Category: Blog

Things to Consider When Renting a Car in Uganda

Getting the best rental car in Uganda, East Africa can be stressful whether first time or as a repeat traveler on Uganda safari. If you have plans to explore Uganda, a rental car is considerably the best alternative for your movement to and from your dream destination. With so many car hire agencies offering related car rental services, finding the best deal also becomes challenging. This is why you need to put into consideration the following steps and tips.

  • Find at least 2 to 4 car rental companies or more to conduct your research before making the final decision. These should fit within your travel desires and it will help you make comparisons on a number of aspects including rates, rental deals with special offers, terms and conditions.
  • Contact a car hire company and inquire if there are special offers, availability, rates, pick-ups, hidden charges among others. Ask everything you want to understand before you pay for your car hire.
  • Select convenient pick up point. When renting a car for your Uganda safaris, ensure that you identify the most convenient point to pick up your rental car from once you land at Entebbe airport. You can choose to pick your car at Entebbe airport or adjacent area to the airport. Also, inquire if the car hire agency does provide free pick ups at the airport or within Kampala capital city.
  • Choose the best rental vehicle. Visitor travel needs differ and you should pick a vehicle that is suitable for your Uganda safaris. It should be accommodative depending on the number of people, luggage. For family tours we still have you sorted with our comfortable safari vans or self-drive tours using 4×4 Toyota Rav4.
  • Book your chosen car in advance. Now that you have made up your mind on the kind of vehicle to use on Uganda safari, take a step to have it reserved early to avoid disappointments. Do not wait for last minutes like others tend to do!

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Imagine Uganda Without Gorillas

Imagine Uganda without Gorillas! Gorillas are a major pillar to Uganda tourism. You cannot talk of Uganda tourism and forget to talk about gorillas.  Gorilla trekking is a daily activity in Uganda’s Bwindi Impenetrable National Park and Mgahinga National Park. The current cost of Uganda Gorilla permit goes up to US$700 making it the most expensive tourist activity.

According to the last census, Uganda hosts over 400 mountain Gorillas making Bwindi and Mgahinga the most visited parks. In this article, let us asses Uganda tourism without gorillas.  Can it progress? Can Uganda still maintain the number of tourists received per annum? Are there other activities which can substitute gorilla trekking?

Yes, Uganda tourism can survive without gorillas. Uganda is gifted with a variety of other attractions that can attract a considerable number of tourists. If you would not like to fork out US$700 for a Uganda gorilla safari, there are many other adventures that you can include in your next Uganda safari holiday Below are some of other tourist attractions on which Uganda can depend apart from the gorillas. ;

Chimpanzees – regarded as our closest relation sharing 99% of our DNA. Trust me, Chimpanzees are amazing because they are intelligent and capable of using tools to perform their daily activities. Chimpanzees are interesting to see – they can use stones, stick and pods among others during their daily activities. Chimpanzee trekking occurs in Budongo Forest, Kibale National Park, Toro- Semuliki game reserve, Kalinzu Forest and Kyambura Gorge.  Chimpanzee permit is cheaper than Gorilla permit and the lowest is US$50 to US$200.

Golden Monkeys – Guests can visit Mgahinga National Park to see the amazing Golden monkeys. The current cost of Golden monkey trekking is US$90 and no need to pre-book. Once you visit Mgahinga, expect to hike to meet gorillas in the Mgahinga uplands. Golden Monkeys move in troops of about 50 members and offers a single trek compared to Gorilla trekking.

The savannah parks protect a variety of attractions – including animals, birds, relief, drainage features among others. Savannah parks in Uganda includes Queen Elizabeth National Park, Murchison Falls National Park, Kidepo Valley national Park, Lake Mburo national park and Semuliki National Park. The major tourist activity in such parks include Game viewing and boat trips. While in Uganda savannah parks, expect to see elephants, Antelopes, Lions, Giraffes, Zebras, Antelopes and Buffaloes among others.

