Rwanda Safari

Highlights of Rwanda

• Ngungwe Forest National Park
• Lake Kivu
• Volcanoes National Park
• Kigali
• Akagera National Park
• Huye

• • Nyungwe Forest National Park

    Sprawling magnificently across the elevated ridge that divides Africa’s two largest drainage systems, the Nile and the Congo …

    the 1,015km² Nyungwe Forest National Park protects East Africa’s largest tract of montane rainforest in eastern Africa. The park is a remarkably rich centre of biodiversity, with more than 1,050 plant species recorded, among them 200 varieties of orchid, along with 85 mammal, 310 bird, 32 amphibian and 38 reptile species. The main attraction for most visitors is the opportunity to track a habituated group of chimpanzees, bu the park is home to a dozen other primate species, most conspicuously the acrobatic Ruwenzori colobus and striking L’Hoest’s monkey. Nyungwe is also highly alluring to birders, since it supports all but two of the 29 Albertine Rift Endemics that occur on the eastern rift escarpment, along with the dazzling great blue turaco, which is often seen is small flocks flapping clumsily across a road or forest clearing. It is also the site of East Africa’s only suspended canopy walkway.
  • Highlights

    A rewarding goal for those with restricted time, a relict forest patch in a valley in the Gisakura Tea Estate supports a habituated and relatively …

    easily photographed troop of Ruwenzori colobus along with various other monkeys. A road encircles the forest offering good views into the canopy and the opportunity to tick a good selection of forest fringe and woodland species including black-throated apalis, white-tailed crested flycatcher, Chubb’s cisticola, montane oriole and two species of crimsonwing. Tours of the tea factory are also offered.

    • Developed by USAID, the Uwinka Interpretation Centre and Canopy Walkway is the centrepiece of a network of six colour-coded trails that run through the territory of a habituated troop of 300-plus Ruwenzori colobus. The highlight is a 200m-long, 40m-high suspended metallic canopy walkway that offers superb bird’s-eye over a steep wooded valley run through by a small stream.
    • The usual site for chimpanzee tracking is Cyamudongo, an isolated patch of montane forest that has been annexe to the national park. Cyamudongo is home to a community of around 40 chimpanzees, which are generally less easily located and more restless than the mountain gorillas of Volcanoes National Park, but can be quite relaxed viewing subjects once found.
    • The most remote Source of the Nile was recently identified to be in Nyungwe National Park, and it can be visited by advance arrangement, a walk that takes up to 60 minutes in either direction.
    • Not to be confused with the Congo-Nile Trail that runs along the Lake Kivu shore, the 42km Congo-Nile Divide Trail is the only multi-day trek in Nyungwe. It follows the spectacular ridge that forms the continental divide between the Congo and Nile watersheds, and includes ascents to several tall peaks. Allow at least 3 days to complete it.
    • Daily grey-cheeked mangabey tracking excursions are offered to seek out the only habituated troop of this rather baboon-like arboreal monkey. The best days to do this are Monday and Friday, when the troop is monitored by researchers.
    • The 6km/3 hour Kamiranzovu Marsh Trail leads to the park’s largest wetland habitat, which stands at a relatively low altitude within a caldera-like depression. The marsh hosts a rich variety of orchids during the rainy season, and is the best place to look for two swamp-associated Albertine Rift Endemics, the diurnal Grauer’s rush warbler and nocturnal Albertine owlet.
    • The circular 4.7km/3 hour Ngabwe Trail, which starts near the easterly Kitabi Entrance Gate, passes through a wide variety of vegetation zones en route to a spectacular picnic site at the summit of the hill for which is is named. Several types of monkey are likely to be seen and it can be extended to become an 8-hour walk through Kitabi Tea Plantation.
    • The Bigugu Trail ascends from the main road to the 2,950m Bigugu Peak, the highest point in Nyungwe National Park. It is about 7km in either direction and takes at least 6 hours. For birders, it is the best place to look for red-collared mountain babbler, a localised Albertine Rift Endemic, and it is also good for orchids, giant lobelias and other wildflowers.
    • Popular with birdwatchers, the 4km circular Karamba Trail offers a good chance of spotting several Albertine Rift Endemics along with Dent’s and red-tailed monkeys.
    • The 10km/4 hour Isumo trail, a favourite option for travellers without private transport, leads through a tea estate then a succession of tree-fern-covered ravines to a pretty but small waterfall. Monkeys are often seen along the way, and it is a good place to seek out Albertine Rift Endenics associated with forest interiors.
  • Practical advice

