Along the Democratic republic of Congo border next to the Virunga National park on the edge of the Albertine rift valley in South western Uganda is where this landscape and wildlife marvel is positioned.
The Bwindi impenetrable national park is a genuine tropical rainforest with 331sq km on an elevation array from 1.160 m to 2.607 m of jungle forest. The Bwindi impenetrable National park is a UNESCO designated world heritage site.
This montane and low land forest was named after the nature of the thick forest spreading all over a series of steep ridges and valleys. The local name Bwindi “mubwindi “means “dark place “
Bwindi impenetrable Forest reserve is one of the richest eco system in Africa set up in 1942 and later on renovated to Bwindi impenetrable national park in 1992. It was acknowledged as the world heritage site.
Bwindi covers an area of about 327km2 of scrambled vegetation draped over an intensively fissured landscape of steep, haughty ridges as well as slippery valleys and high.
The park hosts a population of about 400 individual mountain gorilla troops known as the Bwindi population, with half of the world’s mountain gorillas with the rest of the world-wide gorillas striving in the nearby Virunga national park. The last 2006 gorilla census in the park showed that the numbers had increased modestly from an estimated 300 individuals in 1997 to 320 individuals in 2002 to 340 individuals in 2006.
Bwindi is home to 11 different mammal species including monkeys such as black and white colobus monkeys, red tailed, blue tailed, l hoest monkeys, olive baboon and Chimpanzees. The park hosts 346 bird species with some species not found else where in East Africa and 200 species of butterflies recorded.
The park welcomes travelers who seek to glimpse the wild mountain gorillas, offering them an exclusive invitation to become immersed in the land wildlife and people inhabit. The park’s main attraction is gorilla tracking and tourist are granted special permits at a fee.
Selected gorilla families have been habituated to human presence around them and each troop is visited by 8 individuals and this is done to control tourism impacts on the natural environment as well as degradation of their habitant and risk to the gorillas.
The park can be visited any time of the year although conditions in the park are more difficult during the rainy season. Tourist accommodations such as tented camps, hotels, lodges and cheaper rooms run by the community located near Buhoma entrance gate. The park is remotely located and its accessed through a long 6hr drive from Kampala to Kabale using the Kabale to Buhoma HQ.
You can as well use public transport and a bus leaves from Kampala to Butogota everyday at 6:30am or you may travel by bus or matutu from Kampala and back you can hire a car.