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Tips for Rwanda, Congo and Uganda

Country – January 30, 2016 by Els Slots

Right after Christmas I spent 3 weeks travelling around Rwanda, DR of Congo and Uganda. It was a great and well-balanced trip, that covered 2 TWHS and 4 WHS. 2 out of the latter had not been reviewed before on this website, so this is some real undiscovered territory. Find below my Top Tips for Travelling to Rwanda, Congo and Uganda as a World Heritage Traveller.

Want to see the hippos of the Ugandan Kazinga Channel?
40 US dollar entrance fee + 28 US dollar boat ride

1. Go there when you can afford it

In preparation I read trip reports from people who travelled in this region without entering any of the major National Parks. They only had the money to sustain their daily travel costs of food, public transport and lodging. I’d say: be prepared that these are expensive destinations, and that you’ll enjoy them more if you have saved up a bit. You’ll easily be asked to hand over 50 to 100 US dollar for any activity on top of entrance fees (the Ugandan Wildlife Service provides a handy leaflet with pricing ). And you’ll also have to pay for mostly private transport getting into the parks …

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WHS #592: Kasubi Tombs

Site – January 24, 2016 by Els Slots
The ‘Kasubi Tombs’, as the Tombs of the Buganda Kings are known locally, may be the only tourist attraction of Kampala (a capital city with 2.5 million inhabitants). And then came that devastating fire on March 10, 2010: the main thatched structure with the 4 tombs of the former kings and their regalia burned to the ground . The cause is still unknown: was it arson or was it struck by lightning? Anyway: it hasn’t been rebuilt yet. Still I found it an interesting site, and it is an easy place to visit shortly before leaving Uganda via Entebbe Airport.
The 5 most recent kings of Buganda: the 4 to the right were buried here.
The current king is the one on the left
The tombs are situated on a hill about three kilometers outside of Kampala city centre. Due to a traffic jam my minibus from Entebbe had a hard time reaching the bus station, so I got out somewhere along the way and approached a boda-boda . The guy immediately understood where I wanted to go, and we took off zigzagging through the dense traffic. There are …
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WHS #591: Rwenzori Mountains

Site – January 20, 2016 by Els Slots
Rwenzori Mountains National Park covers a 80km long mountain ridge in the far west of Uganda. It forms a natural border with the DR of Congo. The park attracts some 2,700 visitors a year, of which at least half are local schoolchildren. The others are mainly trekkers and mountaineers, arriving to hike a 10-day circuit or give the 3rd highest peak of Africa (Margherita’s Peak) a try. WH travellers do not often make it there: so far only 16 claim to have visited it, while noone has written a review yet.
Old mining barracks in Kyanjiki
In preparation of my visit I had been looking for the best access point to get into the park without having to do a multi-day hike. I found out that there are two main entries: one at Nyakalengija (with the Equator Snow Lodge and Ruboni Community Camp ) and one near Kilembe. I choose the latter, as the Rwenzori Trekking Services (RTS) advertised one day treks into the park departing from the associated Trekkers Hostel Kyanjiki. The office of the RTS, whose members accompany the hikes and maintain the trails, is also found …
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WHS #590: Bwindi

Site – January 15, 2016 by Els Slots
Bwindi Impenetrable National Park has been made a WHS for its high variety of tree and fern species, whose dense cover of the valley floors has lead to the name ‘impenetrable’. It is the remnant of what once was a very large forest. To the general public the park is mostly known as the number 1 place to see mountain gorillas. Bwindi welcomes over 20,000 visitors a year for that purpose.
Impenetrable Forest
Although the southern part of Bwindi lies only some 50km north of Mgahinga NP and the Virunga Massif, it is a separate mountain range. Both nature reserves were once connected via a corridor, but they got separated some 500 years ago. The mountain gorillas in Bwindi have evolved on their own since, that’s why they’re sometimes regarded as a different subspecies from the Virungan ones. According to research, they are more likely to feed on fruits, travel longer distances per day and build their nest in trees than their Virungan cousins. As this was my second gorilla tracking after Virunga 5 days before, it is tempting to compare the two experiences. In hindsight I am happy …
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Mgahinga – Where Gold Meets Silver

Site – January 9, 2016 by Els Slots

Mgahinga Gorilla National Park is a very small park in the extreme southwest of Uganda. Covering the Ugandan part of the Virunga Mountains, it is contiguous with both Volcanoes National Park in Rwanda and Virunga National Park in Congo. The site has been on Uganda’s Tentative List since 2007, in preparation for a possible transboundary nomination of these 3 parks. Although it’s named ‘Gorilla National Park’, Mgahinga has only one habituated gorilla family that can be visited. And that one is prone to wander across the borders to Rwanda and Congo, so it’s not the safest bet for gorilla tracking (although since a few years the family has returned to Ugandan soil). Probably the only thing that sets this park apart from the nearby WHS of Virunga and Bwindi is its sizeable population of rare Golden Monkeys.

Park entrance - they already have developed an Epic Subtitle

The Ugandan Wildlife Authority has a helpful office in Kisoro, and I booked my Golden Monkey Tracking there a day beforehand. It costs 50 US dollar for the activity, plus 40 US dollar entrance fee to …

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WHS #589: Virunga!

