Three days in Kampala: seven green hills, and a king who still lives on one

Two nights in the Ugandan capital, with the royal tombs at Kasubi, the minaret above Old Kampala, the Kabaka's palace on Mengo Hill and an evening of drumming at Ndere.

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Length
3 days, 2 nights
Where you stay
Kampala
Places
7 across 3 days
OpenFreeMap © OpenMapTiles Data from OpenStreetMap

Kampala was the seat of the Kabaka of Buganda long before it was anybody's capital. The British built their fort on one hill in 1890, the missionaries took two more for their cathedrals, the Muslim community another, and the kingdom kept its palace and its royal tombs on the rest. The city calls itself the city of seven hills and long ago spilled over about twenty, but the original seven still explain why nothing here is on the same level as anything else and why every view involves looking down at red roofs and up at somebody else's church.

The kingdom is the thing that makes Kampala different from other East African capitals. Buganda was a centralised monarchy with a court, a bureaucracy and an army when the first Europeans arrived. It was abolished in 1967, after Milton Obote's troops stormed the palace and the Kabaka fled to London, and restored in 1993 as a cultural institution without political power. A king lives on Mengo Hill today, his ancestors are buried under a giant thatched dome at Kasubi, and both places are open to visitors.

Three days covers the city comfortably. An afternoon in the centre and up the minaret for the view, a full day on the royal hills ending with Uganda's best dance troupe, and a morning in the museum before the drive to Entebbe. Everything else Uganda is famous for is somewhere else, and this is where you fly into to get there.

Highlights

  • Four kabakas of Buganda buried at Kasubi under a dome of reeds and spear grass
  • The climb up the National Mosque minaret, which puts the whole of Kampala below you
  • The royal compound at Mengo, and the underground cells Idi Amin's men used behind it
  • The Ndere Troupe playing and dancing their way around Uganda in a single evening

Where to stay

Kampala, two nights

The geography is the key to the city. Nakasero Hill holds the business district, the government and the good hotels, with the market spilling down its southern side into the crowded commercial streets around Kampala Road. Old Kampala, the next hill west, is where the British built their fort and where the enormous National Mosque now stands. Beyond that are Mengo, with the palace, Namirembe with the Anglican cathedral, Rubaga with the Catholic one, and Kasubi with the tombs.

That layout is the settlement of a religious civil war fought in the 1880s and 90s between Catholic, Protestant and Muslim factions at the Kabaka's court, which ended with each of them installed on their own hill and the British in charge of the whole thing. Kampala is still a city of loud and cheerful religion, and Sunday morning is audible from a considerable distance.

It is greener than its size suggests, hotter and more humid than Nairobi, considerably friendlier, and much more chaotic. Uganda has been called the pearl of Africa since Winston Churchill used the phrase in 1908, and while the pearl part is really about the country outside the city, the goodwill it generates is very much on display in the capital.

Day by day

Day 1 in Kampala

Nakasero market, the Independence Monument and the minaret above Old Kampala

Start with Nakasero market, on the slope below the business district. It is the polite one: fruit, vegetables, fish, spices and flowers, laid out under awnings, and small enough to walk through in half an hour without being swept along. Matoke, the green cooking banana that is the Ugandan staple, is stacked everywhere in enormous quantities, along with jackfruit, passion fruit and things you will not recognise.

Walk up to the Independence Monument on Speke Road, a bronze figure of a man raising a child clear of his shoulders, unveiled for independence in October 1962. It is a small monument on a traffic island and it takes two minutes, but it is the one image of that moment that Ugandans use, and it stands opposite the parliament that came with it.

Then cross to Old Kampala Hill for the Uganda National Mosque, paid for by Muammar Gaddafi and finished in 2007 on the site of the original British fort. The prayer hall is worth seeing, with its Moroccan tiling and Egyptian chandeliers, but the reason to come is the minaret: a spiral staircase leads to a balcony from which you can see the whole city, hill by hill, with Lake Victoria as a grey line to the south. Guides take you round for a fixed fee, women are lent a headscarf and skirt at the door, and late afternoon is the time to go.

  1. 15:00

    Nakasero market

    Other

    The manageable central market: produce, spices and flowers on the hillside below the business district. Half an hour, and photographs after asking.

  2. 16:15

    Independence Monument

    Historic

    The 1962 independence bronze on its traffic island, opposite parliament. A two minute stop on the way up the hill.

  3. 17:15

    Uganda National Mosque

    Religious

    Guided visits include the climb up the minaret, which is the best view in Kampala. Cover arms and legs; robes and scarves are provided at the entrance.

