How to get to Bwindi Forest National Park in Uganda
How to get to Bwindi Forest National Park in Uganda : Bwindi Forest national park can be easily accessed by either by Road or by Air transport as highlighted below;
By road, Bwindi Forest National Park can be accessed through several routes from Queen Elizabeth National Park to the north route of Bwindi takes 2 to 3 hours.
From Kabale to the south route takes 1 to 2 hours drives to access Bwindi.
From Kampala via Mbarara takes 6 to 8 hours’ drive.
By road transport travelers are recommended to use A 4WD vehicle most especially during the rainy season
Public Transport
You can decide to use a bus service that leaves Kampala for Butogota via Rukungiri and Kihihi. Services to use are Amatatu or public minibus, hire car or boda-boda ‘’motorcycle tax’’ which can be taken from Butogota to the park entrance gate at Buhoma.
Queen Elizabeth national park Mweya-Kihihi-Buhoma
From Queen to Bwindi, you will pass through Ishasha a rewarding area with tree climbing lions along with monkeys on the road. Bwindi covers an area of about 160 kilometers from Mweya about 64kilometers from Ishasha.
Kampala-Kabale-Kanungu-Buhoma
This route covers an area of about 414 kilometers and a 5 -6 hours’ drive to access the main destination.
Kampala –Ntungamo –Rukungiri –Kihihi –Buhoma
This route is the easiest from Kampala to the tarmac road via Rukungiri which is about 390 Kilometers in addition to marram road to Buhoma.
Kampala –Kabale –Ruhija –Buhoma
This route is convenient to travelers covering to an area of about 95 kilometers on the marram road and takes 3 to 4 hours. The vehicle that fits through Ruhija is a 4Wheel driver.
Kampala –Kabale –Nkuringo
The route covers a distance of about 105 kilometers from Kabale town, takes about 4 hours on the marram road to access the park. The most suitable car for this route is the 4Wheel driver.
By Air
Travelers who doesn’t want to travel long journey on road, book a domestic flight ‘’Aero link airline’’ from Entebbe or Kampala ‘’Kajjansi airfield’’ to access the modern tarmac airstrip at Kisoro. There are scheduled and chartered flight which can be chartered to the savannah airstrips or the grass Kayonza
Bwindi is well served by three airfields that is Kihihi and Kayonza in the northern sector and Nyakabande in Kisoro for those going to trek mountain gorillas in the southern sector comprised of Nkuringo, Nshongi and Mishaya’’.
Bwindi Forest National park is home rich in species over 310 butterfly species ,200 tree species ,51 reptiles ,88 moths and other 10 primates such as red tailed, Chimpanzees, L’Hoest, blue monkeys, baboons and black and white colobus as well Bwindi’s famous endangered mountain gorillas, the park is comprised with lowland forest at 1160 meter to unique Afromontane vegetation above 2600meter.For this reason a traveler is required to have some level of physical fitness.
Bwindi is also a great location for bird lovers, hosting over 350 bird species and listed on IUCN red data.
The park is also surrounded with unique and amazing local people, the Bafumbira and Batwa pygmy who attracts a lot number of tourist on their visit to Bwindi after gorilla trekking experience.
Note, Bwindi was listed among the Africa’s oldest forest which were destroyed during the arid conditions of the final ice age ‘’12,000-18,000 years ago’ ’Fortunately Bwindi was among a few forest that survived.
Climate and best time to Visit
Bwindi has moderate temperature that ranges between 7 degrees Celsius and 20 degrees Celsius, meaning both morning and nights can be cold. Travelers are advised to carry warm clothes, hike boots, rain jacket, long sleeved shirts and trousers, cotton stocking many more. The best time to visit Bwindi is from June to July –drier seasons, Wet season occurs in March to May as well as from September to November thus experiencing a total annual rainfall of 2390melimeter, it doesn’t mean that it rains all day along, it might rain in the morning at noonday the sunrise out and activities goes on in the park.
Where to stay
Bwindi offers huge comfortable accommodation places to stay in basing on which gorilla group you to trek.
Bwindi Impenetrable Forest started as a reserve in 1942 and later in 1992 gazette as a national park. It was listed as the world Heritage site in 1994 and managed by ‘UWA’ Uganda Wildlife Authority. The park lies in the southwestern region of Uganda and covers an area of about 327 square kilometers of its lowland ranging into an intensive landscape of the steep, haughty ridges and the slippery valleys.
