Kibira National park – Burundi Safari : Self Drive East Africa.

Kibira national park in Burundi is one of the huge and undiscovered rain forests covering 40,000 hectares. Formerly a sacred hunting reserve for the kings of Burundi, today it is habitat to some 98 mammal species, a dozen primates (numerous families of chimpanzees, baboons, red-tailed monkeys, black colobus ), and some 200 species of bird life.

Chimpanzee Tracking
Led by guards of the park, tourists can venture deep into the dark undergrowth to discover the charms of the primeval forest, while soaking in bird songs. It is possible to visit the tourist pygmies’ village of Busekera inside the park and sit beside the Rwegura hydroelectric dam, for a picnic while taking in the magnificent view.

Size of Kibira National Park .

The Kibira National Park is a national park in northwestern Burundi. Overlapping four provinces and covering 400 km², Kibira National Park lies atop the mountains of the Congo-Nile Divide.

Location:

Kibira national park is located in northwestern Burundi and is located south of Rwanda and the national park is an extension of Nyungwe forest national park in Rwanda which is a habitat to some of the habitat threatened chimpanzees.

Things to Do

Still a huge habitat for undiscovered wildlife and birds, here lays a perfect activity to showcase Burundi’s tourism potential and bird watching is extremely fruitful in the forest.

Chimpanzee trekking

Being less popular with tourism clients can trek the chimpanzees in the country’s dense forest cover and also have great opportunities of seeing some other primates like baboons, black and white colobus monkeys, red-tailed monkeys and sometimes duickers are seen.

Primate Walks

You can also take walks to see other monkey species along the forest edge as there are spectacular sighting of monkeys and also photography can take place during the walk, some common species include the L’hoest monkey, black and white colobus monkey.

Forest walks

With the exceptional rivers, walks are really special in the forest and it’s just that feeling once need of true nature and wild sounds in the low land dense forest.

Pygmy visits

Clients can also visit the pygmy villages and share their tradition with the once forest dwellers and they can happily share their past way of living though they have significantly being affected by the increasing development.

Tea plantation walks

Guided walks can be arranged to see the abundant tea fields and also share the experience of tea extraction and how it has affected the likely hood of the people living near the Kibira forest national park

Birding Safaris in Burundi

Planning a Birding safari trip to Burundi to spot the various bird species that are recommended to seen in Kibira National Park once booked through a recommended safari company based in Burundi.  Birding is among the very prominent activity with 200 different bird species and some of the most famously spotted include the great blue turaco, mountain buzzard, white-spotted fluff-tail grey parrot bar-tailed trogon and the black-and-white-squeaked horn bill.

How to Get to Kibira national Park

Kibira national park is accessible by road either from Burundi’s main capital Bujumbura or from Rwanda’s main capital Kigali

  1. From Bujumbura
    The drive from Bujumbura towards northwestern Burundi will take you about 2 hours and you will cover approximately 70 kilometers on pretty accessible road conditions
  2. From Kigali
    The drive from Kigali Rwanda is exceptional and this will take you about 6 hours and you will cover a distance of about 220 kilometers and this will involve crossing the border from Rwanda to Burundi.

Best Time to Visit Kibira National Park.

You want to Visit Kibira National park for Chimpanzee tracking in Burundi, the Best Time to Visit the park is during the short rainy season in the months of September to November and short dry season in the months of December to January. its the alternative destination to visit after Rusizi National Park

Accommodations

Hotel Club Du Lac Tanganyika:

Situated in Bujumbura, Hotel Club Du Lac Tanganyika is a beachfront hotel joined to the airport and close to the Saga beach offering accommodation to all travelers around the world.

This is also close at a distance of 6 mi (10 km) to Bujumbura Central Market and Musee Vivant as well as the U.S Embassy and Prince Louis Rwagasore Stadium in a distance of about 6 mi (10 km).