Ask a driver-guide what “doing Queen Elizabeth” actually means and you’ll usually get two different answers depending on which half of the park they mean. The northern sector around Mweya and the Kazinga Channel is the park most people picture: boat cruises thick with hippos, open crater lakes, a steady stream of vehicles working the same well-graded tracks. The Ishasha sector, tucked into the park’s remote southern tip against the DRC border, is a different experience almost entirely — fewer vehicles, wilder-feeling tracks, and a landscape built around towering fig trees rather than open grassland. If the north is Queen Elizabeth’s postcard, Ishasha is its backcountry.
Key Highlights
- Queen Elizabeth National Park’s remote southern sector, bordering the Democratic Republic of Congo along the Ishasha River
- Famous for tree-climbing lions resting in sycamore fig and acacia trees, one of only two known populations of this behaviour in Africa
- A natural overnight stop between Bwindi Impenetrable Forest and the rest of Queen Elizabeth, roughly 2-3 hours’ drive from Bwindi
- Hippo pools along the Ntungwe River, reachable on guided nature walks
- Noticeably lower vehicle density than the Mweya/Kazinga Channel side of the park
- Landscape dominated by sycamore fig, acacia and candelabra trees rather than open savanna grassland
Why Ishasha Feels Like a Different Park
Queen Elizabeth National Park is large enough, and its two main sectors distant enough from each other, that a visitor moving between them can genuinely feel like they’ve left one park and entered another. The northern circuit around Mweya sits close to the park’s main gates, its lodges, and the Kazinga Channel boat launch, which concentrates most visitor traffic into a relatively compact, well-serviced area. Ishasha sits roughly two to three hours further south, closer to Bwindi than to Mweya, and the extra distance alone filters out a large share of day-tripping traffic.
A Border Location That Shapes the Landscape
The Ishasha River itself forms part of the international border with the Democratic Republic of Congo, running along the sector’s western edge before draining into the marshlands on the shore of Lake Edward. That border-country setting, combined with the sector’s woodland-savanna vegetation of towering sycamore figs, acacia and scattered candelabra trees, gives Ishasha a visibly different character from the open plains further north — denser cover, more shade, and a landscape that rewards slower, more deliberate game viewing over the northern sector’s wide-open sightlines.
The Tree-Climbing Lions
Ishasha’s signature draw is its population of tree-climbing lions, one of only two documented lion populations in Africa known to regularly rest in trees rather than on the ground — the other being in southern Tanzania’s Lake Manyara National Park. An estimated 20 to 35 lions live across the sector, and sightings typically involve scanning the broad, low branches of the sector’s sycamore fig trees, their clear favourite, though acacias get used too.
Why They Climb
The leading explanation ties the behaviour to relief from ground-level heat and biting insects during the dry season, combined with a genuine tactical advantage: from a fig tree’s branches, a resting lion gets an elevated, largely undisturbed vantage point over grazing Uganda kob and other prey moving through the grassland below. For the fuller detail on this behaviour and how it compares to Lake Manyara’s tree-climbing lions, our dedicated piece on Uganda’s tree-climbing lions goes deeper into the science; this guide is about the wider sector the lions call home.
Beyond the Lions: What Else Ishasha Offers
Treating Ishasha as a single-species detour undersells it. Game drives here also turn up healthy numbers of Uganda kob, topi, buffalo and elephant moving through the sector’s woodland-grassland mosaic, and the birding is strong given the mix of riverine, woodland and grassland habitat packed into a relatively compact area.
Birdlife Along the River and Woodland Edge
The combination of riverine forest along the Ishasha River, open grassland and denser fig-and-acacia woodland gives the sector a genuinely varied bird list for its size, with raptors particularly well represented given the open hunting ground the grassland provides. Serious birders visiting Ishasha specifically for its list tend to pair a game drive with an early-morning walk near the river itself, where the denser cover holds a different set of species than the more visible grassland birds spotted from a vehicle.
