Popular for excellent wildlife encounters while on game drive experiences and boat cruise trips, Queen Elizabeth National Park offers a wide variety of unique adventures to spice your holiday escape here. This Uganda’s second visited national park lies along the crater-lake poked rift valley floor overlooking the towering Rwenzori Mountain ranges in western region of the country.
Below, we highlight a wide variety of experiences and adventure opportunities that you could tailor into your holiday escape to Queen Elizabeth National Park.
5 Best Adventure Experiences to do at Queen Elizabeth National Park
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Trek up-close the Chimpanzee Trekking in Kyambura Gorge and Kalinzu Forest
Often overshadowed by Kibale Forest, Queen Elizabeth National Park offers the most affordable and almost exclusive chimpanzee trekking experience in Uganda. The chimp trekking experience is offered at Kyambura Gorge an underground tropical rainforest set along the eastern section of park. And at Kalinzu Forest set on the eastern slopes of the escarpment wall.
The limited number of daily trekkers on these two trek locations make the experience more intimate and personal. It should be noted that prior booking for these experiences is essential.
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Explore the Salt Crater Lakes on a Walking Tour
Queen Elizabeth National Park has over 70 crater lakes created by the same volcanic forces that this western arm of the rift valley and its dramatic forms. Lying along the rift valley floor, these scenic crater lakes differ in character and form with some filled with wooded grasslands and some saline waters.
The Salt lakes in Queen Elizabeth NP are some of the oldest mines on the continent where ancient and traditional mining processes are still employed today.
The largest and most active is Lake Katwe set along the western edges of the park. Guided walking tours to the salt lake explore traditional means of extracting salt across a network of individual salt plots/pans. Lake Bunyampaka on the edges of Kasenyi grasslands in the northern section of the park is another active mine to explore.
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Hike through the scenic Twin Lakes at Bunyaruguru escarpment
Bunyaruguru crater field includes up to 52 crater lakes dotted along the escarpment wall of the Rift Valley on the eastern edges of Queen Elizabeth. Varying in shape and character these crater lakes range from shallow depressions now covered with banana farms to crystal clear water bodies.
The most scenic of the craters, is a pair of twin lakes of Katinda and Mirambi which are only separated by a thin and steep angled tract of land less than a kilometer wide. Scenic hiking trails go around the lakes offering excellent viewing points for all-round panoramic views across escarpment area. Hiking trips vary from 2-hr stretches to full-day excursions that run across village trails to various scenic peaks along the escarpment wall.
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Take a Coffee plantation Tour
While on tour to Queen Elizabeth NP, take a coffee demonstrative experience to learn of this most craved flavor right from its humble inception at the nursery bed, to the farm and later to brewing your own cup!
The coffee experience is a tour explores small homestead growers where you learn of the varieties grown across these fertile lands, participate washing and drying processing. The tour finalizes with traditional roasting and grinding, and to the cup. On tour you will be able to purchase for yourself and friends back home well packed and local processed coffee and therefore supporting these small growers.
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Hike to scenic Waterfalls Hike on Rwenzori Mountains
Time allowing, take a day-hike to encounter scenic waterfalls set within the lush forested slopes of Rwenzori Mountain Ranges. The most accessible of these water falls lie past Kagando Village near the equator line where treks last up to 6hrs.
Beyond the waterfalls, the hiking trail offers distant views of the higher slopes of the Rwenzori Mountain ranges and sweeping views of the rift valley floor across Queen Elizabeth NP.