Uganda's most scenic lake — 29 islands in a volcanic crater, terraced hillsides dropping to still water, and the calmest corner of the landlocked country
Lake Bunyonyi ('place of many little birds' in the Rukiga language) is a crater lake in the Kigezi Highlands of southwestern Uganda, at 1,962m altitude (the second-highest lake in Africa after Lake Kivu, whose surface is at 1,460m — Bunyonyi is technically higher than Kivu), 1.7km deep at maximum depth (making it the second-deepest lake in Africa after Lake Tanganyika), and covering 61 sq km of volcanic crater floor with 29 islands of varying size (the islands range from uninhabited rocky outcroppings to the substantial Bwama Island, which was the site of the colonial-era leper colony from 19…
The Kigezi Highlands' human history is the history of the Bakiga people (the Bantu-speaking agriculturalists of the southwestern Uganda highlands, distinct from the Banyoro and Baganda of the central plateau, occupying the densely terraced volcanic hills since at least 1000 CE). The colonial administration of the Kigezi Highlands (under British administration from 1910, when the area was formally incorporated into the Uganda Protectorate) established the Bwama Island leper colony in 1929 (the leper colony, administered by the Church Missionary Society, housed approximately 1,000 patients at i…