Murchison Falls National Park

Overview

Murchison Falls is Uganda's largest national park at around 3,900 square kilometres, and it is built around one extraordinary piece of geography: the entire Victoria Nile, having drained the largest lake in Africa, is squeezed through a gap in the rock just seven metres wide and thrown 43 metres down into the Devil's Cauldron. The noise and the spray are the point, and you can stand directly above it. Below the falls the river widens and slows on its way to Lake Albert, and the three-hour boat trip along that stretch is the classic way to see the park - hippo, enormous crocodiles, elephant and buffalo on the banks, and the shoebill in the Nile delta if you are lucky. North of the river the Buligi grasslands hold lion, elephant, Rothschild's giraffe, hartebeest and oryx. The Kaniyo Pabidi and Budongo forests to the south have habituated chimpanzees and are a good deal cheaper than Kibale.