Without Gorillas, Uganda can depend on Mountaineering – Mountain Rwenzori in western Uganda and Mountain Elgon in Eastern Uganda offers the best mountaineering services in Uganda, East Africa and Africa at large. The famous Mountains of the moon (Mountain Rwenzori) is interesting with snow capped peaks and lots of other attractions surrounding the mountain. Climbing Mountain Rwenzori will not only reward you the views of glacial features but also gain expertise and physical fitness.

Without Gorillas, Uganda can depend on boat trips – there many water bodies like Lake Victoria, Lake Kyoga, Lake Edward, Lake Gorge, Lake Albert among others. Rivers include Nile, River Katonga and so on.  Boat trip rewards the view of water loving mammals and birds- visit different islands- spend some period on the islands is amazing. Oh! Don’t forget boat trip on Kazinga channel to see water loving birds and mammals like crocodiles, Hippos, Monitor Lizards among others.

Uganda without Gorillas, can survive on culture – Uganda is among countries with rich culture. The country with many tribes offers unique cultural songs, dance, musical instruments, dressing codes among others. Such community is interesting to visit – do not forget to explore the unique culture of the IK (North Eastern Uganda) and the Batwa of south western Uganda.

Uganda is a basket of primates – Kibale National Park alone protects 13 primate species including Chimpanzees, Vervet monkeys, Black and white colobus Monkeys, Red-tailed monkeys, LHoest Monkeys, Grey checked Monkeys, Olive Baboon, Uganda Red Colobus, The potto, Patas Monkeys, Uganda Mangabey and so on. You can also meet primates in other parts of the country like Busitema (Olive Baboon), Uganda Wildlife Education centre (Former Entebbe Zoo) and Ngamba Island on Lake Victoria – for that case, Uganda welcomes primate lovers.

Historical sites like Uganda Museums, Uganda Martyrs shrine Namugongo, Kabaka’s Lake, Kasubi Tombs and so on. Such sites keep the historical tools, clothes among others.

In conclusion therefore, Gorilla trekking earns Uganda a lot of foreign exchange but the country can as well depend on others activities like Chimpanzee trekking, Golden Monkey trekking, Game viewing, Boat trip and Cultural tours among others.

 

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Here is Why You Need to Go on a Self Drive in Uganda

Car rental services in Uganda are the most popular ways for one to explore what this country holds for the world at a visitors own time. With Self Drive Uganda, visitors have opportunity to explore and discover Uganda privately or alternatively while on guided safaris. We therefore have a wide of cars for hire that enable our clients to realize their dreams while on African safaris in the pearl of Africa. If you ever thought about realizing the value for your then contact our receptionist for car hire and you won’t regret in life. We pay attention tour client’s needs and ensuring quality provision is ideally one of our priorities.

Below are some of the reasons why you should embark on self drive safari in Uganda;

We offer wide range of care hire services, including corporate services especially business conference transfers, exquisite wedding parties transportation by offering classic vehicles such as the limousines and the luxury SUVs which can be used on corporate conferences. Our fleet of cars can also utilized by travelers on Uganda safaris as we also have a wide range of 4 by 4 safari vehicles especially the Land Cruiser, Toyota Rav4s, safari vans and others. For those who are interested in group tours, we still have you catered for with our classic minivans and coaster buses. As well, if you are first time or repeat traveler and you need to be transferred from the airport to your respective hotel, there is no need for you to get stranded, you are also covered as we have airport transfer services with the best cars which will deliver you safely and comfortably to your respective destination.

Fast and convenience rights from reservation, there is no need to struggle or line up in long queues to reach the receptionist to make a booking, visitors can simply do it via email and telephone contact and your car hire will be booked for you within the shortest time without necessarily you traveling physically to Uganda to make booking of your car of choice for self drive tour. Our clients can book cars of their choice while in their offices, at home, in the vehicles given the current technological changes which have resulted into smart phones, tablets and laptops which are compatible with websites of our car hire company in Uganda.

