Chimpanzees, golden monkeys and colobus in Uganda and Rwanda
Private safaris to track wild chimpanzees in Kibale, Kyambura Gorge or Nyungwe, golden monkeys on the Virunga volcanoes, and the colobus and mangabeys that share their forests.
We plan private chimpanzee trekking and primate safaris in Uganda and Rwanda, with the vehicle and the guide to yourselves.
A chimpanzee trek is a walk through the forest with a ranger guide until you find a group of chimpanzees used to people, then an hour in their company.
Kibale National Park holds 13 primate species and what the Uganda Wildlife Authority calls Uganda's largest population of chimpanzees. Nyungwe, in Rwanda, also holds 13, and a colobus troop of more than 400.
Golden monkeys are tracked on the Virunga volcanoes, in Mgahinga in Uganda and Volcanoes National Park in Rwanda, the same parks as the mountain gorillas.
A village guide and a traveller looking up into the trees from the Bigodi boardwalk, beside Kibale.
Tick the primates on your list and say how old the youngest of you is. The forests holding the most of your primates light up on the map and come first, and every way to meet them shows whether your group is old enough.
With each forest's primates we name who lists them there: the park's authority, Visit Rwanda, KAFRED at Bigodi or the Budongo research station.
Your primates
Youngest in your group
Has your primates: the bigger the dot, the more it hasHas none of your primatesCity
Every forest and the primates it holds.
Tracking starts at Kanyanchu, 35 km south-east of Fort Portal
Listed by: Uganda Wildlife Authority
How you meet them
Montane rainforest of 1,019 km², run by African Parks with the Rwanda Development Board
Listed by: Nyungwe National Park; Visit Rwanda
How you meet them
Chimpanzees in Kyambura Gorge, a forested gorge 100 metres deep running to the Kazinga Channel; the other primates in the wider park
Listed by: Uganda Wildlife Authority
How you meet them
A primate walk in the Mugiri forest, near Semliki Safari Lodge
Listed by: Uganda Wildlife Authority
How you meet them
A papyrus swamp run by KAFRED, the village's community group, 5 km south of Kanyanchu
Listed by: KAFRED
How you meet them
A group of 20 chimpanzees, Visit Rwanda says; visits include a stay at the Forest of Hope guesthouse
Listed by: Visit Rwanda
How you meet them
In the south of the Murchison Falls Conservation Area
Listed by: Uganda Wildlife Authority; Budongo Conservation Field Station
How you meet them
Report at Kinigi at 7:00; two golden monkey groups, on Karisimbi and Sabyinyo
Listed by: Rwanda Development Board
How you meet them
From the Ntebeko visitor centre, in the bamboo on Mount Gahinga
Listed by: Uganda Wildlife Authority
How you meet them
A forest is listed for a primate only where the park's authority, its managers, Visit Rwanda or the community that runs the walk names it there. Fees are each authority's own for foreign visitors, read in October 2026: the Uganda Wildlife Authority's for 2026, and Nyungwe's 2025-2026 sheet, still the one the park links in October 2026. UWA has set new rates from 1 January 2027; we confirm every fee for your dates.
Ticked your primates? We plan the forests around them.
We plan the route around the primates you ticked and check permits for each one.
You meet your ranger guide at Kanyanchu at 8:00 or 14:00 and walk until the chimpanzees are found. Your hour with them starts then.
A chimpanzee resting on the forest floor, Uganda. This photograph and the one at the top of the page: flowcomm, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Kibale and Nyungwe offer both: up to four hours in Kibale, a full day with the trackers in Nyungwe. Tell us which you want in your first message, so we check the right permits for your dates. UWA has set new tracking rates from 1 January 2027, which we confirm when we book.
Starts at 8:00 or 14:00 in Kibale, and leaves the rest of the day for Bigodi, a walk or a massage back at the lodge.
In Kibale you go out at 6:30 with the researchers and habituators getting a group of wild chimpanzees used to people, UWA's brochure says, and stay up to four hours.
Male chimpanzees in Kibale. Photos: Giles Laurent, CC BY-SA 4.0 (left); Rod Waddington, CC BY-SA 2.0 (right); via Wikimedia Commons.
Chimp tracking, or a full day with the chimps?
Tell us which suits you and when you can travel. We check chimpanzee permits for your dates.
Kibale, Kyambura Gorge and Nyungwe compared: in each you track a chimpanzee group with a guide. Kibale's and Kyambura's permits come from the Uganda Wildlife Authority; Nyungwe's from the park, run by African Parks with the Rwanda Development Board.
Uganda
Queen Elizabeth National Park, Uganda
Rwanda
A young chimpanzee in Kibale, Giles Laurent; Rwenzori colobus in Nyungwe, AlexMiller12345; both CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Kyambura Gorge from the rim.
Each with its IUCN Red List status where we have checked it, and where to look, from the park's or the community's own list. Open one to see it.
Kibale holds East Africa's largest population of the threatened red colobus, UWA's brochure says. The IUCN lists the ashy red colobus, Uganda's red colobus, as Endangered (2019).
Where to lookKibaleBigodi
Kibale's black-and-white colobus is the guereza, Least Concern on the IUCN Red List (2024). UWA lists black-and-white colobus in Queen Elizabeth too, and KAFRED at Bigodi. Nyungwe's are Rwenzori colobus, and its managers say one group of more than 400 has been seen there, the largest ever recorded of any primate in Africa.
Where to lookKibaleBigodiQueen ElizabethToro-SemlikiNyungwe
Found only in the Albertine Rift, UWA's Kibale brochure and Visit Rwanda both say. Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List (2016).
