It is understood that the gorilla habitat experience has become one of the best gorilla experiences because it allows visitors to spend more time with the endangered mountain gorillas. The gorilla habitation experience happens in Uganda, and as of recently, Rwanda has started this great experience.

Although Rwanda has not introduced the gorilla habituation experience, it has about eleven habituated gorilla families that are available for gorilla trekking by visitors. This clearly indicated that Uganda at the moment has the gorilla trekking experience as compared to the gorilla habituation experience.

Gorilla trekking in Rwanda involves tourists, rangers, porters, and trackers who coordinate their efforts to go into the forest and see the gorillas. The process of seeing the gorillas requires you to first search for them, and once you have seen them, you will be able to stay with them for one hour. After this hour, you will return to the gorilla trekking starting point to earn a certificate and then return to the lodge or the next destination of your choice.

As mentioned above, all the people who go for gorilla trekking have different roles that they play to ensure that the visitors get a safe gorilla trekking experience in Rwanda.

The ranger guide during the gorilla trekking experience has the role of ensuring that the visitors are safely guarded and that they follow the observed guidelines during the gorilla trekking process, which is extremely wonderful. The trackers also have a role to play as they ensure that the visitors see the gorillas.

What usually happens is that the trackers will go first into the forest and spot these gorillas, and once they see the gorillas, they will alert the rangers at the park headquarters, who will then follow the forest to see the gorillas. It is for this reason that seeing the gorillas during gorilla trekking in Rwanda is guaranteed at 99%.

For the participants in this great experience, it offers great support for carrying the water and luggage and also offers better safari services, including the cameras, food, and others. The porters help the clients pull and sometimes carry them, just in case of difficulty.

On the other hand, the gorilla habituation process in Uganda has a different story to tell. When we talk of the gorilla habituation experience in Uganda, it involves the client’s participation in the process of preparing the wild mountain gorillas for eventual viewing by visitors.

Here, the visitors are supposed to be 4, and they are accompanied by a combined group of rangers, potters, and trackers. Here, the visitors will spend 4 hours with the gorillas, as compared to the normal gorilla trekking permit.

For the habituation experience to happen, it must involve three stages, and these include the first, which is identifying the wild group that needs to be habituated. This is done by a team of researchers and experts, and once this is identified, there are continuous checks on the identified family, which are done on a daily basis for four weeks for more than two years.

This is done mainly by the researchers to explore the study patterns and the reaction gorilla family. Thereafter, before it is declared and visited by the tourists, there is what is called the mock exercise to ascertain whether the gorilla family habituated is ready.

Once there is successful exposure,  the gorilla family that has been under habituation is given a name and later declared for public viewing, and tourists are now free to come and visit this gorilla family. This is how the gorilla habituation experience happens in Uganda.

Now Where Is The Difference Between Gorilla Trekking In Rwanda And Gorilla Habituation In Uganda

From what we have seen above, it can be seen that gorilla trekking in Rwanda is very easy to do, provided that it is easy to access the gorilla trekking point, and it lasts for one whole day in Uganda. This means that the visitors will have more time and experience with the gorillas in Uganda as compared to gorilla trekking in Rwanda.

Additionally, gorilla tracking in Rwanda requires less physical activity than the habituation process, which is more physically demanding and causes some clients to drop out before finishing the required four hours due to exhaustion. Due to the large gorilla family gathering, clients who enjoy photography will take more pictures during the gorilla tracking experience than during the habituation experience because the gorillas are not present in one location or as a whole family.

In Rwanda, you will spend less time driving to track the gorilla, and for the gorilla habituation experience in Uganda, you will need to drive some distance. In contrast to the habituation process in Uganda, which only involves one family, gorilla tracking in Rwanda gives clients the opportunity to select which gorilla group to track.

While Uganda’s habituation process for gorillas involves driving on rough roads, Rwanda has improved its road infrastructure, from the hotels of residence to the briefing points and start-off points.

We can say that the gorilla trekking and gorilla habituation experiences offer much more for the visitors to enjoy the safari experience, and thus, it is best that you choose which destination or country to visit and the experience, and we shall guide you accordingly.