Murchison Falls National Park
Game Drives | Launch Cruise | Top Of The Falls | Nature Walks
‘The world’s most powerful waterfall’, as largely known here and named by the Uganda wildlife Authority, Murchison falls National Park is one of the most special and amazing destinations that everyone ought to visit. The park is enormously situated in the north western part of the country, lying right at the far northern stretch edge of the Great East African/Albertine rift valley. The park was gazette way back in the mid-1920s as a game reserve, which stands right as the oldest and largest conservation area in Uganda.
This bliss point of a park is perfectly bisected into two by the Nile River, giving it a northern and a southern bank that are a vast palm-dotted savannah plains and a thick savannah woodland respectively. The Victoria Nile submerges 45m over the relic rift valley wall, forming the dramatic Murchison waterfalls, an ornament of the park and the final event in an 80km stretch of rapids. The superlative cascade drains the last of the river’s energy, transforming it into a broad, tranquil stream that flows calmly across the rift valley floor into Lake Albert.
At the falls point, the Nile river squeezes through an 8m wide gorge and rushes with a thunderous roar into the “Devil’s cauldron”, creating a trademark rainbow.
The land is a home to most of the exciting big game, 5 of which are permanent residents say the Lion, the African Elephant, the Leopard, the Hippo and the Buffalo which are just a few of the rest of the 71 other mammal species that hide in the piquant Murchison falls national park. All is just a norm when the solar noon assembles, the Nile crocodiles come out to bask, and a number of antelopes near to bath, drink and tick-picked by flocks of birds that always fly to and off the river banks. The moments here are all a mesmerizing experience.
How to get there
The park can be easily accessed through road using its different gates to reach the Nile at Paraa.
The river is crossed here using ferry which runs at roughly hourly intervals throughout the day.
Two southerly approaches to Paraa lead out of Masindi town, which is a 4hr drive (305km) from Kampala.
Along the way is the Ziwa rhino sanctuary, a home to the only wild rhinos remaining in Uganda.
A longer but more scenic alternative runs for 135km from Masindi to the park’s Bugungu gate, the route includes a passage to the Budongo forest a memorable descent of the rift valley escarpment with views across Lake Albert towards the mountains of the Congo.
The park can also be accessed via Chobe, Wankwar, Mubako and Tangi gates north of the Nile. These are reached from the Kampala-Packwach Road which crosses the Nile at Karuma Falls Bridge in the northern corner of the park, 260km from Kampala. These gates are so convenient to tourist travelling to/from Gulu and Kidepo national park.
The park can also be accessed by air, to Pakuba Airfield, 19km from North Paraa, reached using chartered aircraft from Entebbe international Airport or Kajansi Airfield near Kampala. One can also fly to Chobe in the east or Bugungu near the falls in the south.
Activities
The game drives are one of the most attractive activities in the park, a head of chances to view numbers of both big and the small game. Lions if encountered are splendidly glamorous. The reserved leopards can also be tracked in the early dawn and late dusk. Flocks of the Rothschild giraffes head a browse alongside many tales in the open savannah grass lands.
Birding is super, lovely and anonymously piquant to birders as the park offers over 450 species of birds. This is purely a great deal.
Launch trips to the bottom of the falls which gives a memorable frontal view of the falls, and preferably to the Nile-Lake Albert Delta early in the morning, so good to birders. These all present an astonishing display of wildlife, bird life and the nature scent.
Hiking and nature walks, sport fishing, and cultural encounters are all a memorable big time.
Accommodation
A number of accommodations ranging from low range to almost the most luxurious in the country’s safari lodges are all hidden within this wilderness. These listed but not limited to, Paraa safari lodge, Chobe safari lodge, Sambiya river lodge, Twiga safari lodge, Pakuba safari lodge, Red chili rest camp, Murchison safari lodge, Budongo eco lodge and many others.