7 Days Serengeti and Bwindi gorillas
Overview
Experience two of Africa’s most extraordinary wildlife destinations on this 7 Days Serengeti and Bwindi Gorillas Safari. Begin your adventure in Tanzania’s world-famous Serengeti National Park, where endless plains are home to the Big Five and the spectacular Great Migration. Continue to Uganda’s Bwindi Impenetrable National Park for an unforgettable mountain gorilla trekking experience in one of the world’s oldest rainforests.
This cross-border safari combines classic African wildlife viewing with one of the world’s most remarkable primate encounters, offering the perfect blend of adventure, breathtaking landscapes, and unforgettable memories.
Safari Highlights
- Nature walks
- Game drive
- Boat cruise
Detailed Itinerary
Day 1: Arrival in Arusha
Upon arrival at Kilimanjaro International Airport, you will be welcomed by your safari guide and transferred to your hotel in Arusha.
Relax after your journey and receive a briefing about your upcoming safari.
Accommodation Options
Budget: Arusha Planet Lodge
Mid-range: Four Points by Sheraton Arusha
Luxury: Gran Meliá Arusha
Meals: Dinner
Day 2: Arusha to Serengeti National Park
After an early breakfast, depart for Serengeti National Park by road through the Ngorongoro Conservation Area or take an optional scheduled flight.
Arrive in the Serengeti in time for lunch before enjoying an afternoon game drive across the famous plains.
Search for lions, elephants, buffaloes, giraffes, zebras, wildebeests, cheetahs, leopards, and numerous bird species.
Accommodation Options
Budget: Seronera Public Campsite
Mid-range: Serengeti Heritage Camp
Luxury: Serengeti Serena Safari Lodge
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
Day 3: Full Day Safari in Serengeti National Park
Spend the entire day exploring different regions of the Serengeti with packed lunch.
Your guide will take you to the best wildlife viewing areas based on seasonal animal movements. Depending on the time of year, you may witness the Great Migration, while resident wildlife such as lions, leopards, cheetahs, elephants, hyenas, and hippos can be seen throughout the year.
Return to your lodge for dinner and overnight.
Accommodation
As Above
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
Day 4: Flight to Entebbe and Transfer to Bwindi
After breakfast, transfer to the nearest airstrip for your scheduled flight to Entebbe via Kilimanjaro or Nairobi, depending on airline schedules.
Upon arrival in Uganda, meet your guide and either take a domestic flight to Kihihi or Kisoro Airstrip or begin the scenic road transfer to Bwindi Impenetrable National Park.
Arrive at your lodge and relax before your gorilla trekking adventure.
Accommodation Options
Budget: Broadbill Forest Camp
Mid-range: Lake Mulehe Gorilla Lodge
Luxury: Buhoma Lodge
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
Day 5: Gorilla Trekking in Bwindi Impenetrable National Park
After an early breakfast, report to the park headquarters for a briefing by Uganda Wildlife Authority rangers.
Begin your unforgettable mountain gorilla trekking adventure through the dense rainforest. The trek may take anywhere from two to eight hours depending on the location of your assigned gorilla family.
Once you locate the gorillas, spend one magical hour observing their behaviour, watching them feed, play, groom, and interact in their natural habitat.
After the trek, return to your lodge for relaxation.
Accommodation
As Above
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
Day 6: Community Experience and Return to Entebbe
Enjoy a relaxed breakfast before taking part in a cultural experience with the Batwa community or a guided nature walk around Bwindi.
Later, transfer to Kihihi or Kisoro Airstrip for a scheduled domestic flight to Entebbe, or travel by road if preferred.
Check into your hotel for your final overnight stay.
Accommodation Options
Budget: Airport Guesthouse
Mid-range: 2 Friends Beach Hotel
Luxury: Protea Hotel by Marriott Entebbe
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
Day 7: Departure
Enjoy breakfast at your hotel.
Depending on your flight schedule, relax at the hotel or explore Entebbe before transferring to Entebbe International Airport for your onward flight.
Meals: Breakfast
Optional Activities
- Hot air balloon safari over the Serengeti
- Champagne bush breakfast
- Visit to a Maasai village
- Guided wildlife photography safari
- Scenic flight over the Serengeti
- Olduvai Gorge visit
- Batwa cultural experience in Bwindi
- Guided forest nature walk
- Bird watching in Bwindi
- Coffee experience near Bwindi
Best Time to Visit
This safari is available throughout the year. The Serengeti offers outstanding wildlife viewing in every season, with the Great Migration moving through different regions of the ecosystem depending on the month. Bwindi Impenetrable National Park can also be visited year-round, although the drier months of June to August and December to February generally provide more comfortable trekking conditions. Together, these destinations offer one of East Africa’s finest combinations of classic wildlife safaris and unforgettable mountain gorilla encounters.
- Community village visit
- Lake Bunyonyi excursion after gorilla trekking
- Canoeing on Lake Bunyonyi
- Equator stopover during the road transfer
Tour Includes
- Travel in a 4×4 car
- Professional guide
- Park fees
- Accommodation
- Meals
- All Activities In Itinerary
Tour Excludes
- Alcoholic drinks
- Laundry
- Tips
- Shopping
- Insurance
- Anything not included per itinerary
Combining Tanzania’s Plains With Uganda’s Forests
This itinerary pairs two of East Africa’s most iconic experiences: the Serengeti’s open plains and resident wildlife alongside Bwindi’s mountain gorilla trekking, giving travelers both classic savannah scenery and dense montane forest primate encounters within a single focused week.