Where to lookKibaleBigodiNyungweGishwati
Uganda's only endemic monkey, UWA's brochure says: long mistaken for the grey-cheeked mangabey, and named as a species of its own in 2007. KAFRED, which runs the Bigodi walk, lists it as the grey-cheeked mangabey.
Where to lookKibaleBigodi
A small monkey with a white spot on its nose and a long red tail. KAFRED lists it at Bigodi, and UWA on the primate walk in Toro-Semliki Wildlife Reserve.
Where to lookBigodiToro-Semliki
Visit Rwanda lists blue monkeys in Nyungwe, with owl-faced monkeys, Dent's monkeys and vervets, and in Gishwati with the chimpanzees. KAFRED lists them at Bigodi.
Where to lookNyungweGishwatiBigodi
UWA lists olive baboons in Queen Elizabeth National Park, with chimpanzees, black-and-white colobus and vervets, and KAFRED at Bigodi.
Where to lookQueen ElizabethBigodi
Photos: red colobus, black-and-white colobus and red-tailed monkey in Kibale, Giles Laurent; L'Hoest's monkey and olive baboon, Charles J. Sharp; blue monkey, Wood Wildlife Photography; all CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Uganda mangabey: Barry Stewart, CC BY 4.0, via iNaturalist, resized.
Golden monkeys are tracked on the Virunga volcanoes on both sides of the border, and Visit Rwanda also lists them in Gishwati-Mukura. Volcanoes and Mgahinga are mountain gorilla parks too, so golden monkeys and a gorilla trek fit on one trip: golden monkeys from 12 in Volcanoes, gorillas from 15.
A golden monkey eating bamboo, Volcanoes National Park. Photo: Charles J. Sharp, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Sleep close to the start, so the 8:00 walk is a short drive after breakfast, and spend the afternoon on the Bigodi boardwalk or by a fire above a crater lake.
A cottage veranda at Primate Lodge Kibale; the fire pit above the crater lake at Crater Safari Lodge; the massage room at Primate Lodge Kibale; Kyambura Gorge Lodge at sunset. Facts from the lodges' websites, read in October 2026.
Like a lodge near the chimps? We check its rooms with your permits.
Tell us which one and your dates, and we send a route and a price.
Typically 10 to 14 daysUgandaBest of Ugandafrom USD 3,950per personSee the itinerary
Typically 3 to 5 daysRwandaRwanda Gorilla Trekkingfrom USD 3,900per personSee the itinerary
Typically 8 to 12 daysUgandaUganda Family Safarifrom USD 3,600per personSee the itineraryLonger, shorter, a different month, two countries in one run. Say what you have in mind and a first route and a real price come back within one working day.
Start with a dateIn Kibale, the Uganda Wildlife Authority's permit is USD 250 per person in 2026, with park entry and a nature walk that day included, or USD 200 in April, May and November 2026. At Kyambura Gorge it is USD 100 plus park entry in 2026.
In Nyungwe, Rwanda, the park's 2025-2026 price sheet gives USD 150 plus park entry. UWA has set new rates from 1 January 2027, so we confirm the price for your dates, and we book the permits for you.
12 in Uganda: the Uganda Wildlife Authority's signed guidelines of July 2024 set 12 for tracking and viewing chimpanzees. UWA's Kibale web page still says 16, so we confirm the age with UWA when we book.
In Nyungwe, Rwanda, it is 15, the park says. Golden monkey tracking in Volcanoes National Park starts at 12.
Tracking gives you up to one hour with a group of chimpanzees used to visitors, starting at 8:00 or 14:00 in Kibale. In Kibale the habituation experience starts at 6:30 and gives you up to four hours, UWA's signed guidelines say, out with the researchers and habituators getting a group used to people, its brochure says.
It costs USD 300 in 2026 and USD 400 from 1 January 2027. In Nyungwe it is a full day with the trackers at Gisovu: USD 200 a person, four people at most, from 15 years old.
Choose tracking to keep the afternoon free; choose habituation for the longer time with them.
One hour once the guide finds them, by UWA's rules and in Nyungwe alike. In Kibale the walk takes two to five hours in all, UWA's brochure says; in Nyungwe anything from an hour to several hours, Visit Rwanda says. On the habituation experience in Kibale you can stay up to four hours.
No one can promise wild animals. UWA's Kibale brochure puts the chance of finding Kanyanchu's chimpanzees at over 90 per cent, and says some of its groups have been watched for over 25 years.
Yes. Our Best of Uganda safari includes a Kibale chimpanzee permit and a Bwindi gorilla permit, and in Rwanda we can add Nyungwe's chimpanzees to a gorilla trek in Volcanoes National Park. Gorilla trekking has its own minimum age of 15 in both countries.
On the Virunga volcanoes. In Volcanoes National Park, Rwanda, tracking costs USD 100 a person from 12 years old, and no more than 16 visitors go to a group, the Rwanda Development Board says.
In Mgahinga, Uganda, it is USD 60 plus USD 40 park entry, or USD 100 plus park entry for a day with the researchers on the habituation experience. Visit Rwanda also lists golden monkeys in Gishwati-Mukura.
The Uganda Wildlife Authority asks you to keep at least 10 metres away, not to use a flash, not to eat, drink or smoke during the tracking, not to copy their calls, and not to go into the forest if you are ill, because chimpanzees can catch human illnesses.
Chimpanzee tracking starts at 12 in Uganda, so younger children see primates on other walks. UWA's tariff lists short guided nature walks for children in Kibale, and Primate Lodge Kibale runs a forest walk for children too young to track, the lodge says. Tell us their ages and we plan the days around them.