    Nyungwe is bisected by the surfaced trunk road between Huye and Rusizi and most people travel by car from Kigali, a 220km drive that takes up to five hours. …

    It would also be possible to fly from Kigali to Rusizi and drive the 45km from there to the park, but this would need to be arranged in advance. It is easy to reach the forest on public transport from Kigali, Huye or Rusizi, but this will greatly limit which activities you are able to do. Nyungwe is serviced by one world-class luxury lodge, one decent upmarket hotel, and a range of budget guesthouses. Most activities in Nyungwe can be arranged on the spot, but the number of chimpanzee tracking permits is limited to eight per day, so advance booking is highly recommended.
• • Lake Kivu

    Shared between Rwanda and the DR Congo, beautiful Lake Kivu extends for 2,370km² across the floor of the Albertine Rift, and hemmed in by …

    steep terraced escarpment that rises up to 1.5km above its surface. Ranked among the world’s 20 deepest and 20 most voluminous freshwater bodies, it is lined with pretty fishing villages and a trio of larger ports in the form of Rusizi, Karongi and Rubavu. The latter in particular has long served as a popular weekend retreat for residents of Kigali, and as the most northerly point on the Rwandan lakeshore, it also forms a great place to chill out after tracking gorillas in nearby Volcanoes National Park.
  • Highlights

    The most southerly port on Lake Kivu, Rusizi (formerly Cyangugu) is split into a bland upper town perched 150m above the water and a smaller …

    but more atmospheric lower town set alongside the Rusizi River as it exits the lake. A short ride on a local amato boat (comprising three dugouts bound together with bamboo poles) leads to the islands of Gihaya and Nkombo, both of which support an abundant birdlife. The closest Kivu port to Kigali, Karongi (formerly Kibuye) sprawls prettily across a row of pine- and eucalyptus-planted hills interwoven with the arms of the lake. It is notable for its bustling Saturday market and the recently-opened Museum of the Environment, which incorporates a collection of stuffed animals and mounted butterflies, and s rooftop garden of well-labelled plants used as traditional medicine. Nearby Napoleon’s Island is shaped like its namesake’s hat and supports a massive colony fruit bats. Situated at an altitude of 2,150m on the escarpment above the lakeshore, the 100m-high Chutes de Ndaba is most impressive in the rainy season and a rough footpath leads to the base from the main road between Karongi road and Rubavu. Rwanda’s newest conservation area, gazetted in 2016, the 35km² Gishwati-Mukura National Park protects two relict patches of the vast tract of montane rainforest that once covered the Rift Valley escarpment south of Nyungwe. The more interesting to tourists is the Gishwati Forest, which supports significant populations of chimpanzee, L’Hoest’s monkey and golden monkey, along with 120 bird species, including Albertine Rift endemics such as Ruwenzori turaco, strange weaver and red-throated alethe. the park is not yet open to tourists but a network of walking trails is planned. The most popular Kivu port with tourists is the leafy town of Rubavu (formerly Gisenyi), which lies just 60km from the gorilla tracking facilities at Volcanoes National Park. Rubavu’s lovely setting is capped by by the distinctive outline of Nyiragongo, the most active of the Virunga volcanoes, which lies on the opposite side of the Congolese border, and often belches out smoke by day and glows ominously at night. Tourist facilities are concentred 6km out of town at Rubona, a scenic lakeside village notable for its pretty beaches and fishing harbour. The scenic Congo-Nile Trail runs roughly parallel to the eastern shore of Lake Kivu between Rubavu and Rusizi along 227km of existing roads and motorable tracks. Divided into ten stages, it takes ten days to complete on foot, five by bicycle and two or three by 4x4, sleeping at various lakeshore villages and towns.
  • Practical advice

    RwandAir operates a once-daily flight between Kigali and Kamembe airport outside Rusizi (formerly Cyangugu). Otherwise, main ports on …