  4. 19:30

    Ugandan dinner

    Eat

    Luwombo, chicken or beef steamed in banana leaf, with matoke and groundnut sauce. Order it early: it takes a while.

With more time: Owino market, properly St Balikuddembe, is ten minutes downhill and is the opposite experience: acres of secondhand clothes and hardware in narrow chaotic alleys, fascinating and not for anybody in a hurry. The Nommo Gallery, Uganda's national art gallery, is a quiet garden in the middle of Nakasero if you want the other extreme.

Day 2 in Kampala

Kasubi, Mengo Hill and an evening with the Ndere Troupe

Kasubi first, before the heat. The tombs hold four kabakas of Buganda, the last of them Mutesa II, who died in exile in London in 1969 and was brought home. The building over them is a vast circular thatched dome, built and rebuilt entirely in reeds, poles and spear grass by the clans who have held that duty for generations, and it is one of the largest thatched structures anywhere. It burned down in 2010, an arson case that has never been resolved, and the reconstruction took more than a decade of traditional work. A guide will explain the clan system and what may and may not be photographed, and you take your shoes off to go in.

From there it is a short drive to Mengo Hill and the Lubiri, the Kabaka's palace compound. The palace itself is not the point, and you will not go inside it. What people come for is behind it: a row of underground cells built as an armoury under Idi Amin and used as a place of execution, the walls still carrying messages scratched by the people held in them. It is a bleak twenty minutes and the most direct account of the 1970s you will find in this country.

Finish in the evening at the Ndere Centre, out at Ntinda. The Ndere Troupe performs music and dance from across Uganda, changing costume, instrument and rhythm as they move from region to region, and the compere explains what each one is as they go. Dinner is served outside on the grass before it starts. Check the day, because performances do not run every night.

  1. 09:15

    Kasubi tombs

    Historic

    Ticketed, with a guide included and required. Allow an hour and a half; shoes come off at the threshold of the main tomb.

  2. 11:30

    Lubiri

    Historic

    The royal compound and the Amin-era cells behind it. Guides wait at the gate. Grim, important, and about half an hour.

  3. 13:00

    Lunch on Mengo Hill

    Eat

    A rolex, the rolled chapati and omelette that is Uganda's great street food, from a stall on the road back into town.

  4. 19:00

    Ndrere Centre

    Visit

    Dinner from about seven and the performance after. Check the schedule before you go; there is no show on some nights.

With more time: The Wamala tombs, ten kilometres northwest, hold Kabaka Ssuuna II and almost never see a visitor, and Namirembe cathedral on the neighbouring hill has a much better view than it has interior.

Day 3 in Kampala

The Uganda Museum, then the road to Entebbe

The Uganda Museum, founded in 1908 and the oldest in East Africa, sits on Kira Road in a low modernist building that has seen better decades. The displays are old-fashioned and the lighting is poor, and it is still worth two hours, because the ethnographic collection is remarkable: regalia, weapons, fishing gear and clothing from communities across the country, gathered when a great deal of it was still in daily use.

The room to find is the one full of musical instruments, which you are generally allowed to play. Xylophones, drums, harps, thumb pianos and one-string fiddles from every corner of Uganda, and usually somebody on the staff who will show you how a particular one is meant to sound. Outside there is a line of traditional homesteads built in the appropriate style for each region.

Then leave. Entebbe is 35 km down a road that can take three quarters of an hour or three hours, and the airport is at the end of a peninsula with only one way onto it. If you have a spare afternoon there rather than a spare hour, the botanical gardens on the lake shore and the wildlife centre next door are both good, and both are a short walk from the water.

  1. 09:00

    Uganda Museum

    Culture

    Two hours for the ethnography, the instruments you are allowed to play and the homesteads in the garden. Bags stay at the desk.

  2. 12:30

    Transfer to Entebbe International

    Travel

    Leave three hours before check-in closes. Entebbe Road is the single least predictable stretch of tarmac in Uganda.

With more time: With another morning, the Baha'i temple on Kikaaya Hill was the first house of worship its faith built in Africa and stands in gardens nobody else seems to have found, and the martyrs' shrine at Namugongo marks where converts at the Kabaka's court were executed for their faith in 1886 and draws enormous pilgrim crowds every June.

Before you go

Getting in and out

You fly into Entebbe, on a peninsula in Lake Victoria about 35 km southwest of Kampala, and the transfer takes anything from forty-five minutes to well over two hours depending on the traffic on Entebbe Road. Fixed-price shuttles, ride-hailing apps and hotel cars all work; agreeing the fare in advance saves an argument at the other end.

