Bwindi Impenetrable Forest has a new draw for visitors who want their gorilla trek to mean something. The Volcanoes Safaris Partnership Trust has opened the Bwindi Gorilla Conservation Centre at Bwindi Lodge in Uganda, timed to World Gorilla Day and coinciding with the lodge's 25th anniversary.
The centre pulls together the work of three conservation organisations that have operated in the region for years: the Volcanoes Safaris Partnership Trust, Conservation Through Public Health (CTPH), and Gorilla Doctors. CTPH, founded by Dr Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka, focuses on the link between gorilla health, human health and local livelihoods, while Gorilla Doctors has spent four decades providing veterinary care to eastern gorillas across Uganda, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Both will now have a permanent, publicly accessible home where their work is on show.
The site itself has history. In 1999, a ranger named Phenny Gongo, who had habituated the local gorillas for tourism, identified the spot where a simple mobile camp was pitched — roughly where the new centre stands today. Bwindi Lodge grew from that base, built by Volcanoes Safaris as part of founder Praveen Moman's ambition to create what the company calls the Great Apes company of Africa. Volcanoes Safaris was a charter signatory to the 2005 UN Kinshasa Declaration on protecting great apes, and Moman describes the centre as a practical expression of that long-term commitment.
The facility is designed for more than lodge guests. It has dedicated space for researchers, schoolchildren and local community members alongside travellers, and a further area at Bwindi Bar will host training programmes for people from surrounding villages. That community-facing element matters: conservation around Bwindi only works when the people who live alongside the gorillas benefit from their protection.
For travellers, the centre adds real substance to a stay at Bwindi Lodge. Gorilla trekking permits in Uganda are a significant investment and often sell out months ahead, so having an on-site place to understand the veterinary work, disease monitoring and community health programmes behind the gorillas' survival turns a trek into a fuller picture of what your permit actually funds. Dr Sonya Kahlenberg of Gorilla Doctors called the centre a way for visitors and locals alike to engage with the mission, and Kalema-Zikusoka framed it as a permanent space showing how gorilla health and human livelihoods are connected.
If you're planning a gorilla-focused trip to Uganda, it's worth asking about stays at Bwindi Lodge specifically rather than the wider range of accommodation around the park — this centre is only accessible to those based there, and visits can be combined with early-morning treks into the forest. Pair it with Volcanoes Safaris' other lodges near Rwanda's Volcanoes National Park if you want to see both sides of the Virunga massif gorilla population.
Story via Adventure Travel News.
