Experiential tourism in Uganda
Are you looking for an exciting research experience from close encounter with wildlife, then experiential tourism in Uganda can offer you that. Experiential tourism is a unique experience that allows visitors to actively participate in monitoring some mammals that fills the park and exotic birds using some of the complex scientific locator devices. It is sometimes referred to as research tourism where one yearning to get closer to wild African Fauna is rewarded with this adventurous trip. You get a chance to learn habituation calls as well as monitoring weather, surroundings and behaviors. The results are added to researchers’ databases contributing valuable information to the overall understanding of wildlife ecology and helping to conserve this wonderful ecosystem. Experiential tourism is greatly done in Queen Elizabeth National Park as it has high concentration of wildlife both animals and birds. There are various exciting experiential tourism activities that one interested may engage in such as: Lion Tracking, Mongoose Tracking, Hippo Census (seasonal), and bird counts among others. This activity allows you to have a close encounter with the wild fauna in Africa thus ensuring great experience. Different sections in the Park offer great opportunity of having efficient experiential tourism from learning and tracking animals as well as watching different bird species.
The banded Mongoose project is a good place for Mongoose tracking based on and around Mweya Peninsula in Queen Elizabeth National Park in western Uganda. This Peninsula has over 400 banded mongooses that you can find in twelve social groups. The banded mongooses are small mammals with gigantic appetites and complex social and communication systems which fascinate wildlife researchers. Participates get the opportunity of accompanying the researchers through areas of the park where you can record the behaviors of these highly social creatures. While there, you learn to identify individuals, register their weight, record weather, surroundings and location as well as monitor the mongooses’ behavior which allows you to enjoy a thrilling experience. The session only lasts for 1-3 hours where tracking is possible at 7am or 5pm.
Lion experiential tourism is one of the Uganda’s most thrilling experiences and effective lion tracking research experience is done in the morning or late afternoon. Usually, the pride of lions to be tracked have a lion with a radio collar attached, and through a complex designed radio antennae, you are 100% sure of seeing the lions. With researchers you get a chance to learn the habits of Lions in Queen Elizabeth Park that normally move in groups of 3- 25 individuals in a pride. During the tracking, the number of lions being tracked can grow without warning when an individual or multiple lions join the initial group. So, you have to keep on noticing the number of lions being tracked, nocturnal vocalizations (roars) and their intensity including hyena calls and any distress calls from prey. Researchers tells you the various tricks used in tracking lions such as: that when lions move through tall grass, they create a very slight trail of bent grass, lions sent mark their territory by scrapping the ground with their hind feet. Drying, sticky urine sprayed on a prominent bush is also a common sign left by lions.
You also get additional bonus in the park by viewing other wildlife species as Queen Elizabeth National Park has diverse ecosystems of the park that include sprawling savanna, shady, humid forests, sparkling lakes and fertile wetlands which acts as habitats for various wildlife species. Really get an exceptional experience from Queen Elizabeth National Park from the varied diversity of flora, fauna and ecosystem.