Welcome to Rwanda the land of “a thousand hills.” Our guide/ representative staff will be at the airport to pick you up and transfer you to the hotel overnight. If you arrive in the morning or early afternoon, you will enjoy a short tour of Kigali City visiting the genocide memorial.
After breakfast, your driver guide will pick you up from the hotel for a short city tour, including visits to the Kigali Genocide Memorial and the Kandt Museum. You will then transfer to Akagera National Park, where you will check into your hotel.
Following check-in, you will have lunch before embarking on an afternoon boat safari on Lake Ihema. Enjoy the beautiful breeze and spot birds and wildlife along the way.
Depending on your interests, you may also join an evening game drive in search of nocturnal animals.
Akagera National Park, a sprawling Savannah landscape, is home to an array of big and small mammals. After an early breakfast, your guide will pick you up for a day-long game drive through the park’s northern sector, which is less dense and offers better chances of spotting wildlife.
You’ll take the scenic lakeshore route, scanning for a variety of animals such as zebras, giraffes, impalas, elephants, buffaloes, topis, and even the elusive leopard. With some luck, you may even catch sight of a pride of lions before they retreat from view.
This national park boasts a beautiful diversity of birdlife, delighting both avid birders and casual observers. Enjoy the stunning landscapes of Rwanda, with vistas of lakes, mountains, and sweeping plains.
This morning we depart Akagera National Park for Nyungwe Forest National Park via Kigali. We shall stop in Huye for lunch and a visit to the national museum to learn more about the history and traditions of the Rwanda people. We arrive in Nyungwe forest later in the evening.
After an early breakfast, we’ll depart for a chimpanzee-tracking excursion in the lush Nyungwe Forest. This diverse, primate-rich ecosystem is home to 13 species, including chimpanzees, L’Hoest’s monkeys, and Colobus monkeys, as well as over 300 bird species. At the briefing area, you’ll meet your community guide and receive an overview before setting out on the trek.
Once the chimpanzee tracking is complete, you can choose to do the canopy walk immediately or return to the lodge to rest. The canopy walk offers stunning overhead views of the forest, allowing you to admire the natural beauty from above.
We leave for Volcanoes National Park after breakfast. Enjoy the different sights and winding roads in the land of a thousand hills. You will have opportunities to have different stopovers for pictures and stretching depending on your needs.
The trek to observe Rwanda’s mountain gorillas begins with a briefing at the Kinigi park headquarters, where you are assigned a ranger and a specific gorilla family to track. Your ranger guide then leads you to the starting point, which may require a brief drive depending on the gorilla group’s location. The trek through the dense Virunga jungles to reach these enormous, awe-inspiring animals is a fulfilling, unforgettable experience that many seek out. The duration of the trek can range from a few minutes to several hours, depending on where the gorillas settled the previous night.
Gorilla trekking in Rwanda’s Volcanoes National Park is a truly once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
Spend the morning visiting the Gorilla Guardians Village to immerse yourself in Rwandan culture. Become a king or queen for a day – try your hand at knitting, archery, and traditional songs and dances.
After this cultural experience, transfer to the serene shores of Lake Kivu to unwind from your hectic travels.
This will be a downtime from all the travel and experiences exploring Rwanda on the shores of the beautiful Lake Kivu. The activities you can engage in include a visit to the hot springs, taking a boat trip to an island, kayaking on Lake Kivu, visiting the DR Congo – Rwanda border, and relaxing at the lakeside in the evening sipping a way to your favorite.
Today is your last day on this Kagera Safaris – Rwanda wildlife safari. Start your day with breakfast and transfer to Kigali International Airport for your flight back home. We hope you enjoyed your time exploring this beautiful little country of a thousand hills.