Buses run to Nairobi, Kigali and Dar es Salaam from the depots around the city, and the Kigali run takes most of a day. Coaches leave in the evening for the long routes and arrive at unhelpful hours, so the daytime services are worth paying a little more for.

Uganda requires a visa for most nationalities, applied for online in advance, and proof of yellow fever vaccination on arrival. The East Africa Tourist Visa covers Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda on one application and is worth it if you are doing more than one.

Where to stay

Nakasero and Kololo, the two central hills, hold most of the hotels, the embassies and the restaurants, and are walkable in daylight within their own streets if not between them. This is where to stay for three days.

Bugolobi and Naguru are quieter and greener, ten minutes further out and popular with people who live here rather than visit. Munyonyo and Ggaba are down on Lake Victoria, pleasant and a long way from everything on this list.

Whatever you choose, ask how long the hotel thinks the drive to Entebbe takes on the day and at the time you are leaving, and then add an hour.

Getting around

Ride-hailing apps cover the city, cost very little and are the sensible default. Traffic is heavy for most of the day and the hills mean there is rarely an alternative route, so plan two things in a morning rather than four.

Boda-bodas, the motorcycle taxis, are how the city actually moves. They are fast, cheap, everywhere and genuinely dangerous, and they account for a large share of the casualties in Kampala's hospitals. If you use one, agree the fare first and take the app-based services, which at least supply a helmet.

Walking works within a neighbourhood and not between them: the hills are steep, the pavements are intermittent and the traffic does not expect you. After dark, take a car.

Weather, money and safety

Kampala sits almost on the equator at around 1,200 metres, so the temperature barely changes all year and hovers in the high twenties. There is no real dry season, but the heaviest rain falls from March to May and again in the autumn, usually as short violent afternoon storms rather than all-day drizzle. April is the wettest month by a distance.

The Ugandan shilling comes in large numbers and mobile money is used for almost everything. Carry some cash for markets and boda fares; cards work in hotels, malls and the better restaurants.

Kampala is comfortable by day and asks for the usual caution at night: use a car rather than walking, keep the windows up in traffic, and do not carry a phone in your hand on a busy street. Air quality is poor, which matters more than crime if you have asthma.

Kampala is not a beautiful city and it is a very likeable one. The pleasure is in what sits on each hill and how differently people on the next one see it: a mosque built by a Libyan dictator on a colonial fort, a cathedral in red brick, a king in a compound with a torture chamber in the garden, and a market selling bananas to all of them.

From here the country opens up. Jinja and the source of the Nile are two hours east, with the whitewater below the dam. Southwest, past the equator line at Kayabwe, the road runs eight hours to Bwindi and the gorillas, or a similar haul to Lake Bunyonyi, which is the loveliest place in Uganda to do nothing at all. Murchison Falls is north, where the entire Nile forces itself through a gap seven metres wide.

Make it your trip

Every stop, day and place here lands in your account as an editable trip. Move the days around, swap a city, add your own bookings and costs, and share it with whoever is coming.

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Common questions

Is Kampala worth stopping in, or should I go straight to the parks?
Two nights is enough and it is worth them. Kasubi and the palace explain the Buganda kingdom, which no game park will, and the mosque minaret gives you the shape of the city in ten minutes. Beyond three days the traffic starts to outweigh the sights.
How far is Kampala from Entebbe airport?
About 35 km, which sounds like nothing and is not. Budget an hour and a half in either direction and three hours if you are flying out in the late afternoon. There are fixed-price shuttles, hotel cars and ride-hailing apps, all straightforward.
Should I use boda-bodas?
They are the fastest way across Kampala and they are also the reason a large share of the city's emergency admissions happen. If you use one, use an app-based service that issues a helmet, and never on a wet road at night. Ride-hailing cars cost little more.
Can I combine Kampala with gorilla trekking?
Yes, and most people do it the other way round: two nights here at the start, then the long drive southwest to Bwindi or Mgahinga, which is eight to ten hours by road or a short flight to Kisoro. Permits must be bought well in advance and are limited each day.
What is the weather like?
Warm and humid all year, around 26 degrees, with no proper dry season. The heaviest rain is from March to May and again from September into November, and it usually arrives as an hour of tropical downpour rather than a wet day. April is the wettest month.
Can I copy this into my own trip?
Yes. Take the three days as a base and add the nights before and after that your flights actually need, because the Entebbe road decides more of this itinerary than anything else on it.