07 Days Visit to Murchison Falls , Kibale Forest and Queen Elizabeth National Park

On arrival at the Entebbe International Airport, our company representative will be waiting to meet you and transfer you to your hotel in Kampala. Depending on the time of arrival, you can decide to do some activities in Entebbe, like visiting the Botanical gardens, visiting the Uganda Wildlife Education Centre (formerly Zoo) or visit the reptile village. You will also have a pre-trip briefing. 

Your travel guide will pick you up early morning-0630hrs in Entebbe (Drive Time | 5 ¹/₂Hrs) and 0630hrs and drive you straight to Murchison Falls National Park. This is to enable us to be at the park in time for the various activities.

Visit the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary… “The only place to see white rhinos roaming the wild in Uganda!” Uganda used to have a healthy population of both black and northern white rhinos. The violent demise of species, leading to all Uganda’s rhinos becoming extinct by 1983, was due to various factors, mainly civil war and poaching, as well as urbanization. 

Enter the territory of the southern white rhinos on foot. The white rhino differs from the black species in that it is larger and its square lip is adapted for grazing, which differs markedly from the pointed prehensile lip of the black rhino, which feeds chiefly on the foliage and coarse woody shoots of thorn shrub. The well-trained rangers will guide you through the bush to where the rhinos are on the day of your visit.  On arrival, visit the top of the falls to “see and hear” the magnificence of the Nile. See the Nile thunder through a 6m wide gorge. The site can be reached by vehicle.  Enjoy an evening game drive on your way to the lodge. 

Early morning breakfast, and thereafter transfer for the morning game drive that will last approximately 3 to 4 hours. Lunch is served starting at 12:30; thereafter, enjoy an afternoon boat ride along the mighty River Nile to the bottom of the Murchison Falls. The park is bisected by the Victoria Nile, which plunges 45 m over the remnant rift valley wall, creating the dramatic Murchison Falls, the centerpiece of the park and the final event in an 80 km stretch of rapids. The mighty cascade drains the last of the river's energy, transforming it into a broad, placid stream that flows quietly across the rift valley into Lake Albert. At Murchison Falls, the Nile squeezes through a 6m wide gorge and plunges into the “Devil's Cauldron”, creating a trademark rainbow with a mighty thunderous roar.

Thereafter, enjoy an afternoon boat ride along the mighty River Nile to the bottom of the Murchison Falls. This stretch of river provides one of Uganda’s most remarkable wildlife spectacles. Regular visitors to the riverbanks include Elephants, Giraffes, and buffalo, while hippos, Nile crocodiles, and aquatic birds are permanent residents. The launch voyage upriver from Paraa to see the fall exploding through the cliffs at the head of the Fajao Gorge. This is the park’s oldest and most popular excursion. The 3-hour return trip passes a wealth of riverside wildlife on the way, including huge schools of resident hippos and crocodiles, bathing buffaloes, visiting Elephants, and numerous aquatic birds adjoining the northern bank on the way to the bottom of the mighty Murchison waterfalls. This stretch of river provides one of Uganda’s most remarkable wildlife spectacles. Regular visitors to the riverbanks include Elephants, Giraffes and buffaloes, while hippos, Nile crocodiles, and aquatic birds are permanent residents. 

Have an early morning breakfast at the lodge. Later we drive to Kibale Forest National Park, in Western Uganda, an incredibly diverse forest that is home to over 335 bird species (some rare or endemic) and 13 species of primates including chimpanzee, red Colobus monkey, the rare L’Hoest monkey, blue monkey, grey-cheeked mangabey, black faced vervet monkeys, baboons, pottos and bushbabies. Arrive in Fort Portal in the early afternoon, have lunch at Gardens Restaurant, then head to the lodge, relax, and unwind after your long day’s trip. 

Dinner and Overnight at Primate Lodge | Chimpanzee Forest Guesthouse | Kibale Forest Camp 

and you will always be accompanied by Rangers who will explain the fascinating traditional uses of the forest plant species – the forest elephant, smaller and hairier that its savannah counterpart, moves seasonally into areas of Kibale Forest. 

After lunch, your guide will lead you to Kibale Association for Rural Environment Development (KAFRED), where you will have a swamp walk through communities and gardens hence understanding the people’s way of life in the community, then back to your lodge. 

Cleverly, constructed boardwalks lead you through Papyrus that towers above your head in Bigodi Wetlands Sanctuary, a few minutes’ drive from Kibale Forest. With over 130 bird species, multi-colored butterflies, eight different types of primates and the rare, semi-aquatic Sitatunga (antelope), this is community tourism at its best. 

Dinner and Overnight at Primate Lodge | Chimpanzee Forest Guesthouse | Kibale Forest Camp

Drive to Queen Elizabeth National Park. The drive passes through Fort Portal and then south along the eastern length of The Rwenzori Mountains, with the hope of viewing the glaciated peaks. We gently descend into the Great African Rift Valley and Queen Elizabeth National Park with a peninsula overlooking Lake Edward and Kazinga Channel, offering beautiful views of the park with the Rwenzori Mountains in the background. Queen Elizabeth National Park resides in a fertile, equatorial area and has beautiful scenery. It is Uganda’s most popular and accessible savannah Park, with a total area

of 1,978km². It is primarily associated with grassy savannah plains, but this impressive park also includes within its boundaries leafy rainforests, dense papyrus swamps, and natural volcanic crater lakes. As a result, it has one of the highest biodiversity ratings of any game reserve in the world, including a total of over 95 recorded mammal species and more than 610 species of birds. In the afternoon, we will explore the park and its wonders on a game drive. 

In the afternoon, you will take a boat for a water safari on the Kazinga Channel at Mweya that connects the two lakes of Edward and George. This is likely to be a big highlight of your trip! The expert Uganda Wildlife Authority guides will identify many of the Channel’s 100 bird species, and you are likely to see African Skimmers, Great White Pelicans, Spoonbill, and several Bee-eater species. Hippos wallow at the edge of the water, huge Nile crocodiles bask in the sun, and elephants come down to drink. The Kazinga Channel boat ride is a brilliant opportunity to take some close-up wildlife shots. 

Dinner and Overnight at Mweya Safari Lodge | Marafiki Lodge | The Bush Lodge

The open grasslands of Kasenyi provide QENP’s primary game viewing area, thanks to the resident herds of Uganda Kob and the lions that prey on them. The parks' experienced ranger guides can usually locate lions, but predator sightings can be guaranteed by signing up for a tour with the Mweya-based Uganda Predator Project, which monitors the movement of lions, leopards, and hyenas fitted with radio collars. 

Drive back to Kampala through Mbarara – the land where milk and honey flow on the village paths, and have lunch en route. On the past the equator lines at Kayabwe, there are quite several craft shops where you can purchase memoirs of our trip.