Rwanda, Rwanda
Rwanda Gorilla Adventure
A trek into the Virunga mountains to meet Rwanda's mountain gorillas.
Overview
Two and a half hours north of Kigali, five volcanoes rise out of the farmland and disappear into cloud. This is the Virunga Massif, and somewhere in the bamboo and hagenia forest on those slopes live some of the last mountain gorillas on earth. Volcanoes National Park is where Dian Fossey did her work, and where the fight to save this species began. Fewer than three hundred gorillas remained when she started. There are now over a thousand across the Virungas and Bwindi combined, the only great ape population in the world whose numbers are climbing rather than falling. You'll spend one hour with a habituated family. Just one. It is not long, and everyone who has done it says the same thing: it rearranges something. The rest of the trip is built to give that hour the space it deserves. There is no rushing, no long transfers, just short drives, good food, and somewhere comfortable to come back to with mud on your boots.
Schedule
After a long drive back to Kigali from our race base, we'll bring you to your hotel for a relaxed night, and maybe an extra long shower. Your guide will meet you in the evening to brief you on the trek ahead — what to pack, what to expect, and what time the alarm goes off.
Included
An easy morning drive north out of Kigali, climbing steadily through some of the most intensively farmed and most beautiful country in Africa — terraced hillsides, eucalyptus, and the volcanoes growing larger in the windscreen the whole way. Two and a half hours on good tarmac and you're there.
The afternoon is yours to settle in, get your kit sorted and let the altitude do its work. Your guide will run through the trek in detail this evening. Early night — the mountain starts before dawn.
Included
Today is the one. You'll be at Kinigi park headquarters by seven, where rangers assign each group to a gorilla family based on fitness and how far the trackers have had to go. Then the walk begins — out through the potato fields, over the buffalo wall, and into the forest.
How long it takes is entirely up to the gorillas. It might be an hour, it might be four. The ground is steep, often wet, and you'll be somewhere between 2,500 and 3,000 metres. Then the trackers stop, and you put your bag down, and there they are.
Included
A slow breakfast with the volcanoes out of the window, then the easy run back down to Kigali — two and a half hours, arriving with the afternoon still ahead of you. Time for a coffee, a last look at the hills, and a flight home you don't have to rush for.
Included
What's Included
