Lake Mburo National Park

Danny and I, along with Sofie the other volunteer on our campus, spent the past weekend at Lake Mburo which is quite close to us – about 60 or 70km. There are seven lakes in the park, savannah, and mountains and hills. Lovely.

The park does not get crowds of visitors like other national parks because it doesn’t have the ‘Big 5’, or chimps or gorillas like other parks. It is, however, the only national park in Uganda that has zebra and impala. Between 4-6,000 zebras roam the park.

Accommodation is basic or luxury—nothing in between. Since we took our chances and arrived without reservations we spent Saturday night in basic, tiny, and clean rooms. There were no private toilets or showers but were in buildings close by—however, in the middle of the night it seemed miles away! Sunday night was spent in a banda which was in a good location close to park headquarters and the restaurant.

Warthogs were everywhere. I must say they have a face only a mother could love! They liked to eat the grass near the restaurant and we had to walk past them to visit the ‘long drop’. They paid no attention to us.

Sunday morning we took a boat ride on Lake Mburo to look for hippos and crocodiles. Our boat spotted one baby crocodile on a branch near the water and a large crocodile in the distance. Hippos are easily seen near the lakeside restaurant. We also took a game drive in the evening with a ranger in our own vehicle. This was fantastic as we took back trails (good thing we bought a 4 x 4!) and saw hundreds of animals. Danny stopped the car in front of a water buffalo and baby which displeased the mama. The ranger told him to go forward quickly—it could charge us when it feels threatened.

In the evening after dinner when it was pitch black we took a detour to attempt to spot hippos coming out of the lake. We surprised one crossing the road—a huge, wet, lumbering animal. For a moment we feared it would charge us as it was frightened and looked panicky as it hunted for the familiar trail to the water.

On Monday morning we arose before sunrise for a 6.30 am walk with an armed park ranger. Walks are not allowed in the park without being accompanied by an armed guide—just in case. We were looking for hyenas but didn’t spot any. Zebras, monkeys, impalas and a variety of similar animals were spotted and our group got quite close to many of them. We love how graceful the impalas, etc run and leap.

Great trip…we will return.




Photos are being uploaded to this album: http://flickr.com/photos/anniedanny/sets/72157604433975130/

Links:

http://www.uwa.or.ug/mburo.html

http://www.traveluganda.co.ug/lakemburo.asp