The Minimum Age for Gorilla Trekking in Uganda |The #1 Guide
What is the minimum age for gorilla trekking in Uganda?
Gorilla trekking is the most adventurous thing to do during a safari to the Pearl of Africa. Mountain gorillas exist in Uganda’s Bwindi Impenetrable National Park, located in the southwestern part of the country. The conservation area hosts half of the world’s remaining gorilla population. It was gazetted in 1991 to protect the critically endangered species of the mountain gorillas, and by 1994,was declared a UNESCO World HeritageSite.Bwindi is managed under the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA), that set all the rules and regulations governing the gorilla experience.
Gorilla trekking offers an opportunity for guests to meet mountain gorillas within their natural habitats; in Bwindi, they are within the 4 sectors of Buhoma, Ruhija, Nkuringo, and Rushaga. Different gorilla families can be spotted in each of the sectors, living in families of up to 20 members led by a male silverback.Gorilla tracking starts at 8:00 am with a briefing from a ranger. Each of the gorilla families is allocated to a maximum of 8 people. It takes 2-8 hours to do the activity.
Most travelers, especially those with families, wonder what the minimum age for gorilla trekking in Uganda is. The minimum age for tracking gorillas is 15 years old. The age is set to this because most of the young travelers are considered unable to deal with the wilderness and gorilla character. The primates are very gentle and calm but can also be very aggressive when they feel threatened. Children are capable of screaming or running upon an encounter with large gorilla family members.
They are most likely to get carried away and forget the gorilla rules and regulations. These include not eating near the gorillas, littering in the park, or keeping a 7-meter distance rule. Younger travelers find this overwhelming and can easily not pay attention to any of these details.
Gorilla trekking is a strenuous and tedious activity that involves walking up and down of hills and valleys within the forest, it takes 2-8 hours or sometimes the whole day doing the activity which requires for one to be mentally prepared to participate or even exercised to meet the demand, in most cases younger travelers accompany parents on safari and may not be fully mentally ready or even excited for the experience which makes it very difficult for them.
Mountain gorillas share up to 96% of human DNA and can easily contract diseases from visitors or vice versa. Younger children are prone to communicable diseases like the flu and cough; keeping a mask on for a long time for kids may be impossible. Hence, to protect both the children and the gorillas, the age limit is a requirement.
When tracking Mountain gorillas, there is a need to be quiet for a peaceful moment; if a silverback stages a performance, children can hardly stay quiet. There are cases where the primates come very close to the kids; it absolutely requires a high level of emotional maturity to deal with this kind of situation.
Uganda is different compared to Rwanda in terms of flexibility, there are cases where the child is like 14 years of age, able bodied and can participate in the activity, it is on rare occasions that these are allowed to do the tracking provided they meet a certain criteria, the child’s 15th birthday aught to be within same year as the tracking time, he or she must be ohysically strong, the parents must sign a legal document that allows and assumes all responsibility if their child. If the child is 13 and below, it is strictly NO gorilla trekking for them.