Gorilla safaris from Kigali

A day trip to Volcanoes National Park

The quickest way to see gorillas from Kigali is our one-day trip to Volcanoes National Park. We collect you at about five in the morning and drive two to three hours through the hills of the north to the park headquarters at Kinigi, for the ranger briefing. The walk to your family takes between two and six hours, then you have one hour with them, and you are back in Kigali in the evening.

With a night in Musanze

We usually suggest a night in Musanze, also called Ruhengeri, before the trek. It is much closer to the park, so the morning is calmer, and it leaves time for the Musanze caves, lava tubes under the town, or the craft market. With a second morning you can also track golden monkeys, found in the bamboo below the gorillas, usually within thirty to forty-five minutes.

By helicopter

If time is short, a helicopter from Kigali reaches the Virungas in well under an hour, over hills, lakes and tea plantations. Our two-day fly-in safari spends the night at Virunga Lodge, on a ridge above the twin lakes of Burera and Ruhondo, treks the next morning, and flies you back to Kigali in time for an international flight.

Across the border to Bwindi

Bwindi's gorillas are closer to Kigali than to Kampala, and our two-day trip from Kigali to Bwindi uses that. We drive south-west through Rwanda's terraced hills, cross into Uganda at Cyanika or Katuna depending on which sector your permit is for, and spend the night near the forest. The trek is the next morning, after the Uganda Wildlife Authority briefing, and takes between two and seven hours before your hour with the family. You are back in Kigali the same evening.

You need a visa for each country, and both can be had on arrival. The East Africa Tourist Visa is the better choice: one visa covers Uganda, Rwanda and Kenya, so there is no second visa to buy at the border.

Our guide to gorilla trekking in Uganda covers Bwindi in more detail, and gorilla permits compares the two countries' permits.

Two countries, two treks

With a few more days you can trek in both countries. Our six-day double gorilla trekking safari and the seven-day version with golden monkeys both start from Kigali.

Booking

Permits sell out before anything else, so we book them first. For the dry months book six to nine months ahead; in the green months eight weeks is often enough. Rwanda's permits depend on availability at the time of booking.