Lonely Planet™ · Thorn Tree Forum · 2020

stay near National Parks

Country forums / Africa / Uganda

Hard to find good info on next subject.
As I’m fine-tuning my itinerary for Uganda there’s one bottle-neck. My main reason to visit Uganda is to see gorilla’s, chimps and golden monkeys in their own habitat. I’m now looking into the possibility of staying near the NP’s where I will visit them.

What are some nice places to stay (and sleep) near Kibale NP, Mgahinga NP and Bwindi NP (try to do gorilla tracking in south Bwindi). I want to sleep near the NP’s for easy access the next morning to go on primate tracking. I’m not looking for places which are over $ 100 /night, but (budget)places with nice banda’s.

Also important is accessibility from nearby towns. Will try to get boda-boda’s most of the time to get to the NP entrances. Otherwise it will be private hire (or taxi’s).

So far I have Community Camp near Mgahinga NP (from Kisoro). Other suggestions?
Still need info on Kibale NP and Bwindi NP (I’m gonna ask for south Bwindi)

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We were on a budget when we went as well. We were able to arrange seeing the gorillas at Bwindi (amazing!) through Byoona Amagara. Jason is the owner and can arrange budget-friendly trip options to see the gorillas and chimps. They come highly recommended from us! Just send him an email with what you want to do, and he'll work with you to arrange things. http://lakebunyonyi.net/index2.php?page=23 Very happy we did this! Have fun!

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Whatever you do, book the transportation the previous day. Either from the accomodation you are staying (some have vehicles) or from a trustworthy provider.

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Near to Kibale, we stayed at Safari Hotel in Nkingo village. It's just a little guest house with 4 basic rooms, a few slightly more expensive brick bandas behind, and a lovely manageress (who is also a very good cook!)

It's about halfway between the park entrance and Bigodi, where I can recommend the swamp walk. Takes about half an hour to walk to either place from the guest house so no need to worry about transport - although getting away is a bit harder, we waited a good couple of hours for onward transport south. We got there via shared taxi from Fort Portal and transport may be easier if you want to go back to Fort Portal afterwards.

For Mgahinga we stayed at the Community Camp, just 2 mins from the park entrance. They have one smart bungalow and a couple of smaller bandas, or you can camp. There's nothing much else nearby apart from an expensive hotel, but the Camp does decent meals and has a bar.

You can take a boda from Kisoro, but the road is very bad and I wasn't keen to try it with luggage. Indeed, while at Mgahinga, I saw a heavily loaded boda fall over and dump its 3 passengers - mum and 2 kids - onto the road (no one hurt, luckily). I'd advise a private hire or hitching. We managed to get lifts both ways, but there isn't a lot of traffic as the park entrance is at the end of the road.

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