Reliability, all our car rentals are best for clients to realize their travel dreams in Uganda. We operate 24/7 and any time you contact us we shall be at your service. We have well trained, experienced, reliable, trusted and professional drivers to help take you through any part of Uganda for your vacation. They are time conscious and they can deliver you to your respective destination at that expected time.

Affordability, our 4 by 4 car rentals are pocket friendly and they feature roof tents which you can use as accommodation. You can also choose an ordinary 4 by 4 with no camping offers.

Unlimited travel, our car rentals are issued on unlimited mileage which means visitors can enjoy their safaris at their own pace.

Comfortability, our cars aren’t only better and reliable but also offer you that total comfort that any traveler deserves while on self safari in Uganda and our team can be contacted at any time for any assistance.

Absolute getaways, with self drive tours, visitors have a chance to retire the brain with amazing interaction with nature.

In conclusion, self drive safaris in any new destination including Uganda are more of adventurous. You have opportunity to explore and discover new interesting tourist sites own your own at your own time. The other advantage is that it offers better wildlife spotting experiences and close encounters for you and nature.

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Choosing a Car Rental Company to Use in Uganda

Car renters always look at different factors before hiring a car. For your travels in Uganda here are some important facts that you should look at when choosing a car for your next trip. The answers are, in alphabetical order, the: age of the fleet; Please note that most car rentals in Uganda offer cars […]

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Planning a Uganda Road Trip

Our car shuddered to a standstill beside a wooden sign on a deserted western region part of Uganda road. “This is fountain of the pearl of Africa”, I read as I stepped from the car into the shimmering mid day heat. We’d been heading through Queen Elizabeth National Park towards the Uganda-Rwanda border, to a town called Kisoro which boasted of a very conducive climate for a night. Unfortunately as we rounded a bend I was faced with a rock slide in progress and totally misjudged the clearance of my rented car from Uganda Self Drive a reputable car renting company in Uganda opting to try and drive over the bouncing debris. There were a series of sickening thuds and bangs which caused my partner and I to cringe, and the car to grind to a standstill after around a hundred yards, with an alarming flow of unidentified liquid pouring onto the road surface.

We both looked under the car at the damage, then at each other then down the long straight road ahead of us. On average we’d been passing another vehicle about every half an hour and we were around an hour’s drive from our isolated hotel. Around ten miles back down the road, we’d passed a small garage at a cross roads, with a sign which read ‘this shop protected by a sawed off shot gun 3 days per week. You guess which days’. We’d also seen a hand painted sign pointing to the hills reading ‘Ghost Town Road’. That was the only sign of life and it looked like we could be waiting for some time to be rescued.

After about 20 minutes, with my partner berating me for my lack of driving judgment as we sat in the now roasting car, the air conditioner having failed with the engine, I notice a speck on the horizon, tailed by a large dust cloud.”Told you we wouldn’t wait long”, I said, trying to sound optimistic. It took around 10 minutes before I noticed that I had to do some thing very fast. I reached for my mobile phone, called the car rental company from which we had hired the car. This company is so generous that it contacted it’s area agent and with in a blink of an eye a rescue car was at our footsteps and we were 0ffered another car and off we proceeded with our journey.

Archie the mechanic suggested we call the rental company and we were eventually put through to the nearest outlet, In Midland, which was about 250 miles away. It took us some time to convince the rental company clerk that there was no Chevrolet dealership nearby who could recover the vehicle, and that in fact there was very little at all between our location and where he was, around 5 hours drive away. He agreed to send a vehicle transporter which would recover our car and deliver a new one, though providing an address was something of a challenge – ‘From the crossroads, over a hill, round a bend, through a rockslide, along the road a few miles, by a sign. Yes the sign says something like ‘Beware of Mountain Lions…’

Try the Ghost Town’ suggested Archie, pointing us into the distant hills. ‘A Few of the people who live up there have no water so they go to the hotel to fill up. You might get lucky.’ And so we set off into the hills under a blazing sun, remembering the Mountain Lion sign and jumping at every snapping twig.

