ERNA VAN DEN DOEL JOINS AMUKA AS NEW MANAGER
(Posted 14th February 2017)
The Amuka Safari Lodge, located on the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary – the only place in Uganda where rhinos can be seen in the wild – has confirmed the appointment of Erna van den Doel as their new manager.
Visitors to Amuka can book all sanctuary activities, like rhino tracking, shoebill stork tracking, guided nature and bird walks and of late even night walks – all accompanied by well trained rangers and guides – as the lodge is just a few minutes drive from the sanctuary head office from where all the excursions start.
(Images courtesy of www.rhinofund.org)
The lodge, persistently rated by TripAdvisor as the best speciality accommodation facility in the Masindi area – number one out of four ranked – was initially constructed in 2010 and expanded and upgraded three years later.
The cottages, offering both twin and double beds, are, while not luxurious, providing all the needed creature comfort while the food is inspired by home cooking, prepared literally in front of the visitors in the open plan kitchen adjoining the restaurant. Highlight no doubt, especially during the hot dry season, is the lodge’s swimming pool which helps cool down after a long day out in the bush tracking rhinos or seeking out birds.
Erna has been in Uganda a few times before as a visitor and in her own words is very much relishing the challenge and opportunity to raise Amuka’s profile and have more guests stay over before or after seeing some of the 19 rhinos now found on the sanctuary.
According to Angie Genade, Executive Director of the Rhino Fund and the Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, is one more birth expected this year while for 2018 as many as five births are predicted, the highest number yet.
This firmly underscores the success of the breeding project initiated by the Rhino Fund Uganda when it set out to raise funds in 2001 to construct the sanctuary infrastructure. Initially dismissed as a castle in the air, then often ignored even by other East African rhino conservation groups, has Ziwa almost single handedly seen numbers rise from an initial four adult rhinos to 19, with the loss of only one still born calf and one adolescent who died of wounds sustained after a fight with the predominant bull, despite immediate veterinary assistance. The reproduction rate has been described as phenomenal, in part induced by a suitable habitat, excellent care by the sanctuary team and the best of security measures to protect the animals.
Recently renovated does the sanctuary head office now shine again as new, arguably the best such facility in the entire Ugandan conservation set up.
