Uninhabited for decades, Rubundo Island National park has until recently been almost untouched by tourism. It has, though, become a sanctuary for threatened wildlife and has seen many species introduced over the years. With the opening of Rubondo Island Camp in 2013, the island has now become a wild safari destination particularly popular among game fishing and bird watching enthusiasts.

Until the middle of the 20th century, Rubondo was home to a community of people whose livelihood was dependent on fishing. This all changed in 1965 when around 400 inhabitants were relocated and the Rubondo Game Reserve was formed.

Between 1966 and 1969 the Frankfurt Zoological Society introduced 16 captive-born chimpanzees to the island. The animals had no rehabilitation or pre-release training. The chimpanzees were all wild-born and purportedly of West African descent, although there are no records of specific country of origin for the majority of released individuals but the founder chimpanzees had spent varying periods, from 3.5 months to 9 years, in captivity in European zoos or circuses before their release. The chimpanzees after one year were able to find and eat wild foods and construct nests for sleeping, and have now reverted to an unhabituated state characteristic of wild chimpanzees. From 16 founders the population has now grown to around 40 individuals

Following on from this success, several other mammal species were introduced to the island, including elephants, giraffe, white rhinos and the rare suni antelope. In 2000, 37 grey parrots that were victims of illegal trade were rescued and released on Rubondo Island National Park. The parrots rapidly took to their island home and they can be now found all over Rubondo.

Another great attraction to Rubundo Island National Park is its surroundings. In the 1950s, a proposal to increase fish catches in the lake by introducing the Nile perch (mbutta or Sangara) was adamantly opposed by scientists who feared that the lack of a natural predator for the non-native species would result in the imminent destruction of the lake’s bountiful ecosystem. They were right, and along with the consequences of overfishing as well as pollution caused by rapid human expansion around the shores, Lake Victoria has suffered.

That said, Lake Victoria itself is impressively the largest lake on the continent, the world’s second-largest freshwater lake, and the world’s largest tropical lake. It is so large it extends significantly into three separate African countries: Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya. A rim of jungle highlands rises all around the immense lake, embracing the water in a forested bowl that’s dotted along its shoreline with small, busy towns. Visitors enjoy excellent natural sites with a surprising lack of tourist traffic.

Rubundo is set in this amazing scene where, despite the continued decline of Lake Victoria’s eco-system, it has managed to maintain and grow a thriving wildlife eco-system that is up there with any of Tanzania’s safaris.