Uganda is not an obvious Safari destination. It's variety in scenery, people and wildlife makes it an truely recommended and unique travel, especially for someone who has already seen the big game Safari in Kenya or Tanzania. In Uganda you can see tree hanging lions in the morning and Mountain Gorillas in the afternoon, there is no other country in the world that has that. We went with drifters, a tour operator that uses very comfortable trucks (instead of jeeps) for groups up till 16 people. In my opinion, the trip was such a great experience because we camped almost every night and we had the most fantastic guide Anthony Washford to drive the truck, cook the food and plan all the excursions such as the astonishing Gorillas at Bwindi.
Brian
CA
Visited:
September 2010
Reviewed: Sep 20, 2011
20-35 years of age
The review below is the personal opinion of Brian and not that of SafariBookings.
Wildlife disappointing compared to Serengeti area
3 / 5
3
/5
3 / 5
4 / 5
4 / 5
/ 5
Having done a safari in the Serengeti immediately before Uganda it was always going to be difficult to live up to expectations. The quantity and variety of wildlife was poor in comparison. The people in my group who were starting with Uganda were quite thrilled with what they saw so I may be being overly harsh. Our guide explained that much of the wildlife was decimated during the Idi Amin era and is still recovering so perhaps in the future it will improve. The campsites we used varied quite widely from fairly developed areas in Jinja/Kampala to merely a flat area near the river at Lake Mburo. The gorillas and Bwindi forest in general were amazing and did make the trip to Uganda worthwhile in my opinion.
The Far HorizonsVisited:
April 2012
Reviewed: Jun 4, 2012
4 / 5
4
/5
4 / 5
4 / 5
5 / 5
5 / 5
Uganda is an unspoiled destination, because it has never suffered the mass tourism of Kenya and Tanzania. The people are friendly and welcoming by nature, and there is plenty of opportunity to get out of the vehicle and explore on foot and to interact with the locals.
Game densities in some places are very good, but here, you have to work a little harder to spot your game than in other, more popular destinations. Also, top end accommodation can be hard to find in certain areas. However, Uganda has a beguiling charm, and will get under your skin. At the end of a multi-country African safari, Uganda will linger as one of your fondest memories, sometimes for reasons you can't quite put your finger on.
Anonymous
GB
Visited:
June 2012
Reviewed: Oct 29, 2012
Email Anonymous
| 20-35 years of age
| Experience level: over 5 safaris
Gorilla trekking Tour
5 / 5
5
/5
5 / 5
3 / 5
4 / 5
4 / 5
I had wanted to hire a car and drive through Uganda, but after spending over a month trying to secure gorilla tracking permits to no avail, I was told that often the Ugandan Wildlife Authority are uncooperative with individual groups of tourists as they are paid of my tour companies, whether this is true I’m not sure but I tried contacting them by both email and phone for over a month and received no correct info and was just led around in circles with false email addresses etc...
If you are situated in Uganda it’s a different ball game and it seems it’s a simple process to obtain the permits from the UWA office in Kampala. Seeing as I didn’t want to risk arriving and there being no permits left I decided to give up and book through a tour agency. In the end I’m so glad we did, we booked the permits and a driver to take us from Kampala to Queen Elizabeth National Park for a safari, on to Lake Bunyonyi for a night, down to Bwindi Impenetrable Forest to track gorillas and
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finally across the Rwandan border to Kigali.
All the booking and communication was done through Jackie from Katona, who was extremely helpful and answered all of my questions, gave great advice and put together multiple itineraries based on each new request, for us to look through.
When we arrived in Kampala we found the office easily and paid the balance and made some final arrangements which all went smoothly. (It’s worth noting that USD notes printed before the year 2000 and which are smaller denominations than $50 are not accepted anywhere in Uganda).
We met our driver the next morning and he was quiet but helpful throughout the trip. Overall the value for money was amazing and we got to see so much more and got a lot more packed into the time we had there. You are read about our experience in Queen Elizabeth National Park and our experience tracking gorillas in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest here, we never would have seen so much wildlife both on the safari and on the drive without our driver’s sharp eyes. We also had baggage missing from our flight when we landed and the company arranged for it to be driven down and meet us the day after the tour started, they took away all the worry and did this all completely free of charge