Because the Serengeti and Bwindi sit in different countries with distinct logistics, this itinerary typically uses a short regional flight to connect the two destinations efficiently, preserving more time for the parks themselves rather than long overland transfers.
Practical Notes
A Uganda e-visa or East Africa Tourist Visa, arranged before travel, is required for most nationalities, along with a yellow fever vaccination certificate if arriving from a country with risk of transmission. Travel insurance covering trekking or wildlife activities and medical evacuation is strongly recommended, and malaria prevention is worth discussing with a travel health clinic ahead of your trip.
US dollars printed after 2009 are widely accepted for park fees, permits and lodge bills, while local currency is more practical for tips and smaller day-to-day purchases. Mobile network coverage is generally reliable at lodges and along main routes but becomes patchy inside the parks themselves.
Because permits and lodge availability are limited, particularly during the June to September and December to February peak seasons, we recommend booking this itinerary well in advance, especially given the multiple destinations and border crossings this trip involves.
Tipping is customary though not compulsory. Rangers and trackers typically receive a tip at the end of any trekking activity, scaled to group size, while your driver-guide, who accompanies you throughout the trip, is usually tipped separately at the end. We’re glad to advise on typical tipping ranges when you book.
A private 4×4 safari vehicle with an experienced English-speaking driver-guide accompanies you throughout this itinerary, handling both park game-viewing tracks and the road transfers and border crossings this trip involves.
Who This Itinerary Suits
This itinerary suits travelers who want both classic Serengeti wildlife viewing and a mountain gorilla encounter within a single, focused week, without the longer time commitment a fuller multi-park circuit in either country would require.
Because this itinerary connects two countries via a regional flight, it works well both as a standalone week-long trip and as the foundation for a longer regional circuit if you have additional time to extend either the Tanzania or Uganda portion.
Gorilla Trekking Sectors in Bwindi
Bwindi Impenetrable Forest is divided into four trekking sectors — Buhoma in the north, Ruhija in the east, and Rushaga and Nkuringo in the south — each with its own habituated gorilla families and its own character. Buhoma offers the gentlest terrain and is the most established sector, with lodges close to the park gate. Rushaga has the highest concentration of habituated families and is also where gorilla habituation experience permits are issued, allowing visitors extended time with a family that is still being acclimatised to human presence. Ruhija sits at higher altitude with cooler mornings, while Nkuringo is known for its steep ridgeline approach and rewarding views over the forest canopy. Your guide assigns you to a specific family the morning of the trek based on fitness level and permit allocation, and treks can last anywhere from 30 minutes to several hours of hiking through dense, humid rainforest before the encounter.
Nairobi City and Wildlife Highlights
Nairobi is one of the few capital cities in the world with a national park inside its boundaries, and a morning game drive in Nairobi National Park, with the city’s skyline visible behind grazing giraffe and rhino, is a genuinely unusual way to begin a Kenya safari. The Sheldrick Wildlife Trust’s Elephant Orphanage, where visitors can watch orphaned elephant calves being cared for and readied for eventual release back into the wild, and the Giraffe Centre, which lets visitors hand-feed endangered Rothschild’s giraffe at eye level, are both popular half-day additions for travellers with time before or after their safari.
Wildlife and the Great Migration in the Serengeti
The Serengeti’s vast, open plains support one of the last great terrestrial wildlife migrations on earth, as roughly two million wildebeest, zebra and gazelle move in a broadly circular pattern through the ecosystem each year, following the rains in search of fresh grass. Depending on the season, this can mean vast herds spread across the southern plains during calving season, dramatic river crossings in the west and north, or smaller, more dispersed groups elsewhere in the park — so the exact experience varies considerably by month. Beyond the migration, the Serengeti’s year-round resident wildlife, including some of Africa’s largest lion prides and healthy cheetah and leopard populations, makes it a rewarding destination regardless of when the herds themselves are present.
Wildlife Density in the Ngorongoro Crater
The Ngorongoro Crater, the world’s largest intact volcanic caldera, contains an estimated 25,000 large mammals within its roughly 260-square-kilometre floor, a natural enclosure formed when a volcano larger than Kilimanjaro collapsed in on itself some two to three million years ago. Because the crater walls largely confine the resident wildlife year-round, sighting rates for lion, elephant, buffalo, hippo and the crater’s small but present population of black rhino are exceptionally high regardless of season, making it one of the most reliable single-day game drives in Africa. The descent into the crater floor along a steep access road, followed by a full day exploring the grassland, swamp and forest habitats within, is typically treated as its own dedicated day on a Tanzania itinerary.
Climbing Routes on Mount Kilimanjaro
Mount Kilimanjaro, Africa’s highest peak at 5,895 metres, can be climbed via several established routes that vary in scenery, traffic and acclimatisation profile. The Marangu route, the only one with hut-based rather than tented accommodation, is the shortest but also has one of the lower summit success rates due to its fast ascent profile; Machame, nicknamed the Whiskey Route, is more scenic and allows better acclimatisation over a longer itinerary; and Lemosho, the longest of the popular routes, offers the most gradual ascent and correspondingly higher success rates. Regardless of route, the climb passes through five distinct ecological zones, from cultivated farmland through rainforest, moorland and alpine desert to the arctic summit zone, a transition unlike almost any other trek in the world.