Flights
Entebbe is served from Europe with one connection — via Istanbul, Addis Ababa, Doha, Dubai, Amsterdam or Brussels — and directly from several African hubs. The airport is forty kilometres from Kampala, and the road can take well over an hour. Arrange a transfer.
When to come
Two rainy seasons: March to May and October to November. The dry periods, June to September and December to February, are best for gorilla trekking and game viewing — forest trails become extremely difficult in the wet. Uganda sits on the equator but at over a thousand metres, so the climate is mild year-round rather than tropical: pleasant days, cool nights, and genuinely cold at altitude in Bwindi.
Getting around
Roads to the main destinations are paved but journeys are slow: Kampala to Bwindi is eight to ten hours. Domestic flights to the airstrips near the parks save a full day each way and are worth the cost on a short trip. Boda-bodas — motorcycle taxis — are the everyday urban transport and the main cause of road injury: use a reputable app-based operator and insist on a helmet. Avoid night driving.
Orders of magnitude
| Return flight from Europe | €600 to €1,100 |
|---|---|
| Mid-range hotel night | $50 to $130 |
| Gorilla permit | Several hundred dollars per person, excluding guide and lodging |
| Domestic flight to a park airstrip | $200 to $400 |
What holds everywhere
- Insurance covering medical costs and repatriation stops being optional as soon as local healthcare is limited. Check it actually covers the destination: many policies exclude areas under adverse travel advice.
- Carry cash. In much of the world cards work in the big cities and nowhere else. Check the ATM situation and your bank's charges before leaving.
- Leave margin on connections. A tight transfer on a thinly served route is expensive: the next flight may be tomorrow, or in three days.
- The real budget runs over two years, not one trip: repeated flights, paperwork, translations, legalisations, any support sent. It is always underestimated.