Eventually we arrived Kabale town which is at the border of these two countries for at least a night before embarking on our journey. Reclaimed by a hardy bunch of artists, musicians, loners and eccentrics. Today, Kabale boasts a couple of eating options, some shops and lodgings and as we trudged, sweating into town we were greeted by the site of a graveyard with tumbledown tombstones, a few scattered dwellings in various states of disrepair…and the Starlight Theatre. An incongruous sight in this far flung corner of western Uganda, the Starlight had once provided entertainment for the miners and their families. Now it had been converted into the Ghost town’s only bar, and its appearance was so unexpected I almost expected it to fade, mirage like, from view as we approached.

There are some meals that stick in your memory. Sometimes because of their quality, but often because you were so hungry that whatever you ate would seem like a sumptuous banquet. Similarly with drinks. On an occasion where your mouth is parched and dry and you feel that you’ve perspired every last bead of sweat from your body, an ice cold beer can live as long in the memory as a bottle of the finest champagne. And so it was with the icy bottle of Shiner Bock which I threw down in one gulp in that strange little bar.

The room was populated by a number of bewhiskered characters who all looked strangely similar to the mailman… in fact one of them was the mailman! He raised an arm in greeting, while some of his drinking buddies glanced in our direction but barely raised a bushy eyebrow. It seemed that two sweaty, red faced, stranded travelers stumbling into their local bar was a regular occurrence. We sank a couple more cold beers and began to consider how we’d get back to the hotel to await delivery of the replacement car. It seemed that no one was making a water run that day so we headed back to the Main Road.

After around 20 minutes, a VW Beetle of late 60’s vintage, rounded a bend and chugged towards us. It was driven by a middle aged woman with matted hair, accompanied by a scowling teenage girl in the front seat and a snot nosed toddler and two exuberant dogs in the rear. As is the custom in the middle of nowhere, the car lurched to a halt, and the woman leaned out to ask where we were heading. She shook her head at being told our destination, telling us she was heading to ‘a rock’ around half way along the road. “I can take you there if you like” she drawled “you could even walk from there it’s only about 15 miles”. Intrigued by the prospect of visiting a rock in the middle of nowhere we climbed aboard and she introduced herself as Jessie. Noticing us scratching after a couple of miles, she looked in the rear view mirror and shouted ‘The dogs have got fleas and they sleep back there’. The toddler beside us, Marvin, grinned a toothless smile and scratched away beside us.

After around 20 minutes we rounded a bend surrounded by low cliffs and Jessie stopped the car. The family disembarked and we followed. Jessie opened the boot and produced three bouquets of flowers which she thrust into the arms of the still scowling, nameless teenage girl. We all headed towards a large rock which threatened to encroach onto the carriageway. It was decorated with paint from a number of vehicles and at its base were a scattering of long dead blooms which Jessie brushed aside with a once white training shoe. “My man wrecked his truck here last year”, she explained. “We’ve just popped by to say hello”. The teenage girl held her younger brother and squatted by the curbsides as her mother placed the flowers whilst singing an unidentifiable Country and Western tune. Feeling uncomfortable at being present at such a private moment, we thanked Jessie, bid the family farewell and set off walking along the road in the direction of our hotel which, as had been pointed out, was only about 15 miles away.

We’d been walking about 20 minutes when a distant rumble heralded the arrival of our final lift of the day- a battered blue pick- up truck with a white haired, mid 60’s woman at the wheel. The flatbed of the truck was full of water canisters so we squeezed in the cab alongside her. Her name was Margaret, and we were in luck, she was going to the hotel to top up her water supplies. She was wearing two odd boots, a pair of dungarees that had obviously belonged to a giant, and a pair of John Lennon style spectacles. She was also drinking from a can of beer and had a carrier bag of ‘refreshments’ in the foot well of the cab. She handed us a beer each and we set off, with Margaret entertaining us with tales of her freewheeling life. A true Hobo, she’d lived all over the world and now lived in a shack in the hills with a large hole in the roof which she told us “Don’t matter anyway, ‘because I sleep out on the porch all year round”.