Site – January 4, 2016 by Els Slots
From the moment that I became aware that it’s feasable at the moment to cross the border into the Democratic Republic of Congo and visit Virunga National Park , I simply had to do it. I booked myself into the comfortable Mikeno Lodge , arranged transport from Kigali in Rwanda to the Congolese border and signed up for a gorilla trek in the park. This is one of the earliest WHS (1979) and it has been praised in superlatives for its montane landscape, volcanism and biodiversity. The site is also one of the 50 remaining WHS that are still unreviewed at this website. The park has been faced with “an almost uninterrupted series of trials” since the mid-1980s, ranging from the influx of one million Rwandan refugees in its vicinity to the oil exploration by SOCO. The latter is the subject of the acclaimed but rather unsettling documentary Virunga (2014), which I watched on Netflix a week before I headed out there. “Congo is safe now”, my Rwandese driver said while we were passing empty refugee camps near the border.
Park quarters at Bukima
One of the first remarkable …
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Rwandan Genocide Memorial Sites

Site – December 29, 2015 by Els Slots

Rwanda has no WHS to date, and it saddens that the only entry on its Tentative List comprises the Rwandan Genocide Memorial Sites . The horrors of the Rwandan Genocide still determine the image of this small country, though it has come a long way since. The TWHS covers four locations connected with the memory of those 100 days in Spring and early Summer of 1994. Spread out over the country, they are: Nyamata (a church), Murambi (a school), Bisesero (a hill) and Gisozi (the main Genocide Memorial Center in Kigali).

Remembrance wall at Kigali Memorial

On my first morning in Rwanda I headed to the Memorial Museum of Gisozi. I got there on the back of a moto-taxi, the ubiquituous and very convenient mode of transport in Kigali. The Museum is guarded tightly, they wanted to see what I had in my backpack and pockets. Police and soldiers in the streets are a common sight in Rwanda, especially at intersections and government buildings. The Genocide Museum was opened in 2004 to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide. It consists of a building …

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A second look at Edinburgh

Site – December 19, 2015 by Els Slots
In determining the Top 200 among WHS , we are constantly reassessing a certain site’s uniqueness on a global scale. The Old and New Towns of Edinburgh became a WHS because of juxtapositional Urban Planning: the organically grown medieval Old Town versus the planned 18th/19th century New Town. “The dramatic topography of the Old Town combined with the planned alignments of key buildings in both the Old and the New Town, results in spectacular views and panoramas and an iconic skyline .”
View on the Old Town from Calton Hill
So if the Skyline is what makes it different, Edinburgh should particularly be enjoyed from a high viewpoint. On a crisp Sunday morning in December I walked the short and easy trail to the top of Calton Hill. This is a setting very typical of Edinburgh: it’s one of several hills surrounding the city center, dotted with monuments and memorials to historic Scotsmen. I wasn’t the only one enjoying the morning here: especially young Asian tourists (or are they students?) know about the place too. This spot allows unobstructed views on both the Old and New Towns. You supposedly …
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WHS #588: Forth Bridge

Site – December 13, 2015 by Els Slots

Before the year 2015 ends, I needed to go on ‘mileage run’ to secure KLM Elite Status for next year. So I went on the lookout for a cheap return ticket to a nearby destination, including opportunities for an unvisited WHS of course. The choice fell upon Edinburgh – although I had visited the city before in 2001, I had at the time not been to the Forth Bridge . This 2015 addition to the List has many superlatives attached to it in its nomination file, such as “icon of Scotland”, “potent symbol of the Railway Age” and “unique milestone in the evolution of bridge and other steel Construction”.

The Bridge lies just a few km from Edinburgh Airport, and already good views of it can be had from the air. I had especially chosen a window seat, and though it was a bit hazy early morning the three big arches were clearly recognizable on the approach. December is not a particularly good month to plan a visit to the Forth Bridge: the Firth of Forth ‘cruises’, where you can admire the construction from the water, aren’t running past November. …

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WHC 2016: Cetinje

Site – December 5, 2015 by Els Slots
Montenegro made a sudden appearance on the international political scene this week as it was asked to become a member of the NATO . The move steers it away from the Russian sphere of influence, which it was a part of essentially until independence from Serbia in 2006. So far this small Balkan country holds 2 WHS, both 'inherited' from former Yugoslavia. At the WHC session of 2016 it hopes to double this number with the transboundary site of the Stecci Medieval Tombstones and on its own steam with the old capital Cetinje .
Kids celebrating Independence Day
Cetinje was the Royal Capital of Montenegro from the 15th century until Montenegro's incorporation in Yugoslavia after WWII. In the early 20th century it was the world's smallest capital, registering only 5,895 inhabitants. It is considered both a cradle of Montenegrin culture and a Serbian Orthodox religious center. The official residence of the Montenegrin President is still located here. I visited Cetinje in 2013, on my way between Podgorica and Kotor . Buses between the two cities will make a stop in Cetinje, so it's an easy break. It's also within …
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