    Lake Kivu are most easily reached by road. Rusizi is about 220km/5 hours southwest of Kigali via Huye and Nyungwe National Park, whilst Karongi is 135km/2 hours west of Kigali and Rubavu is 155km/3 hours northwest via Musanze (the gateway town for gorilla tracking in Volcanoes National Park). A newly surfaced 200km road also connects the three main ports to each other, as does a twice-weekly ferry service. A decent selection of budget and midrange accommodation is available at Rusizi, Karongi or Rubavu. For something more upmarket, you are best heading to Rubavu. Boat trips onlt othe lake can be arranged at all the ports.
• • Volcanoes National Park

    Protecting the Rwandan sector of the Virunga Mountains, the 160km2 Volcanoes National Park is best-known as the place where Dian Fossey …

    launched her pioneering study of mountain gorillas in the wild in 1966, and where the Oscar-nominated film Gorillas in the Mist was shot on location in 1988. It is one of Africa’s most scenic national parks, comprising a chain of six extinct and three active volcanoes whose steep forest-swathed slopes are linked by fertile saddles formed by solidified lava flows. Straddling the border with Uganda and the DR Congo, the Virungas provide sanctuary to more than half the world’s mountain gorillas, and the Rwanda component is home to a dozen habituated groups for which a total of 96 tracking permits are issued daily. Other wildlife includes the nimble bamboo-guzzling golden monkey, elusive populations of elephant and buffalo whose spoor often litters the forest trails, and the likes giant forest hog, bushpig, bushbuck, and black-fronted duiker. Around 200 bird species are thought to inhabit the mountains, a list that includes at least 16 Albertine Rift Endemics. Tracking mountain gorillas is far and away the most popular tourist activity, but it is possible to extend a stay with other activities such as golden monkey tracking, hiking to Dian Fossey’s former camp at Karisoke, and hiking to four of the volcanic peaks.
  • Highlights

    Tracking mountain gorillas in the Virungas ranks high on almost every traveller’s bucket list of must-do experiences. And the reality seldom …

    disappoints. Gorillas are more closely related to humans than any animal other than chimpanzees, and the sheer bulk of these charismatic apes - a silverback might weigh 200kg - is deeply impressive. Meanwhile, the very fact that tourists can routinely approach gorillas to within a few metres pays testament to their remarkable peaceable temperament. True, the hike up can be hard work. You’ll be climbing steep slopes, through tangled vegetation, at an altitude of above 2,500m - and it isn’t called rainforest for nothing. But the reward, a magical hour spent in the company of nature’s archetypal gentle giants, is quite simply one of the world’s most exhilarating and emotionally charged wildlife encounters. An Albertine Rift Endemic whose range is practically confined to the Virunga Mountains, the handsome golden monkey is named for the luxuriant orange-gold patches on its back and flanks. Daily tracking excursions run into the national park to visit a habituated troop of these delightful hyperactive monkeys, which generally frequent patches of bamboo - their primary diet - but also sometimes gather at fruiting trees. A popular half-day round hike leads to the original Karisoke Research Camp, which was founded by the legendary primatologist Dian Fossey in 1967. Set an altitude of around 3,000m on a forested saddle connecting Mount Karisimbi and Mount Bisoke, the camp had to be evacuated several times during the civil war, and it was eventually relocated to the town of Musanze at the mountains’ base. Nevertheless, it is profoundly poignant to visit the living quarters - now in ruins - where Fossey was murdered in 1985, and to pay tribute at her tomb, which stands alongside those of several gorillas killed by poachers during her tenure. Guided hikes can be undertaken to four of the Virunga Peaks set within the parks. Most worthwhile is the day hike up the 3,711m Mount Bisoke, which is topped by a beautiful crater lake enclosed by slopes swathed in atmospheric giant lobelias and hagenia woodland. It’s a steep hike, gaining more than 1,000m from the trailhead to summit, and the descent can be treacherous after rain. For dedicated hikers and summit baggers, the most alluring of the Virunga peaks is Mount Karisimbi, which stands at 4,507m, making it the tallest point in Rwanda and sixth-highest mountain in Africa. Karisimbi also boasts the greatest vegetation diversity of the Virungas, and the ascent rises through clumped bamboo and hagenia forest to the otherworldly Afro-alpine zone. It’s a steep hike even by the standards of the Virungas, and it entails camping overnight in near-freezing conditions. Bordering the national park, Gorilla Guardians (better known by its former name of Iby’Iwacu Cultural Village) is the flagship for a community project that project that provides employment as niche farmers, beekeepers and the like to about 1,000 local villagers. It also offers tourists a fascinating and enjoyable programme that culminates in a traditional Intore drumming and dance routine set in a fantastic wood-and-thatch replica of a traditional Rwandan palace.
  • Practical advice

