6 Day Chimps, Gorillas And Golden Monkey Safari – Rwanda

Depending on the time of your arrival, we shall have a tour of Kigali city visiting the genocide museum, opened in 2004 to mark the tenth anniversary of the Rwandan genocide. Whilst the genocide occurred as a result of a complex series of factors it can only be seen as an absolute tragedy to Rwanda and it’s people. Time spent at the genocide museum will be emotionally moving and an important way to understand the absolute courage and resilience of this beautiful, tiny country. The tour will be concluded with a group transfer to the Kigali International Airport before midday.

Start after breakfast with a morning drive to the southern province of Nyanza, with different cultural stopovers starting with the Royal palace. After continue to the best ethnographic museum in East Africa in Huye formerly known as Butare, this will bring more light as you explore most of the sections in the Museum on how Rwanda was made from the traditional setting to the current day. Time allowing experience the amazing Intore dance troupe perform before heading out to Nyungwe Forest the largest and oldest afro montane forest on the African continent, enjoy the drive as the raods wind into and through the park to the beautiful and lush green tea plantations. Dinner and overnight stay at Nyungwe Top View Lodge. FB.

Today, you will have an early morning breakfast then set off to discover the primates and scenic splendor of Nyungwe Forest. Primates walks in this forest is a little challenging as the slopes are steep but all can be down played by the park rangers who are well trained, experienced and very knowledgeable about the flora and fauna in Nyungwe. The guides shall provide you with all the relevant information about the different primate, plant and other animal and plenty of bird species in Nyungwe forest. Among the primates, expect to see the L’Hoest’s monkey, Grey Cheeked Mangabey, chimpanzees, on lucky days, you can plunge into the golden monkeys, large troops of the Angola Colobus, Red-tailed Monkey, Silver Monkey, Hamlyn’s Monkey, Dent’s Mona Monkey, Olive Baboon, among other primates. We later get back to our lodge for dinner and overnight stay. FB.

In the morning, you will set off with a scenic drive northwards towards the Volcanoes national park in current day Musanze, depending on the road conditions; you can drive with great views of Lake Kivu which is one of the most beautiful and largest lake in Rwanda bordering the Democratic Republic of Congo or use the other optional route. The drive is long and the winding roads make it enjoyable together with the wonderful scenery as you appreciate the formation of the Great East African Rift Valley giving you a wonderful scenery, as your guide to stop for photography and whenever you feel like stretching up. This park is part of the virungas conservation area which house 3 gorilla parks and this particular one is home to 360 Mountain Gorillas some of which are habituated and you will encounter them the following day. Dinner and overnight stay at Hotel Gorilla. FB.

You will start with an early breakfast before you set out for the long awaited day, our tour guide will lead you to the park headquarters for a briefing session at the park headquarters before heading off with your ranger guides to the starting point, which might be a short driving distance then commence the memorable gorilla tracking experience, the most thrilling wildlife encounter Africa has to offer. You will be hike to find the gentle and awesome mountain gorillas and after finding them, you will have a full hour with them, take photographs and enjoys the antics of baby gorillas as they swing from from one tree to another and as they tease each other including the silverbuck. We later get back to where our hike started and drive to our lodge probably in time for lunch, in the afternoon we can choose to visit a cultural village then later get back to our lodge for dinner and overnight stay Hotel Gorilla. FB.

In the morning, you will again drive to the park headquarters for briefing, and later go for golden monkey tracking. Little is known about the mannerisms of the Golden Monkeys except for the fact that they live in social groups near the foothills on the park ranges mostly in the bamboo shoots as it is their favorite meal, they usually number utpo 30 individuals. It is an exceptional experience seeing them feed on fruits, leaves and insects; the trek is not as hard as that of the gorillas after which we shall get back to our lodge, freshen up, checkout after lunch and head to Kigali for our flight enroute. BL.