Never ceases to amaze. I happened to win the office’s lottery to lead a group of 3 guests on a 4 day gorilla trekking expedition to Bwindi Impenetrable Forest. You see, at Buutu Safaris we insist on tracking every gorilla family. This enables us to get in depth knowledge about gorilla tracking in Uganda and Rwanda. As such we are able to tailor the best gorilla trekking safari experiences for our guests. What that means is that we have to track all the gorilla families in Uganda and Rwanda! Yes, it is a tough job but someone has got to do it. This time round, it just so happened that someone was in front of me.

On this 4 Day Gorilla Tracking safari, we set off quite early from Jinja city to beat the Kampala traffic jam. Day 1 on this safari is meant to reduce the monotony of driving a long distance. The journey from Jinja or Kampala to Bwindi can take 10 - 12 hours. As such, we decided to break this safari up so the journey takes 2 days. These 2 days are designed to be spent partly exploring the medley of wonders in Queen Elizabeth National park which is found along the way to Bwindi Impenetrable Forest national park.

So on day 1, we started the drive that took us through the equator crossing point, to Mbarara town and through the tea estates. We made our way through the lush kalinzu forest and finally descended into the scenic rift valley from the Kichwamba area. This drive from Mbarara to the Kyambura area is arguably one of the most scenic drives in Uganda.

We arrived in Queen Elizabeth national park in time for an evening game drive. We drove through the mating grounds in search of the usual suspects like the buffalo, lion, leopard and elephant. The setting sun and the backdrop of the Rwenzori mountain ranges made the drive magical. We saw plenty of Uganda kob antelope and a lone leopard. We then made our way to the lodge arriving late but still in time for dinner.

The following morning, we had a leisurely breakfast before we embarked on the second leg of our journey to Bwindi. Half way through the journey to Bwindi, we took a detour to the remote sector of Ishasha where we embarked on yet another game drive. This particular area has long been inaccessible by most; yet, Ishasha offers incredible big game viewing opportunities. And indeed, we saw the tree climbing lions, herds of buffalo hippopotami in Ishasha river and elephants among others.

After a long journey that took us through Queen Elizabeth National Park, we made it to the Ruhija sector of Bwindi. Ruhija, like the Buhoma, Rushaga and Nkuringo sectors of Bwindi offers sweeping views of the impressive tropical rainforest. Our early arrival allowed us a good view of the thick jungle we were going to trek through.

On day 3, the sun rose quickly as the morning mist rose above the forest. After an early breakfast, we made our way to the park headquarters a few minutes away from our lodge. We were welcomed by the hospitable rangers of Uganda Wildlife Authority and the porters from the community. We were joined by 2 other travellers making the total of our group 5. The maximum number of people that can trek a gorilla family in a day is 8. The smaller the number of people trekking a family the better that’s why I always prefer going gorilla trekking in the off season. The excitement in the group was tangible as one could easily tell the moment of truth was upon us. The thrilling journey into Bwindi was about to commence.

As always, the rangers took time to explain the do and don’ts as they prepared us to head into the depth of Bwindi Impenetrable Forest. We were allocated slots to track the Bitukura family.

We headed out for a five minute drive before we were dropped off at the tracking starting point. The rangers led us into the forest but this time we walked along the forest borders. Unlike my previous outings, this time round we stayed close to the forest edge and even when we went deep into the forest, the forest cover was not as dense. The climb was still steep but it was nothing close to the trekking in Nkuringo and Rushaga where we trekked across cliff sides. This particular gorilla family, the Bitukura family likes to remain close to the edge of the forest and often wanders into the community.  So this time round the lead trackers said they had not moved far out into the jungle to find the family.

And sure enough within 30 minutes we found the lead trackers who had gone into the forest earlier to locate the gorillas nesting grounds from the previous night. Lo and behold we saw movement and what appeared to be a very dark object. Low and behold, there was a juvenile and a black back gorilla.

We moved closer and started a count of the gorilla family. The silverback was calm and cool. The juveniles were restless as usual and the silverback was a picture of cool and quiet confidence. But unlike my previous experiences in Buhoma, Rushaga and Nkuringo sector, this gorilla family was unsettled and constantly on the move.

It turns out one of the gorillas had just recently passed away and left an orphan. The rest of the group was thus taking extra care to look after the orphan. It was quite touching to watch the silverback gorilla take the orphan on his back and take extra care to ensure the orphan baby was well.

However, it appeared our presence was unwelcome so the gorillas kept moving as though to get away from us. And when the gorillas realised we were unrelenting in our pursuit, the gorillas moved to a thicket and suddenly stopped. Unknown to us, the ground below the thicket was littered with ants which swiftly made their way into our pants. Within a few moments everyone in the group was fighting off ants. The rangers scratched, our guests smilingly brushed off and the porters laughed as they too tried to fend off the ants. Luckily, those who wore good boots and tucked their trousers into their pants survived the worst of the ant attack. As we scrambled to get away from the ants, the gorillas were unbothered and I dare say they were happy having led us into the ants. So as they wanted, we made our way out of the area as the one hour was almost over.

We began the trek back to the starting point shortly after. The one hour we were allowed had quickly elapsed and the ant attack was not allowing us extra time with the gorillas. We quickly arrived at the briefing point where we were given certificates and congratulated.

After the tracking we made the 2 hour journey to Lake Bunyonyi where we spent the evening and the night. The drive to Lake Bunyonyi took 2 hours during which we had the chance to see the best of the gorilla highlands. Upon arrival we relaxed into our exquisite Arcadia Lodge and Day 4 started with a leisurely breakfast at what is arguably Uganda’s scenic lodges, Arcadia Lodge lake Bunyonyi. We enjoyed the sweeping views of Lake Bunyonyi upon the backdrop of the three volcanoes which could all be seen on what was a crisp clear morning. The trouble is that we only had a short morning here. So after a hearty breakfast we made our way back to Kampala. Once again we made the most of the Ugandan roadside as we drove through the roadside markets, towns and gardens. We made sure to capture the area making stops to take pictures of the pristine locations along the way and of buzzing activity at some of the colourful roadside markets. In fact we were lucky to find fresh fruit from finger bananas and passion fruit which made good snacks. We got to Entebbe airport at 5pm as we used a shortcut that helped us avoid the worst of kampala traffic.