    All activities in Volcanoes National Park start at the park headquarters in the village of Kinigi, which lie 12km north of the …

    substantial town of Musanze, and 110km from the capital Kigali. Gorilla tracking and other hiking permits are best bought in advance and participants must be at the park headquarters by 7am, or they risk invalidating the permit. There is no accommodation within the national park, but several lodges and hotels can be found along its borders, at Kinigi, and in Musanze. The nearest international airport is in Kigali, so you need to travel by road from there. It is easy to get as far Musanze or Kinigi on public transport, but if you do this, you will need to charter a 4x4 with driver to get you to the trailhead in the morning. Technically it is possible to track gorillas as a day trip from Kigali, but it isn’t recommended as you would need to leave at around 4am to be sure of getting to the park headquarters in time.
• • Kigali

    Founded as recently as 1907, Kigali served as a minor administrative centre in the colonial era, and had a population of fewer than …

    6,000 when it was selection as capital of newly-independent Rwanda due to its central location in 1962. Today, this strikingly neat and modern-looking highland city sprawls attractively across a series of hills spanning altitudes of 1,300-1,600m, and hosts a population well in excess of one million. Thanks in part to a longstanding nationwide ban on plastic bags, Kigali is widely regarded to be Africa’s cleanest city (in 2008, it became the first African town to be presented with the UN’s annual Habitat Scroll of Honour award). It is also the main port of entry to Rwanda, being the site if th country’s only international airport, and its central location makes it a useful base for exploration further afield.
  • Highlights

    The profoundly moving Kigali Genocide Memorial stands in Gisozi, the burial site of over 250,000 people killed in a three-month period during Rwanda’s …

    1994 genocide. It is managed by the Aegis Trust, UK-based organisation dedicated to assisting widows and orphans of genocide victims, and educating a new generation about the dangers of prejudice. The memorial is home to the Genocide Archive of Rwanda, which includes photographs, official documents and geographical data relating to the genocide. A comprehensive audio tour is available in English and several other languages. Another site associated with the tragic events of 1994, the Remera Heroes Cemetery contains the grave of Agathe Uwilingiyimana, who was less than a year into her term as prime minister when she was assassinated on 7 April of that year, at the outset of the genocide. It also houses the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, whose anonymous occupant symbolises all those who died in the conflict. Kandt House Museum is set in Kigali’s oldest building, an unassuming example of colonial architecture built in 1907 for the eponymous explorer and German governor. It opened as Rwanda’s natural history museum in 1907, but following the recent relocation of most of its exhibits to the much larger Museum of the Environment in Karongi, it will focus more on the history of Rwanda and the development of Kigali as capital when eventually it reopens. Until that happens, Kandt House is still worth a visit for the great views over the city. The suburban Nyabugogo Market is Kigali’s busiest shopping area, with stalls and vendors selling offering everything from trendy trainers and shoes and the latest electronic equipment to fresh fruit and vegetables, and oven-warm baguettes. It is a fascinating, vibrant place to explore, but don’t take photos without the subject’s permission. The top birdwatching site in the city limits, the artificial Lake Nyarutarama frequently supports a variety of kingfishers, ducks, pelicans, herons and egrets, along with black crake, African jacana and pied and malachite kingfisher, while the surrounding grassland hosts a selection of widow birds, weavers, waxbills and seedeaters. A more far-flung but rewarding goal for birdwatchers, Nyabarongo Bridge spans the eponymous river as it flows through swampy Bugesera District about 15km south of Kigali. The main attraction here is aquatic and papyrus-associated birds, which range from pelicans and moorhens to localised papyrus-dwellers such as papyrus gonolek, white-winged scrub-warbler, papyrus yellow warbler and papyrus canary.
  • Practical advice

    Rwanda’s only international airport is situated about 5km from central Kigali, but it will should soon be replaced by the modern Bugesera International Airport …