Margaret approached driving as she approached life- with a ‘devil may care’ attitude, and we flew round corners on the wrong side of the road, with Margaret struggling to turn the wheel as she hung onto her tin of beer. She’d swig off the last remnants of the can with a slurp, hurl the can from the window and retrieve a replacement from the bag at her feet. Bumps in the road didn’t seem to register with this aged rally driver and we regularly seemed to take off, car chase style, and land with a bang as beer sloshed onto the wind shield from our 3 cans. It was a relief as we finally screeched round a bend and onto the hotel’s gravel car park in a cloud of dust.

We helped Margaret fill her water cans and limped to our room to await the delivery of our new car. We were hot, hungry and dusty and ached all over. We’d trashed a car in the middle of nowhere, drunk in a ghost town bar, been bitten by fleas and driven home by a drunken pensioner. But we’d had a classic road trip day – meeting interesting characters who helped us out of a tricky situation. The only disappointment was that we never did get to see that beer drinking goat!

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Extend Your Safari to Rwanda

Many travelers would like to combine their Uganda safari with an extended exploration into the top adventure sites in Rwanda. Located in the Southern Part of Uganda, Rwanda is an amazing country to enjoy a gorilla safari in Africa. Many travelers who would like to maximize their gorilla watching experience combine their holiday to both countries.

There are so many different places to consider when planning a vacation. Many people automatically decide on a tropical island or beach vacation, but there are many more adventurous and wonderful spots that can bring lifetime memories and not be the same old vacation that you are used to. Rwanda safaris are amazing safari vacation packages that allow you to see a completely different side of our amazing world. There are wildlife safaris, where you will tour spots of Rwanda and see how the wildlife lives in their own habitat. There are jungle safaris where you will travel through the jungle with an experienced guide and witness jungle life as it is happening. There are gorilla trekking safaris where you will walk among the gorillas and see just how they exist in nature. This is an amazing and different experience that will bring lasting memories, and it is also a great way to bring the family closer together, by becoming one with nature!

If you have always been curious about other parts of this world and are interested in nature, a good idea for your next vacation might be a safari trip. Rwanda safaris offer an experience simply like no other. You will go on a guided tour through the jungles and landscape of Rwanda, where you will see with your own eyes nature at its finest. You will see the gorillas in their habitat, and you will see lions and tigers. You will see plant life that you never knew existed, with all the brilliant colors of a storybook. Taking a safari vacation is a serious life changing experience. You will be touring with a professional guide who knows exactly what to do, and there may be other travelers in your group, who you can get to know and possibly make a lifelong new friend! There are various types of safari tours as well, so you will be able to go on the safari tour that most interests you.

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Kidepo National Park Turns 50 Years Old

This month, Kidepo Valley National Park is celebrating 50 years since it was gazetted as part of the independence celebrations. Hilary Bainemigisha visited the park and brings you first hand information of what more is needed, beyond the Golden Jubilee Kidepo valley was like a beautiful nun in a convent, inaccessible to suitors, but attractive. […]

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Kampala the Capital of Uganda

Uganda is the pearl of Africa due to her favorable climate characterized by rainfall and sunshine which are balanced throughout the year. Kampala is the capital city of Uganda and strategically located in the central region of the country. The capital city is surrounded by water bodies like Lake Victoria, Kyoga and rivers like River […]

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Taking a unique tour in Rwanda

Exploring new places is a fun filled experience for most people. It is because of the simple reason and things that tours offer you thrill and a lot of excitement. You are able to watch some of the greatest attraction which this place is famous for. So if you are looking for options related to […]

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Unveling the 7 Wonders of Uganda

Uganda, commonly referred to as the Pearl of Africa is one of the most adventurous destinations and a must visit for any Tourist from anywhere on the globe. Follow through this article and discover why Uganda, was ranked the No. 1 travel destination in World in 2012 by Lonely Planet. 1.       The Mountain Gorillas of […]

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