Musanze and Murambi Caves for Tourism in Rwanda
Rwanda, the “land of a thousand hills” is among the world’s top tourist destinations with a variety of tourist potentials. Among the most adventurous are the caves, that attract many tourists in the area especially those coming for gorilla trekking safaris.
A cave is a natural underground space large enough for people or wildlife to enter, and visitors find it memorable and adventure experience to move for over a Kilometer through the dark underground. However, for proper movement, torches are used to provide light. While in the cave, expect to encounter, the rare wildlife like bats and some time reptiles but guides are always near to feed you with necessary information and security while on this adventure.
Some of the wonderful caves in the northern province are known as Musanze, about 2km long with many bats. We also have Murambi cave offering fantastic views of different Islands on Lake Kivu. It is a 10 meters long cave and can shelter more than 10 visitors. More are Manjari which is 1.660 m and Nyiragihima in Ruhengeri which 1.116 m situated in the northern region. There are in total 52 surveyed caves in the province with 15.2 km cave passages.
The longest cave of Rwanda is “Ubuvumo Bwibihonga” a multi-level system of parallel lava tubes with 4.530 m length.
Caves exploration is a new tourism potential that must be marketed properly to attract tourists into the country. The country today is famous for mountain gorilla trekking and genocide memorial museums. For instance, Musanze caves exploration can be combined with a 3-day gorilla trekking package to make one’s interesting and amazing. Below is the proposed itinerary in brief combing mountain gorilla trekking in Rwanda with Musanze caves exploration;
Day 1: Kigali city tour
Breakfast at your hotel in Kigali, go for a city tour, Places to visit include Gisozi genocide museum, craft markets, lunch and transfer to Parc National des Volcans.
Day 2: Gorilla trekking adventure
Breakfast at your lodge, followed by an adventurous trek to search for the amazing gentle giants in their natural habitat. Return for lunch, relax at the lodge or take a community walk or Iby’Iwacu cultural village tour, dinner, and overnight.
Day 3: Musanze caves exploration, Departure
Start early with breakfast, take a walk through the dark Musanze caves located near volcanoes National park. Later hit the road back to Kigali where the tour ends.