    Kigali lies at the hub of the country’s impressive network of tar roads and it is also the hub of a public transport network - mostly comprising minibuses - that connects to all other towns of importance. Good roads and bus services also link it to border crossings with Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi and the DR Congo. The city is well-supplied with tour operators able to arrange trips to the various national parks and other places of interest countrywide. A good range of accommodation is available to suit all budgets and tastes. These include several world-class international chain hotels, a scattering of smaller and more characterful boutique hotels, and a good choice of budget guesthouses and hostels. Kigali also now boasts a diverse restaurant scene. A French and Belgian influence predominates, but there are also plenty of more cosmopolitan options, from Indian and Chinese to Ethiopian and Ugandan.
• • Akagera National Park

    The ideal complement to the primate-oriented wildlife-viewing offered at Volcanoes and Nyungwe National Parks, Akagera is a classic savannah reserve …

    that has undergone an ambitious recent rehabilitation programme to become a fully-fledged Big Five safari destination. As with Rwanda other national parks, the setting is spectacular: a chain of low grassy mountains that slope down to a tract of undulating most savannah hemmed in by an extensive wetland comprising a dozen lakes, extensive papyrus swamps and a labyrinth of channels fed by the meandering Akagera River. Having suffered heavily from poaching and encroachment since the 1990s, Akagera was placed under the dynamic stewardship of the non-profit African Parks Network in 2010. Since them the boundaries have been fenced, the range of tourist activities has been expanded to include guided walks, boat trips and night drives, and an ongoing programme of reintroductions has resulted in the return of lions and black rhino, meaning that all the Big Five (a lost that also includes buffalo, elephant and leopard) can be seen. Other wildlife is also abundant, and the birdlife is truly fantastic, making Akagera a superb add-on to gorilla tracking in the Virungas.
  • Highlights

    Akagera offers excellent Big Five game viewing. Buffaloes are plentiful and easily seen, elephants are quite common but more difficult to track down …

    and leopards are observed with increasing frequency on night drives. Lion and black rhino had both been poached to extinction by 2005 but both have since been reintroduced. Seven lions were flown in from South Africa in 2015, followed by another two in 2017, and more than a dozen cubs have now been born in the park May 2017 saw the arrival of 18 black rhinos, one if which has already given birth to a health calf. Other wildlife often seen on game drives includes Maasai giraffe, Burchell’s zebra, warthog, olive baboon, vervet monkey and 11 species of antelope. Most common is the impala, which tends to stick to wooded savannah habitats. The grassy Mutumba Hills and plains to its north are the main stronghold of eland (Africa’s largest antelope), topi, Bohor reedbuck, oribi, roan antelope and the rock-hopping klipspringer. Defassa waterbuck, bushbuck and common duiker are all likely to be seen in the vicinity of the lakes, while the secretive semi-aquatic sitatunga is largely restricted to inaccessible swamp interiors. Organised night drives in an open-topped game-viewing vehicle offering a good chance of spotting several nocturnal hunters, among them leopard, spotted hyena, genet, civet and white-tailed mongoose. Other animals often seen on night drives include bushbaby, elephant-shrew and various species of owl and nightjar. Boat trips on Lake Ihema offer a fabulous introduction to the park’s aquatic fauna. Crocodiles and hippo are all but guaranteed, and an abundance of water birds includes African fish eagle, African darter, open-bill stork, African jacana, malachite kingfisher, and papyrus specialists such as blue-headed coucal, papyrus gonolek and white-winged warbler and. A fantastic seasonal heronry is a breeding site for half a dozen species including the localised rufous-bellied heron and both types of night heron. With an avian checklist comprising 480 species, Akagera offers the most diverse birdwatching in Rwanda, though it is perhaps of less ornithological importance than Nyungwe, since it doesn’t support any Albertine Rift Endemics or other forest birds. Particularly strong on raptors and waterbirds, Akagera also supports a host of colourful and conspicuous savannah and woodland dwellers, among them the gorgeous Ross’s turaco, Meyer’s parrot, double-toothed barbet, lilac-breasted roller and black-headed gonolek. The red-faced barbet, a localised endemic of savannahs between Lake Victoria and the Albertine Rift, is often seen in the car park and gardens of Akagera Game Lodge. For many, the single most alluring bird resident in Akagera is the shoebill, a 1.5m-tall slate-grey papyrus dweller named for the hefty clog-shaped, hook-tipped bill which it claps together like outsized castanets when agitated. The exact status of the shoebill in Akagera is uncertain, but at last one pair inhabits the papyrus beds fringing Lake Birengero, and is often seen through binoculars from the roads along the western shore.
  • Practical advice

