Uganda

Travellers are flocking to Uganda's beautiful mountains, trekking opportunities and communities of mountain gorillas. Kampala is now the modern, bustling capital of a new Uganda, a country with one of the fastest growing economies in Africa.

Uganda's long string of tragedies since independence has been a staple of the Western media, so most people still regard the country as an unstable place to be avoided. However, it's getting back on its feet and the transformation is little short of astounding.

Before independence, Uganda was a prosperous and cohesive country. Its great beauty led Winston Churchill to refer to it as the 'Pearl of Africa', but by the mid-1980s it lay shattered and bankrupt, broken by tribal animosity, nepotism, insanely corrupt politics, mass murder and military tyranny. Despite the killings and brutality, Ugandans appear to have weathered the storm remarkably well. However, even rose-coloured glasses won't hide the country's huge debt, AIDS crisis and wonky human rights record.