Little-Known Hiking Overnights in Southwestern Uganda
I am Levi Ayebare, 28, and I have been working with Gorilla Highlands Experts on the Ugandan side of the region as a tecnico. This…
Lake Bunyonyi /Uganda/
altitude: 1,962 m/6,437 ft
max length – width: 25 km/16 mi – 7 km/4 mi
depth: 44 m/144 ft
Lake Bunyonyi, located close to the town of Kabale in southwestern Uganda, was formed 10,000 years ago when a river was dammed by lava. This place of many little birds is one of the safest lakes in Africa and has a great number of small islands: 29.
Until the 1940s, unmarried pregnant women were left at Akampene (Punishment Island) to starve to death or drown trying to swim to the shore — they were often saved by poor men or slaves who could not afford the regular bride price. That practice, common in the Gorilla Highlands region, stopped after a missionary doctor Dr. Leonard Sharp founded a leprosy hospital on Bwama Island. Once anti-leprosy drugs were introduced in the 1980s, it became a boarding secondary school.
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