Traveling in East Africa

Recommendations and instructions from a volunteer (accurate as of June 2013)

There are good resources on traveling in East Africa (notably Lonely Planet, though it frequently is incorrect), so I thought I would compile some information on some the places I traveled. I would recommend using these recommendations alongside the Lonely Planet. This is current as of now (unless things have changed since I have been there). You are welcome to email (arolnick @ gmail.com – no spaces) with questions that I will answer as best as I can. In some areas I have not provided much detail because I am not trying to write a guidebook here, just making some recommendations and offering general advice.

1) Travel from Tanzania to Rwanda. There are a few options for this. From Dar you can take a TAQWA bus all the way to Kigali. This is not recommended, but is very cheap (about 60,000 shillings). Buy a bus ticket a couple days in advance. The bus will drive from Dar to Kahama where it will overnight (arriving sometime between 9pm and 2am), and then continue on the next morning. You will probably arrive in the late afternoon on the following day. This is not pleasant, but doable. Alternatively you can take the TAQWA bus to Bujumbura, but ask to get off at Benako. From Mwanza you can take a bus to Ngara for 20,000 shillings (but also ask to stop at Benako). The best company is Nyuhunge, but only by a little. Most of the busses that run from Mwanza to Benako or Ngara are very old and in bad shape. This is about an eight hour ride. From Benako you can take a shared taxi (3000 shillings) to the border, or, if you’re feeling adventurous, a motorcycle should take you for 10,000 shillings (8,000 if you’re lucky). Tanzania immigration is on your right, around where all the trucks begin lining up. Then, you can walk across the border, over Rusumo falls, and Rwanda immigration will be on your right. Walk further and there will be busses waiting. Most of the busses on the Rwanda side are good and will take you to Kigali for 3,000 francs. To go from Kigali to Tanzania, you basicially do the same in reverse. If you want to travel to Mwanza, you’ll have to spend the night in Ngara, which means crossing the border, and taking a taxi to Benako and then to Ngara. Or, you can take a motorcycle for about 14,000 shillings, including the cost of taking the ferry over the back (and more direct) road. There are some decent guesthouses in Ngara, including Lavender Lodge, and KGB. Both are 10-15k a night. You can book a bus to Mwanza in the bus stand, again Nyuhunge is recommended, but the others will (probably) get you there.

2) Staying in Kigali, and things to do. I recommend Hotel Isimbi, because it has fast wireless, a good staff, and during the week a nice lunch buffet. I only ever stayed there: the price is great in a double. It is centrally located near Simba and Nakumat, and near a number of good restaurants, including specifically Khana Kanaza (expensive, but out of this world Indian), Carnation Tea house (great lunch buffet), Heaven (expensive, but good American/Continental food), Little Vegas (burgers, right across the street from Isimbi). Also I recommend Meze Fresh (Mexican!), and Mr Chips (get the pulled pork), though these are both a motorcycle ride away). You should go to the Genocide Memorial, though the genocide is so current that the memorial’s take is a little a-historical. Also worth seeing are the two sites recommended in Lonely Planet that are a bus ride outside of the city.

Outside of Kigali: Musanze is about an hour or two north of Kigali and is a cool town. There are plenty of good places to stay. If you can book gorillas independently through the RDB, all you need is a driver to take you to the ranger station, then onto where you start the gorilla trek, and then back to Musanze when you are finished. This is a cheaper way to do it. Even cheaper, it is probably possible to find others tracking gorillas the same day as you and to share their car. That does present a slight risk as you do need to be at the Ranger station early, but it would save you money on paying a driver. I also climbed Mount Karisimbi, which you should email me about if you’re interested in doing and have some questions.

I also traveled from Gisenyi to Kibuye (stay in Home St Jean), but didn’t really do anything interesting in either place. Kibuye is much cooler than Gisenyi, but the road from Gisenyi to Kibuye is pretty beautiful. Email me if you’re considering doing this, because I have some tips about this journey.

3) Staying in Uganda and things to do. Kampala is about a 10 hour bus ride from Kigali, and I recommend Jaguar Coach, which seems to have nice busses. I stayed at Backpackers in Kampala, which was pretty cool. I was only there for a few days, but there a lot of good places to eat in Kampala, so check those out. In Uganda I rafted the headwaters of the Nile through Adrift, but I have a bunch of friends who used different companies and enjoyed them as well. Red Chili is also another backpackers place in Kampala. Both these places have boards with listings for all kinds of cool stuff to do in the area – believe me, there’s a lot!

4) Staying in Dar and things to do. I recommend staying in the Econolodge, or the YMCA. Econolodge is really close to a great outdoor dinner restaurant called Mamboz, and is also a short walk to the Zanzibar ferry, and a longer one to the short ferry that takes you to Kigamboni. There’s not a lot to do in Dar, other than the go to the beaches south of the city for the day. Take the Kigamboni ferry, and hop on a dala, motocycle, or bajaji. Kipipeo Beach is very nice. A bajaji should be about 4-5k shillings to that beach. The peninsula north of the city center has a lot of nice restaurants.

Anyway, that’s it for now. Maybe I will update this in the future. Or you will email me (arolnick @ gmail.com – no spaces) with questions, because travel writing is not my thing, but I wanted to record some useful information for future travelers. Mostly I started off strong, and proceeded to get bored. And didn’t even cover Zanzibar. Manch Lodge (where I am staying as this is posted) has decent rooms, and decent wireless internet, so thank them for this post.