About Lodges in Uganda National Parks

National Park Lodges, accommodation in National parks, where to stay near Bwindi impenetrable National Park, where to stay in Queen Elizabeth National Park, Where to stay in Murchison Falls National Park.

National Park Lodging and accommodation is something everyone has to consider and gives it the first priority before he/she travels to any destination in the whole world. Uganda offers a broad range of accommodation options starting from camping, moderate and upmarket/luxury lodges/accommodation facilities. Most of the National Park lodges in and out of the  Parks are privately owned by the local individuals and some foreigners and a group of local tour operators. These lodges offer a range of services from transfers, bedding as per the booking on either bed and breakfast, half board or full board, Meals for walk-ins, some activities such as walks around communities, and laundry. Some of the lodges in and out of the National Parks have grass thatched tents, Grass thatched cottages, built cottages, and rooms that provide accommodation in various room types like Single, Double, triple, and family houses. Some of the lodges in reference to the above categorize their rooms with different attractive terms depending on what services are available in the room, such terms include superior, standard, executive, suites, and others use animals and birds names to differentiate the various rooms. The rooms are always en-suite with flushing toilets and bath-room inside though others are eco-lodges with eco-toilets.

Location of the National Park Lodges

As stated above that most of the lodges are privately owned by local individuals and tour operators, many are situated outside the National park’s boundaries because the land here belongs to locals whereby they can easily own private land titles than encroaching on the National Parkland which belongs to the Government. Some other lodges share boundaries with the National Parks thus giving them an opportunity to access the National parks and activities easily and on time. Other accommodation facilities are found inside the National Parks but these are mainly government facilities like the Uganda Wildlife Banda’s and others have acceptance from the Government to run the facilities on behalf of the Authority.

The location of the lodge matters a lot when it comes to the scheduled activities in the National Parks for incidence boat cruises where you have to be at the pier at a specific time of the day depending on which boat you are booked on. Therefore Great adventures Uganda would advise any potential visitor to opt for a lodge that is within or on the boundaries of the National Park, to curb the inconveniences that might be caused because of punctuality.

Social Amenities

Apart from a few,  National Parks in Uganda are in remote areas, which means that access to hydroelectricity is kind of hindered but the presence of solar power and generators has helped a lot when it comes to power at the lodges. In most lodges, the power is turned off completely during the day to enable them to charge the solar batteries and switch on power later in the evening at around 6: 00 pm such that you are assured of the lights throughout the night. For those who use generators, it does not run throughout the night, it is a switch of at 11:00 pm and provides flashlights in the rooms for your lighting, the generator is turned on in the morning at 5:00 am to enable you to do the rest of your personal preparations.

Please Note; sometimes female visitors do travel with hair driers, but some of the national park lodges do not allow using the driers because of the issues of power but national park lodges that have nice generators and hydroelectric power do allow the use of hair dries in recommendable areas.

Charging points

Since some of these national park lodges use solar power and generators in most cases they do not have charging points in the rooms. They always have an arrangement whereby they set a charging point where everyone charges his or her gadgets once power is switched on. These charging points are always set up in the restaurant, at the reception, or another accessible public point.

Please note that here in Uganda we mainly use three-pin plugs so carry one with you so that you use it here or you can always tell your guide to find you one when you arrive.

Internet connection

Most national park lodges have got Wi-Fi and since some of them are located in higher altitudes they find a challenge of a better strength of their Internet connection which makes it unreliable. What happens we do advise that you get a local sim card and load mobile data which is somehow reliable at most times. We also sometimes load data on your guide’s phone and he tethers you so that you have internet even in the vehicle.

Laundry

National Park lodges and hotels offer laundry services once you need them and they always put a basket or a bucket where you put the laundry you need to clean. There is also a form you fill mentioning or listing your laundry staff one by one. Some of the lodges use washing machines and some do the laundry manually and these are always the room attendants in a particular lodge. Sometimes lodges that do laundry manually and they located in higher altitudes for example in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest National Park have a challenge of the weather condition and this sometimes makes it hard for the laundry to get dry in time so you need to be careful when doing your laundry.

Roads that link to the National park lodges

The roads to National park lodges are feeder and rough roads, in this case, they are bumpy and we do have challenges most especially in the rainy seasons. They are always slippery and sometimes impassable. For those in the Mountains like those roads going to Bwindi Impenetrable Forest National Park are sometimes gets landslides and also washed away by the rains and some small rivers tend to flood which make it a big challenge in the rain season. In the dry season, the roads are passable only that the dust is always too much. We at Great Adventures Uganda Limited use 4*4 safari vehicles so that we over go such a situation in case we encounter them at any time.

How to Reserve the National Park  lodges

Great Adventures Uganda limited is the best answer to the above question, as ground handlers, we have mutual understandings with almost all the lodges in each National Park and we can have you reserved in a lodge of your choice or we recommend a lodge basing on the level of services provided by a particular lodge and at a reasonable price. If you would like to enjoy the feel and nature of Uganda, you can contact any of our safari consultants in the office at info@waveexpeditions.ug for more information and inquiries.