One hour with a gorilla family. Then the rest of Uganda.
Which Bwindi trek includes the drive south. What the Murchison boat costs. Whether Kibale earns the extra day. Reviews of every tour you can book in Uganda.
A gorilla family, a river of hippos, the rapids and a market morning.
The four bookings a first Ugandan itinerary is built around. What each one costs, and what the people who took it say.
01The one you came for3 Days gorilla trekking Safari tour in UgandaThree days built around a single permitted hour in Bwindi, with the long drive south already priced in.
02The park run3 Days Murchison Falls Adventure Wildlife Safari Uganda TourMurchison in two nights: the launch to the foot of the falls, then the climb to the top of them.
03The river dayTubing the NileTubing the calm water above the Jinja rapids. The cheapest good day in the country, by some distance.
04A morning in KampalaKampala’s Best Experience walking tourSeven hills, a market that swallows whole streets, and a minaret you can climb for the view over all of it.
Uganda fits a forest, a savannah and a rift valley into one week.
The Impenetrable Forest in the far southwest, the falls in the north, the Kazinga Channel in the middle, the loudest chimpanzee forest in East Africa, the river at Jinja and the capital everything leaves from. Six starting points, and the best day out in each.
Kampala is worth a day before anyone drives you south.
Everything in Kampala →
The city spreads over seven hills and hides its best parts in lanes a car cannot take. Walk the market, climb the minaret at the national mosque for the whole sprawl at once, then let somebody who rides for a living put you on the back of a boda.
The market, the mosque, the minaret
Through St Balikuddembe market, where the aisles narrow to a shoulder width, then up the minaret of the national mosque for the view that finally makes the geography make sense.
The city from the back of a boda
Boda bodas are how Kampala actually moves. A guided ride threads the back routes between the hills and covers ground a walking tour cannot reach before lunch.
Entebbe, the airport town worth a morning
Most trips land here and leave immediately. The botanical gardens, the lake shore and the swamp boats to the shoebill sit within half an hour of the terminal.
Three ways to end up standing in front of a gorilla family.
A permit buys one hour with one habituated family, on one dated morning. What changes is everything around it: how many days the drive south eats, whether you sleep at the forest edge, and whether the chimps get folded in on the way back.
The Ugandan days out more travellers take than any other.
Every Uganda tour review →What the country actually sells: forest permits, park circuits, a river morning and a walk through the capital.
1
3 Hours Guided Cycling Tour Across Lake Victoria
Start at 8:00 am at Beach House Gardens in Ggaba. Take a local boat to Buule, then ride 20 to 25 kilometers along narrow dirt trails beside Lake Victoria. Your mountain bike, helmet, boat transfers, guide, soft drink, and Ugandan Rolex snack are included. Guide Zaga has led this route.
From · $60
Read our review →2
Kampala’s Best Experience walking tour
from $33
3
3 Days gorilla trekking Safari tour in Uganda
from $2,600
4
Lake Victoria Island Cycling Tour from Kampala
from $62
5
Kampala Walking City Tours (Women Guided)
from $34
6
1 Day Sipi falls hike
from $20
7
8-Day Murchison Falls, Chimp and Epic Gorilla Trekking Safari
from $3,598
8
Tubing the Nile
from $55
Uganda keeps its savannah in the rift valley, not on a plain.
Murchison splits around the falls and drifts north with hippos in it. Queen Elizabeth runs between two lakes and a crater field. Lake Mburo is small enough to walk and the only park with zebra. Ziwa holds the country’s rhinos, tracked on foot.
At Jinja the Nile is a day out, not a viewpoint.
The river leaves Lake Victoria here and hits grade five water within a few kilometres. Raft it, tube the calm stretch above it, or take a boat to the point where the lake becomes a river. Downstream at Murchison the same water is the reason the park exists.
- 13 Hours Guided Cycling Tour Across Lake Victoriafrom $60
- 2Lake Victoria Island Cycling Tour from Kampalafrom $62
- 3Tubing the Nilefrom $55
What a day in Uganda actually costs.