The Ishasha Hippo Pools
Away from the vehicle tracks, the Uganda Wildlife Authority has opened guided nature-walk trails to two hippo pools along the Ntungwe River, giving visitors a rare on-foot alternative to game-drive viewing in a park otherwise dominated by vehicle-based activity. It’s a different pace and perspective entirely, and one of the more distinctive add-on activities available anywhere in Queen Elizabeth.
Edward Flats and the Off-Circuit Tracks
For travellers wanting to push further from the already-quiet main Ishasha circuit, the Edward Flats area offers some of the remotest game tracks in this part of the park, though a Uganda Wildlife Authority ranger is required to explore this zone — a reflection of both how little-visited it is and how easy it would be to lose your bearings without local knowledge.
Planning Your Visit
Getting There and Where to Stay
Most visitors reach Ishasha either from Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, a drive of roughly two to three hours, or from the Mweya side of Queen Elizabeth further north, making it a natural link between the two. Ishasha Wilderness Camp sits inside the sector on the Ntungwe River and functions as the area’s most established base, positioned almost exactly midway between Mweya and Bwindi — a genuinely convenient overnight stop for travellers connecting the two rather than a detour that adds significant extra driving. A handful of smaller camps and lodges operate around the sector’s edges as well, generally simpler and more budget-oriented than the lodges clustered around Mweya, which suits Ishasha’s lower-key, fewer-crowds character.
Combining Ishasha With a Longer Loop
Because of its position, Ishasha rarely functions as a standalone destination on its own itinerary. Most travellers build it in as a one- or two-night stop inside a longer loop that already includes Bwindi gorilla trekking and time in Queen Elizabeth’s northern sector, using the drive south from Mweya or north from Bwindi as productive game-drive time rather than dead travel hours — the Ishasha road itself often turns up wildlife sightings before you’ve even reached the formal game tracks.
Best Time for Lion Sightings
Tree-climbing behaviour is most reliably observed during the dry seasons, when heat and biting insects at ground level give the lions the strongest incentive to climb, though sightings happen year-round and depend heavily on which trees the resident pride is favouring at the time. No guide can promise a sighting on any given drive, and treating Ishasha purely as a lions-in-trees checklist item risks missing the rest of what the sector offers if the pride happens to be on the ground that day.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Ishasha part of Queen Elizabeth National Park, or a separate park?
It’s a sector within Queen Elizabeth National Park itself, not a separate protected area, though its remoteness and distinct landscape make it feel like one. Park entry rules and fees apply the same as elsewhere in Queen Elizabeth, and a standard Queen Elizabeth entry ticket covers access to Ishasha without any separate permit or additional fee structure.
Can I be guaranteed to see the tree-climbing lions?
No sighting on safari is ever guaranteed, and Ishasha’s lions are no exception — they move between trees and the ground depending on heat, insects and hunting opportunity. Dry-season visits and an early-morning or late-afternoon drive generally improve the odds, and an experienced guide who knows which fig trees the resident pride has favoured recently will typically outperform a driver working the sector for the first time, which is worth asking about when booking a stay here.
How does Ishasha compare to the northern Mweya sector for a first-time visitor?
Mweya offers a wider range of activities in a smaller area, including the Kazinga Channel boat cruise, and suits visitors who want an efficient, well-serviced circuit. Ishasha rewards visitors with more time and an appetite for a quieter, more remote experience, and works particularly well as a stop between Bwindi and the rest of the park rather than a standalone destination.
Do I need extra permits to visit the Edward Flats area?
You need a Uganda Wildlife Authority ranger to accompany any exploration of Edward Flats specifically, arranged through the park office or your lodge, given how remote and lightly tracked this part of the sector is.
Recommended Safaris
Ishasha’s location makes it a natural link between gorilla trekking and the rest of Queen Elizabeth National Park. Our Bwindi Impenetrable National Park and Queen Elizabeth National Park pages both cover the parks this sector connects, and our 8-day Uganda Primates & Wildlife Group Safari is built around exactly this kind of primate-and-savanna combination. For more on the sector’s headline wildlife draw, see our piece on Uganda’s tree-climbing lions. Want Ishasha built into your own route between Bwindi and the rest of Queen Elizabeth? Reach our team through our Book Now page and we’ll plan it around your dates.
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