tracked the Ruhija gorilla group, gorilla permits costs $700.
In the evening I was taken back to Trekkers Tavern cottages, breakfast, lunch and supper were all included on my budget here for three days. On another day I was taken back to the forest to do cultural encounters with the Batwa community who are the permanent residents in this forest. These performed to us some of their traditional songs, we visited their handcraft shops, I also learned how bananas can be used to make juice and local beers. Other activities that I missed included but can be done in the park included, Nature walks, Birding and mountain biking.
On that day evening, I was taken to Ishasha Jungle Lodge near Queen Elizabeth national park where I slept. Early in the morning on the next day, I was taken to the park where I did launch trips which gave me a chance to see herds of hippos, buffaloes and the elephants plus birds along the Kazinga channel. This activity lasted for 2hours and in the evening, I was taken to Ishasha sector within the park, this is where I observed tree climbing lions up on the fig trees within the park.
Other areas of interests that are within the park include the Kyambura gorge, Maramagambo forest, Mweya peninsula and Lake Katwe where local mining of salt is done by the local community among others. On my seventh day while experiencing these better places, I was taken to Rwenzori mountain national park and due to the fact that we reached in the evening, I slept at Geo Lodge Equator Snow with full board. In the morning of the visited most of the interesting areas within the park and these included, Lakes such as Bukuju and Mahoma, Bulemba houses where the remains of the earlier Rwenzururu king was laid, Equatorial snow peaks such as Mount Stanley and Speke.
I did not perform any activity here but some of the colleagues I found there were doing Birding in the montane forest, culture encounters with the Bakonzo. Others were doing mountain climbing on the Rwenzori Mountains up to the snow peak of Margherita, hiking and nature walks. We went to Murchison falls national park that evening and we slept at Paraa Safari Lodge. Murchison Falls National Park gets its name from the magnificent Murchison’s fall.
The truth is that this is one of the best places to head for a game drive. The Nile explodes out of a narrow gorge and falls down in a thundering cascade to form the waterfall. I observed crocodiles and hippos which fill the river lines of the Nile and a wide variety of water bucks, buffaloes and birds. One of the highlights of this area is taking a launch boat through some beautiful papyrus swamps.
This took us 3hours on the boat in afternoon since it’s the excellent time for game sightings as the animals tend to head from the bush to the shores of the River as the day gets hotter. Other wildlife found in these areas includes lions, leopards, elephants, giraffes, hartebeests, oribi, and Uganda Kobs.
On the last day with en-route visit to Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary for Rhino tracking I was taken back to Kampala via Gulu-Bombo-Kampala road to prepare for my departure and very early in the morning, I was taken to the airport but as I was going back while in the plane, I was wondering the beauty that is possessed by Uganda in terms of tourism.
