Rwenzori Mountains

The highest point in Africa at 5,895m and the tallest free-standing mountain on earth — a walkable summit that needs no technical climbing, only time, patience and respect for the altitude. The Machame and Lemosho routes give the best acclimatisation and the best scenery, climbing through rainforest, moorland and alpine desert to the Roof of Africa. Summit night starts around midnight and finishes on the crater rim at sunrise.

Uganda's largest and oldest park, split by the Victoria Nile as it forces itself through a seven-metre gorge and detonates into the Rift Valley below. Game drives on the northern bank turn up elephant, giraffe, buffalo and lion across open savanna; the afternoon launch cruise runs to the foot of the falls past hippo pods and basking crocodile. The Delta stretch is one of the last reliable places on earth to see the shoebill.

Uganda's most popular savanna reserve sits beneath the Rwenzori range between lakes George and Edward. The Kazinga Channel cruise delivers density you rarely see anywhere else — elephant, buffalo and hippo along a single stretch of shoreline. In the southern Ishasha sector the lions climb fig trees and drape themselves across the branches through the heat of the day, a behaviour recorded in only a handful of places worldwide.