A safari to remember in Rwanda

Many things make a Rwanda safari a memorable one but a magical encounter with the endangered mountain gorillas can’t be forgotten. I went with my wife on a gorilla safari to Rwanda after my friend who had got that chance some time back told me how magnificent it is to sit among the remaining gorilla in their natural habitat. I had doubt because I didn’t know that you can meet these look to be tough apes in a close distance. I sat with my wife and planned this safari ounce in a life time to Africa.

We planned to travel in December to have our christmas in the forests of volcanoes national park in Rwanda. We wrote to different tour and travel companies until we when we chose Rwanda gorilla expedition, they charged us a fair price we took a 4 day gorilla and Diane Fossey hike safari Rwanda. They have good people right from those working in office to the field guides, Mbazira our tour consultant was there to give us any informative information about gorillas and Rwanda in general before we started our safari.

As soon as we arrived at Kigali international airport our safari guide was their waiting for us to take us to our booked accommodation in Kigali, he briefed about the whole safari we, slept at frame tree Hotel, the following day we were pick up by our safari guide who took us for a Kigali city tour were we visited very many interesting places around the city like the genocide memorial, national museum, market places, we took lunch from one of the beautiful restaurant in the city after we drove up to our booked lodge in the volcanoes national park for refreshment and overnight(Le Bambou Lodge).

On the day of our scheduled tracking, we walked up every early for breakfast and then after our guide drove us to the park headquarters in kinigi where we met other trackers, we received briefings from the park wardens about the whole process of gorilla tracking/trekking and from here we got assigned to the different tracking groups . We were assigned to a gorilla group called kwitonda, we escorted the ranger guide to the forest, and everyone was excited about the activity. Our ranger guide was informative and he answered which ever question was asked and he gave us all necessary information on any species we met on the way during the search of our cousins.

Once we were about to meet these apes, the ranger guide alarmed us as he was in position to know where they are through their nest and dung he met after a long search. after a short while we met a group of gorillas with a dominant silverback which was sited on the ground critically looking at us eye to eye everyone was curious to have a close contact of a silverback, without a blink of an eye other members come around as if they were aware that we are coming.

The ranger was there to guide us as we spot these apes. We took as many photos as well we can while studding their behaviors. In fact the one hour allowed with these apes is not enough because I was still interested in watching them, but we had to leave and return back to the park headquarters, each received a certificate for participating in gorilla tracking.

Our guide drove us back to the lodge for relaxation as the evening was waiting us for a community walk, where we met the batwa pygmy whose men grow to up to 15inc, they performed us several activities including singing and dancing as well as teaching us their hunting skills. We come back to the lodge for dinner and an overnight, the night was full of memories of the day’s activities majorly the long life experience gorilla tracking. The next day was spent hiking the Diane grave yard; here we received more information about how she conducted her research on the gorillas for over 18 years before she was killed by the said poachers.

Our stay in Rwanda was a short-lived although we enjoyed a lot, next time we are planning a longer safari than that one we took, we are thinking of doing Uganda and Rwanda hope it will be more fantastic.