History of Bwindi

Bwindi Impenetrable National Park lies in south western Uganda on the edge of the Rift Valley. Before getting a National park status, two blocks of the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest were designated as Crown Forest Reserves in 1932 and stretched on an area of about 298Km². Later in 1964, it was turned into an animal sanctuary in order to protect the mountain gorillas.

In 1991, the Impenetrable Central Forest Reserve, along with the Mgahinga Gorilla Reserve and the Rwenzori Mountains Reserve, were designated as a national park and named it the Bwindi Impenetrable National Park.

in 1993 due to the existence of almost half of the world’s mountain gorillas; the parks management, the Uganda National Parks which later turned into Uganda Wildlife Authority bought a piece of land from the Batwa people-first keepers of Bwindi forest that stretched a further 4Km² and was incorporated to the park. Its Uganda’s oldest and most biologically diverse rainforests, which dates back over 25,000 years and contains almost 400 species of plants.

Locals around Bwindi National forest call it “Mubwindi bwa nyinamuraki” .The forest has a swamp in the southern sector and one time a family wanted to cross the  swamp but it seemed to be impenetratable because of the thick vegetation. Ugandans believe forest heads are spirits and this family asked permission from the spirits to cross peacefully.

Bwindi was gazetted as a National Park in 1991 and declared a UNESCO Natural World Heritage Site in 1994.