    Although it is officially part of Tanzania, Zanzibar is in almost all aspects – politics, religion, culture and food – very different …

    Akagera National Park lies about 110km east of Kigali along a road that is surfaced to within 27km of the entrance gate. Allow three hours for the drive. High clearance and ideally 4x4 are required to drive within the park. Most people visit as an organised road safari out of Kigali. There are no flights and no public transport is available to the entrance gate. Accommodation within the park includes a long-standing hilltop lodge scheduled for major renovations over 2018/9, a lovely exclusive tented camp on Lake Ihema, a non-permanent seasonal tented camp, and several campsites suited to self-sufficient campers.
• • Holiday in Huye

    The self-styled ‘intellectual centre’ of Rwanda, Huye (formerly Butare) stands at a breezy altitude of 1,755m to the southwest of Kigali.…

    During the colonial era, it was the second-largest town in the joint territory of Ruanda-Urundi (after the capital Bujumbura, which lies in modern-day Burundi) and it came as a surprise when it was overlooked as capital of Rwanda when the territories split at the time independence. Now only the fourth-largest town in Rwanda, it contains several colonial-era architectural relicts, and is also an important educational centre, home not only to the country’s oldest university but also to several technical and training schools and colleges. Huye is also the closest large town - and often visited in conjunction with - the fascinating former royal capital of Nyanza, which lies off the Kigali Road about 40km to the north, and now houses an impressive traditional palace and museum.
  • Highlights

    The country’s oldest institution of higher learning, the University of Rwanda was founded on the outskirts of Huye in 1963, though the Art Deco buildings …

    at its centre originally formed part of a Catholic primary school for colonials. A troop of more than 50 vervet monkeys is more-or-less resident on campus, and the adjacent Ruhande Arboretum is a peaceful refuge whose collection of indigenous and exotic trees harbour plenty of birds. A gift from King Baudouin I of Belgium, the National Ethnographic Museum of Rwanda opened in 1988 and its seven spacious halls document the traditional cultures and history of the country and its people. Key displays deal with the country’s earliest known hunter-gatherer inhabitants, the importance of cattle in Rwanda society, the royal Intore dancers, and traditional customs and beliefs. Huye Cathedral is a huge red-brick edifice built in the late 1930s in memory of Queen Astrid, the 29-year-old Swedish wife of Belgium’s King Leopold III who died in a car accident in 1935. Try to time your visit to catch a mass or rehearsals to hear the 30-strong a capella choir in full voice. Founded outside Huye in 1958, the Benedictine Gihindamuyaga Monastery was designed in the early 1960’s by the Belgian architect Lucien Kroll and selected as Rwanda’s entry in The Phaidon Atlas of 20th-Century World Architecture in 2012. The monastery is home to a jewellery workshop and boutique selling a small selection of hand-crafted silver and gold items. In 1899, Nyanza Hill was selected by the recently enthroned Mwami Musinga Yuhi V as the site of the country’s first permanent royal capital, a role it retained throughout his reign, then that of his son and successor Mwami Rudahigwa Mutara III, until the traditional monarchy was abolished in 1961. Today it boasts two sites of great cultural and historic interest. The Rukari Museum comprises a Western-style palace that was built for Mwami Rudahigwa Mutara III in 1932 and now houses an excellent selection of exhibits chart the history of Rwanda from the 5th century onwards. Alongside it is a fabulous reconstruction of a traditional domed palace, built with poles and layered thatch, and furnished in period style. About 1km away, the Rwesero National Art Gallery, set in a house constructed for Mutara III Rudahigwa over 1957–59, hosts a fascinating collection of traditional and contemporary Rwandan artworks dating from the 1950s onwards.
  • Practical advice

    A good 130km surfaced road connects Kigali to Huye; private vehicles should get through in under three hours and there is also plenty of public transport. …

    Nyanza lies 2km west of the main road between Kigali and Huye, and can be reached by turning off at Kubijega junction, around two hours’ drive from Kigali and just 45 minutes from Huye. There are plenty of midrange and budget hotels in Huye, but nothing more exclusive is available. For this reason, a lot of people explore the area as a day trip from Kigali, or en route to Nyungwe National Park.