4 DAYS GORILLAS IN THE MIST Experience

Morning Breakfast & check out. At 09:00am, you will first visit the Kigali Genocide Memorial as a historical component of your trip. The Kigali Genocide Memorial, the center was officially opened on 7th April 2004 to mark the tenth commemoration of the 1994 genocide against Tutsi in Rwanda. The memorial is the final resting place for up to 259 000 victims of the genocide and serves a place where people can grieve for their lost loved ones and remember them. It also serves as a museum where both local and international visitors can learn about the history, implementation and consequences of the genocide. The Centre is managed and run by the Aegis Trust on behalf of the National Commission for the Fight against Genocide 2 After you will depart to approximately 2-hour drive to Musanze, home to the Volcanoes National Park. You will arrive in the time for late lunch. After check in and late lunch at the lodge you will visit the Ibyi’Iwacu Ex-Poachers Cultural Village for a Rwandan cultural experience. Volcanoes National Park, which runs along the border with the DRC and Uganda, is home to the Rwandan section of the Virunga’s. Comprising five volcanoes, the Virunga’s are utterly spellbinding and many would argue that this is one of the most exciting national parks in Africa.

Rwanda encompasses the Rwanda section of the Virunga Volcanoes, a series of eight volcanic mountains which sit astride the border triangle between Uganda, Rwanda and DR Congo and include the still active Nyiragongo and Nyakagezi located in DR Congo. Situated 115kms/2½hrs drive north-west of Kigali and encompassing five of the volcanoes, the park’s 160km² of bamboo montane forest are habitat for the rare and critically endangered Mountain Gorillas of which only approx. 800 members remain in the world! Immortalized in the movie “Gorillas-In-The-Mist” depicting the life and times of American zoologist Dian Fossey who spent almost 20 years from the 60s to the 80s studying the gorillas, they inspire great human curiosity owing to their being massive wild animals that genetically, socially and physically so closely resemble humans. Other mammals include the beautiful Golden Monkeys, a variety of antelopes, hyenas, bushbucks, and some buffaloes and forest elephants, as well as over 170 species of birds. Of the many gorilla families, 10 have been habituated and opened for controlled Gorilla Tracking, one of the most popular tourist activities. Other activities in and around the park include golden monkey tracking, guided hikes up several of the Volcanoes as well as scenic tours and cultural tours in the outlying areas

Iby’Iwacu Cultural Village

Situated in Kinigi at the foothills of the Sabyinyo Volcano, ‘ex-Poachers’ as it is popularly referred to, is an award-winning conservation initiative where former poachers were persuaded to desist from poaching and instead come together to form this replica of a Rwandan traditional village with a king’s palace and four traditional huts where they showcase aspects of Rwandan culture, traditions and customs and earn a living as conservationists. On arrival at the village, guests are welcomed with cultural drums, song and dance then led by a village guide through the various exhibitions including traditional rural life, cookery and foods, weaving, grinding, fire-making, a traditional healer with a herbal and spiritual medicine’s ‘laboratory’ , archery, javelin, a blacksmith and architecture, Rwandan kingship, palace life and coronations as well as the villagers’ previous life as poachers and their new found passion in conservation and how they have benefited. At the end of the tour, you will have an opportunity to learn a few steps and moves in the very captivating Rwanda cultural dance as well as buy some local curios and crafts including the popular agaseke (traditional baskets), calabashes, hammocks, traditional wooden crockery, dancing bows, arrows and beautiful drums of all sizes. Later (if time allows), you will visit the Ellen DeGeneres Museum.
Dinner& Overnight: Mountain Gorilla View Lodge / The Bishop’s House / Bisate Lodge –Full Board

You will have an early morning breakfast, departing for the park headquarters for briefing and being assigned into Gorilla groups complete with rangers. You will then trek through the Volcanoes National Park depending on where the gorillas are, on your gorilla trek. You will arrive back at your lodge in time for lunch. Afternoon at leisure.

Volcanoes National Park protects the steep slopes of this magnificent mountain range - home of the rare mountain gorilla - and the rich mosaic of montane ecosystems, which embrace evergreen and bamboo forest, open grassland, swamp and heath. The high point of the trek will be spending an hour with the remarkably peaceful gorillas despite their size and appearance, as they go about their daily life: feeding, playing, resting, grooming and raising their young

Dinner& Overnight: Mountain Gorilla View Lodge / The Bishop’s House / Bisate Lodge–Full Board

Early breakfast at the lodge. At 6:40 in the morning, you will set off on your golden monkey trekking experience, stopping by the park headquarters for briefing and assigning of guides. After the trekking experience, you will return to the lodge for lunch, You will check out to your hotel and drive back to Kigali Approx. 2 hour’s drive. According to your departure time you will do a short city tour while you are shopping for the souvenirs, then the guide will transfer at Airport.

END of Safari – BL – Urugendo rwiza!!