Twenty Kilometres From the Gate
Masindi is the last town before Murchison Falls, and the forest, the birds, the rhinos and the lake are all within a morning of the veranda. Some of what follows we run ourselves. Some we will quote for you. The rest we will simply tell you how to reach, honestly, including the things we do not sell.
Booked Through Reception
Tell reception and it is organised: guide, timing and the early breakfast or packed meal that goes with it. Please give us at least four days, and two weeks if you can.
A private, community-guided tracking morning on family land bordering Budongo Forest, led by our own community guide. No Uganda Wildlife Authority permit and no park entry fee are needed, and there is no permit scarcity and no advance-payment deadline. Two to three hours, twenty minutes from the hotel. It is a different thing from official tracking inside the Forest Reserve, where children under fifteen are not admitted - if that is what you want instead, we will help you arrange it.
A guided walk through the hotel - Hemingway’s room, and the rooms named for Katharine Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart - then the Baker Trail where it crosses our ground, and the historical walk through Masindi town: the early explorers, the railway years and Bunyoro history. Three to four hours, on foot, starting at the veranda.
Traditional dancers arranged for groups in the hotel gardens. Worth planning into a programme in advance rather than asking on the night.
Airport transfers, vehicle hire, local transfers, and logistical support along the safari routes. Tell us where you need to be and we will quote it.
The Royal Mile
Rated the finest birding site in Uganda, about forty kilometres out on the Masindi to Butiaba road at Busingiro, in Budongo Forest. Great blue turaco, chocolate-backed kingfisher, yellow-footed flycatcher and forest hornbills, on a three-hour guided walk or a full day. The forest activity fee is set by Budongo, not by us, so we quote it rather than list it: send how many of you there are, your nationalities and how many vehicles are needed, and we will arrange the booking, the guide and the transport and come back with a figure rather than a range.
Within Reach of the Gate
We do not sell these and we take nothing from them. We will tell you what they cost in time, when to leave, and whether the road is any good that week. Distances are by road from our gate.
The Kichumbanyobo gate is half an hour away. Game drives on the northern bank, the launch to the foot of the falls, and the walk to the top. Park entry and activities are booked with the Uganda Wildlife Authority. Leave before dawn and we will have breakfast packed.
The only place in Uganda with wild southern white rhino. Tracking is on foot with a ranger and takes a couple of hours. Booked directly with the sanctuary.
The escarpment road drops to the lake and the fishing landing at Butiaba, where Baker launched in the 1860s and where the Rift is at its most obvious. A long half day.
A short walk or a five-minute drive from the gate, and the easiest birding of the lot. Best in the first hour after sunrise.
The Half Past Five Tour
A free historical tour of the hotel at 17:30, for guests staying with us. It takes in the 1923 wing, the rooms named for the people who slept in them, and the ground the Baker Trail crosses. Book it at reception when you arrive rather than on the day, so the guide is expecting you.
Give Us Four Days
Anything we arrange for you needs at least four days notice, and two weeks is better. Guides and vehicles in Masindi are not held on standby, and the chimpanzee groups are small. Tell us at the time of booking rather than at check-in and it will be waiting for you.
If a vehicle breaks down, an itinerary falls apart or something medical happens on the road, come to reception. We are the hub on this stretch and we will help where we can, though we cannot promise what other people are able to provide.
Ask Reception
Write to reservations@masindihotel.com or message +256 772 420 130. If you are bringing a group, everything on this page can be built into one quotation with your rooms and meals.
Groups and conferencesGetting here