8 Days Uganda Primates Habituation & Lions Tracking Safari

Uganda Primates Habituation & Lions Tracking Safari – 8 Days

Overview | Highlights | Detailed Itinerary | Includes | Lodges

Overview

This Uganda Primates Habituation & Lions Tracking Safari is an 8 day thrilling package in which you take part in the habituation exercises of Mountain Gorillas and Chimpanzees to make them get used to the presence of human beings around them and to track Lions and Mongooses to learn experientially about their group dynamics, behaviours and lifestyles.

Taking part in the habituation of Mountain Gorillas and Chimpanzees is an experience to leave you with memories of a lifetime while tracking the Lions and Mongooses will enable you to gain insights into the habits, group dynamics, composition and behaviours of these cats and to understand the wildlife ecology that facilitates conservation of their habitats.

Safari Highlights

• The opportunity to accompany the researchers through areas of the park normally off-limits to tourists
• Spending 4 hours with a family of semi-habituated Mountain Gorillas and another 4 hours with a family of Golden monkeys and enjoying the thrilling moments of watching them as they respond to the simulation of researchers in the process of making them get used to the presence of humans.
• Gaining insights into the habits, behaviour, security consciousness and survival mechanisms of these highly social creatures that have a lot in common with human beings
• An opportunity to film and capture perfect photo shots of the habituation exercise
• Getting the additional bonus of viewing several other wildlife in the parks visited for habituation and tracking experience
• You can also make a valuable contribution to longstanding research projects as the data collected is used by the researchers to improve the tourism industry.

Activity Schedule

Day 1: Travel to Kibale National Park, guided primates walk in Bigodi Swamp
Day 2: Chimpanzee habituation experience in Kibale Forest
Day 3: Travel to Queen Elizabeth National Park & viewing the Rwenzoris and Crater lakes
Day 4: Lion tracking experience in the Kasenyi sector of Queen Elizabeth National Park
Day 5: Tracking Lions in the Ishasha sector and travel to Bwindi Impenetrable Forest National Park
Day 6: Gorilla habituation experience in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest
Day 7: Golden monkey habituation exercise in Mgahinga Gorilla National Park
Day 8: Return to Kampala & Departure

Safari Itinerary

Day 1:  Travel to Kibale National Park, guided primates walk in Bigodi Swamp

Begin the Uganda Primates Habituation & Lions Tracking Safari with an early breakfast and travel to Kibale Forest National Park in western Uganda. You will be driven through a beautiful countryside of rolling hills and plains dotted with homesteads, gardens and plantations of Bananas and tea. This is a 5-6 hour Uganda Primates Experiential Safari journey with lunch en route and you will get to the Park in the early afternoon hours. You will check in at the lodge of your booking for a short rest after which you will visit a nearby forest swamp to see primates like black and white colobus monkeys, L’Hoest monkeys, grey-cheeked mangabey, red tailed monkeys, bush babies, pottos and other forest animals.

Expect to see a variety of birds like the yellow spotted nicator, rumped tinker bird, little greenbul, green-breasted pitta, the crowned eagle, black bee-eater and the rare great blue turaco.

At the eastern edge of the Kibale forest is Bigodi Wetland Sanctuary which is maintained by the local community.

Day 2: Chimpanzee Habituation Experience

Today you will accompany researchers on a chimpanzee habituation exercise. You will get to the forest early enough to watch the chimps as they leave their overnight nests between 6:00 – 6:30 am and follow them throughout the day as they hunt for food, feed, copulate, breastfeed, rest, patrol and play until it is time to build new nests around 7 pm.

Unlike a normal chimpanzee trek, the unrushed nature of the habituation trek allows for a far more relaxed study of the exciting life of the chimpanzees; enables you to gain an insight into their behaviour and to appreciate the challenges of the researchers in getting these elusive apes get used to the presence of humans without changing their natural behaviours.

The exercise ends as the chimpanzees climb into their newly built nests to sleep. This part of the Uganda Primates Habituation & Lions Tracking Safari is an experience never to leave you the same!

Day 3: Travel to Queen Elizabeth National Park & Viewing the Rwenzoris and Crater Lakes

After breakfast, we will transfer to Queen Elizabeth National Park with stopovers for sightseeing and lunch. You will enjoy viewing the Rwenzori Mountain ranges that imposingly occupy the horizons, view crater lakes and visit the Amabeere Ga Nyina Mwiiru caves. These are caves of wonder with milk-like substances oozing out of the rocks and cultural legends attached to them.

You will learn about their cultural significance and also get a scientific explanation of their existence.

Then the Uganda Primates Habituation & Lions Tracking Safari party will drive to Fort Portal town where you will have lunch and later continue to Queen Elizabeth National Park. Dinner and overnight will be at the lodge of your booking.

