Kibale Forest National Park

The chimpanzees have made Kibale one of Uganda’s most famous wildlife destinations. You can join a small group and follow a Uganda Wildlife Authority Ranger into the forest on the trail of the chimpanzees, beginning to understand their environment as you walk. When contact is made, you stand quietly - slightly unbelieving - and have up to one hour to observe our closest relatives from a distance of just a few metres. 

At Kibale, there's a strong urge to pull on your boots and walk. The forest, with its epiphyte-covered passes, tangled undergrowth and sun dazzled glades teeming with life, is a proper outdoor adventure. Sure, it is hot, the nettles are king-size, and you don’t want to mess with the ants, but every step taken is a discovery.

The main draw of Kibale is the chimpanzees. Chimpanzee trekking is much easier than gorilla trekking, and you can also join the habituation team to spend hours with these amazing animals.  

The high number of chimpanzees, the accessibility of the forest and the length of habituation makes Kibale the most popular places to track chimpanzees in Uganda. Although sightings are not guaranteed, you have over a 90% chance of seeing them in Kibale. 

Unlike gorilla trekking, Kibale’s terrain is not too challenging and so you don’t have to be particularly fit or able to trek for long periods to track chimpanzees. Standard tracking excursions last about three hours and include a maximum of one hour with the chimps, during which you can expect to get within 8-10 metres.

Permits are required to track the chimpanzees, and you will join a group (maximum of 8) led by Uganda Wildlife Authority Interpretive Rangers who will introduce you to the chimps and their forest world.

The tracking excursions depart twice a day at 08:00 and 14:00. The morning departures are the busiest because many itineraries combine it with an afternoon visit to the Bigodi Wetland Sanctuary.

For photographers or those with an interest greater than can be satisfied by just one hour, you can join the researchers of the habituation team to spend either a half-day or a full-day in the forest, far from the busier paths.

Walking with the habituation research team, you will push deeper into the forest. These chimps are less used to human presence and so the experience is unpredictable and can be challenging if the chimps decides to move quickly to another location.

This experience is available as both a half and full day excursion. For those joining for the full day, you will join the chimps from when they break nests at about 6:30am and stay with them the whole day until they nest again for the night at about 7pm. 

To a certain extent, a tropical forest generates its own weather patterns. That, plus Uganda’s equatorial position, means that you should always be prepared for some rain during your stay.

That said, it is generally still true that the wetter months are April and May, and November. The hottest months are January and December.

The whole concept of 'best time to visit' doesn't really apply to Uganda. The country is equatorial and so receives similar temperatures throughout the year and rainfall can be expected year-round. Weather patterns are also changing, meaning rigid seasonality is becoming outdated. 

The crater lakes are a glorious scenic contrast to the forests and swamps of Kibale and can be accessed from all properties. Explore them as part of a day drive with your guide or from crater-rim lodges. 

More than 30 permanent crater lakes exist in the Toro region, scattered over 10 kilometres on the western boundary of the park. It is a heavily cultivated area (the climate is ideal), but lush pockets of forest remain. The lakes are a mixture of saline and freshwater and some are bilharzia-free, making for a spectacular wild swimming spot.

The lodges in this area, like Kyaninga and Ndali, offer canoeing, mountain-biking and walking trails for a more active experience of a beautiful place.

About an hour from the forest, the small, bustling, town of Fort Portal offers a great place to stay if you want to explore the foothills of the northern Rwenzori Mountains and the Semliki Valley as well as Kibale Forest.

Kyaninga Lodge is an unforgettable story as well as an amazing place to stay. Luxury cabins constructed from massive eucalyptus logs, built by self-taught builders, line the rim of the Kyaninga Crater looking down into the 220-metre lake below. 

Think an alps ski chalet meets jungle lodging, and you have Kyaninga Lodge. 

Of course, many visitors don’t want to just visit the forest, they want to stay there; experiencing the transition between night and day, becoming enveloped in the endless sounds of birdsong, insects, and animals pushing through the undergrowth and the heavy drops of tropical rain.

If this is you, then Primate Lodge is the place to stay. Located just a 5-minute walk from where the chimp treks begin, Primate is a very comfortable lodge in the heart of the forest. Each thatched cottage looks out into its own area of forest, while the open dining area and sitting room looks out onto a forest full of butterflies when the sun shines.

One of the most popular options in the Toro Crater Lakes area is Ndali Lodge in the Rwaihamba Cluster. Owner-managed and set on a tea-estate established by the same family in the 1920s, the lodge has a quirky, English-country house feel with beautiful views to the west and the peaks of the Rwenzori Mountains.

Small scale, locally-owned lodges like these are so special. The owner of Ndali goes above and beyond to ensure you enjoy your stay, the food is always excellent and the views simply staggering. Simple, unassuming, and always over-delivers. 

Protected, initially since the 1930s as a logging reserve, and as a national park since 1993, the forest has over 351 tree species, the oldest and tallest specimens reaching 200 years and 55 metres.

75% of Kibale’s vegetation is forest with grassland savannah appearing on summits and ridges. The topography determines the nature of the forest, with swampy areas in valley bottoms and drier variation on the slopes.

Kibale Forest lies in Kabarole District on the eastern flanks of the Rwenzori Mountains about 50 kilometres north of the equator.

Kibale Forest Wildlife Corridor Game Reserve, a 180 km wildlife corridor that runs from Ishasha in the South of Queen Elizabeth National Park to Sebitoli, the northern region of Kibale Forest allows wildlife to travel freely between the two parks.  

Kibale Forest has an elevation of 1,110m to 1,590m. Nearby is the eastern border of the rift volcanic belt with its series of volcanic vents. It is the ash expelled by explosions from these vents, scattered first by the passing of the inter-tropical convergance zone and then by gravity wind flow from the expanded ice-fields of the Rwenzori Massif during recent ice ages, that is responsible for the fertile soils of the forest.

The soils lie atop a basement complex of Precambrian gneiss projecting southward through the northern limit of the Ndale volcanic field.