Every tour on the site, grouped by what it costs. The gap between the cheapest good day here and the most expensive one is wider than in almost any country we cover.
City walks, boda rides, the equator stop, tubing the Nile and a morning in the Entebbe gardens.
Day safaris, the Kazinga launch, rafting, rhino tracking and the single-day runs out of Kampala.
Permitted primate treks and the multi-day park circuits, where the permit and the driving are the price.
Three things that happen in Uganda and almost nowhere else.
Savannah and waterfalls exist all over the continent. A mountain gorilla within arm’s reach, the exact point the Nile begins, and coffee grown on the shoulder of a dead volcano do not.
The Bwindi Gorillas
Roughly half the world’s mountain gorillas live in this one forest, in families that have been habituated to people over years of daily contact. A permit puts you with one family for one hour, and the trackers who found them at dawn radio your guide the direction. The walk in can take twenty minutes or most of the morning, uphill, through vegetation the name of the forest does not exaggerate.
- 13 Days gorilla trekking Safari tour in Uganda★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 121 reviews
- 28-Day Murchison Falls, Chimp and Epic Gorilla Trekking Safari★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 72 reviews
- 35-Day Pearl of Africa Chimps and Gorilla Trekking Safari★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 52 reviews
The Source of the Nile
Lake Victoria spills north at Jinja and becomes the river that reaches Egypt. There is a marked point on the water where the current starts and the lake stops, and boats take you out to sit on it. A few kilometres downstream the same water is folding into grade five rapids, which is why the rafting industry set up in the same town.
- 1Tubing the Nile★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 69 reviews
- 2Private Whitewater Tubing in Bujagali Hydropower Plant★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 21 reviews
- 3Family Float Trip★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 8 reviews
Sipi Falls
Three waterfalls drop off the western shoulder of Mount Elgon above Kapchorwa, with coffee gardens terraced into the slope between them. The walk links all three in a long morning, and the farms in between roast and cup what they grow, which is the part most people remember.
- 11 Day Sipi falls hike★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 100 reviews
- 22 Sipi Falls hike and Coffee Tour Experience★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 23 reviews
- 32 Days Sipi Falls Hike and Coffee Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 15 reviews
Four Ugandan bookings that will not wait.
Most of this country can be arranged from a Kampala breakfast table the day before. These four run on permits, boat departures and water levels that take no interest in when your flight lands.
- 013 Days gorilla trekking Safari tour in UgandaA permit is dated, capped per gorilla family and sold per person. In the dry months they go months ahead, and the date printed on it is the only date it works.
- 025 Days Uganda Gorilla, Chimpanzee and Wildlife SafariKibale runs a morning group and an afternoon group with a fixed number of places in each. There is no standby queue at the gate.
- 03Uganda Jungle RaftingThe rafting companies run set departures and the river level decides which rapids are in play. Weekend seats fill first.
- 04Mabamba Swamp Shoebill Tracking Boat TourMabamba swamp is worked at first light by canoe and the boats are spoken for the night before. By mid-morning the bird has moved into the papyrus.
Two wet seasons, and the park tracks take them personally.
March to May and September to November, the murram roads turn and the forest trails go slick. The parks stay open and the gorillas do not care, but the driving gets long. The answer is to spend those days where the ground is paved: the capital, the lake shore and a coffee slope with a roof on it.
Kibale and Kyambura: Uganda’s chimpanzee mornings.
Chimpanzees are heard long before they are seen, and Kibale holds them at a density nothing else in East Africa matches. Kyambura Gorge, inside Queen Elizabeth, is the version you can add to a park day without a separate drive.
By place - forest, park, river and city
By kind of day - forest, savannah, water or street
Kampala, the river, two parks, then the forest: the circuit most first trips make.
The newest Uganda tour reviews.
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7 Days Fort Portal Culture Tour Western Uganda
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Experience Chimpanzee Trekking in Budongo Forest
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3-Day Mind Refreshing in Murchison Falls National Park
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