Day 4: Lion tracking experience in the Kasenyi plains

Lion chilling in QENP

We set out early in the morning for a game drive in the northern part of the park called Kasenyi in search of lions. This is the best area for viewing the cats in action owing to the vast population of Uganda kobs in this part of the park. The pride (family) of lions and the family of mongooses to be tracked each have a member with a radio collar attached to it that enables the researchers to know where to find the family.

The researchers will explain the fascinating habits, behaviours, instinct attributes and security consciousness of these cats and the various tricks used in tracking them. You will learn about how the lions leave trails of bent grass as they move, how they scent mark their territories and why they spray sticky urine in particular areas.

You will learn special features about the banded Mongooses particularly their gigantic appetites and their complex social and communication systems which are fascinating. The tracking sessions last 1-3 hours and as a bonus expect also to see teeming herds of impala-like, as well as topi, elephant, giant forest hog, and Cape buffalo.

You will return to the lodge for lunch and later go for a boat launch along the Kazinga channel whose shores harbour a profusion of water animals and birds including pink-backed pelicans, pied and malachite kingfishers, saddle-billed storks and many others.

You will return to your lodge for dinner and overnight.

The exercise is incredibly stupefying!

Day 5: Tracking Lions in the Ishasha sector and Transfer to Bwindi

You will have breakfast and drive to the southern sector of Queen Elizabeth National Park known as Ishasha for another game drive. Ishasha Sector is famous for its tree-climbing lions which you will see resting on the branches of Fig trees as they scan for kobs, their favourite prey, in the neighbouring mating grounds. You will visit the Kob Mating Ground – a defined area specifically used by these stunning antelopes for challenging other males, enticing females and mating.

During the game drive, you will also see herds of kobs, elephants, topi, giant forest hogs, Cape buffalo etc. at very close range. You will later set off and drive south to Bwindi Impenetrable Forest National Park arriving in the late afternoon hours.

Time allows you will visit a community of former forest people, the Batwa, who used to live in this forest before it was gazetted as a national park. You will learn about their former life as gatherers, hunters, and warriors and about their survival skills in challenging forest life. Dinner and overnight will be at the lodge of your booking.

Day 6: Gorilla habituation experience in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest

You will wake up early in the morning and head to the park headquarters to join other visitors for a briefing about the dos and don’ts while with Mountain gorillas on a habituation exercise. After the briefing, you will start your trek into the forest guided by researchers and guides to find a family of Gorillas under habituation.

Unlike a normal Gorilla trek, this experience offers something far more intensive and educative as you will spend about 4 hours watching the moves of the Gorillas to see how they respond to the simulation by the researchers to make them get used to the presence of people around them. This exercise presents you with the opportunity to gain insights into their lifestyle, mannerism and survival instincts and to film and capture perfect photo shots.

The exercise is incredibly stupefying! You will return to your lodge for dinner and overnight.

Day 7: Golden monkey habituation exercise in Mgahinga Gorilla National Park

You will wake up early and transfer to Mgahinga Gorilla National Park to participate in a habituation experience of the Golden Monkeys. You will get to the forest early enough to catch up with the Golden Monkey as they come out of their sleeping habitats between 6:00 – 6:30 am.

You will watch them as they stretch to exercise their bodies, make noises to communicate, care for the young, go food hunting, patrol and play until late in the afternoon when they vanish to their hiding places to sleep.

You will watch as the researchers carry out simulation activities to make the Golden monkeys get used to the presence of human beings and be educated by the researchers about their feeding habits, the kind of noises they make to communicate the invasion of their space by strangers, what they do when they sense danger, what they eat, how the mothers care for the young, and how the members of the family keep together.

You will also gain an understanding of the forest, the plant life, and the other species found there. This is an experience never to leave you the same!

Day 8: Return to Kampala & Departure

You will have a relaxed breakfast and set off on a return journey to Kampala. You will have a stopover at the Equator where you will have an opportunity to stand in two hemispheres at the same time and take some photos.

You will arrive in Kampala in the late afternoon and either be transferred to the airport for your departure flight or to the hotel of your booking for dinner and overnight.

End of the Uganda Primates Habituation & Lions Tracking Safari.

Requirements for Chimps, Gorilla & Golden Monkey Habituation Experience

• Uganda Visa (USD50) which can be paid on arrival at the Airport
• Chimpanzee and Gorilla habituation permits (paid for in advance through our company)
• Travel & Health insurance arranged for from your home country
• Yellow fever vaccination certificate
• Physical fitness

Cost Includes

• Airport transfers on the first and last day,
• Transport in a 4×4 safari vehicle
• Services of an English-speaking driver guide
• Fuel for the whole trip
• Accommodation and meal plan as per the itinerary
• All park entrance fees
• Drinking water while in the vehicle

Cost excludes

• Gorilla Habituation permit at USD1500 per person
• Chimpanzee habituation permit at USD250 per person
• Lions and Mongoose tracking permits
• International airfares
• Uganda Visa
• Items of personal nature such as tips, drinks, and laundry