It’s perhaps fair to say that the Kidepo Valley National Park of north-east Uganda shares more with its near neighbours across the border in Kenya than it does with any other national park in its home country. Glowing dust-red and dry-grass brown under the gaze of Mount Morungole and the undulating Dodoth Hills, the park adds the likes of cheetahs and kulus to the list of more typical Ugandan wildlife, like leopard, giraffe and buffalo. And that’s not even touching the whopping 475 or so bird species that flit through the skies, the fields and the whistling thorn bushes here, ranging from stalking ostriches to Abyssinian hornbills. The nerve center of the action, and the base point for many a Kidepo Valley National Park tour guide, is at Apoka. Here, a smattering of UWA-managed lodges mix with some convenience shops, and rangers head out to explore the riverside plains of the Narus Valley and various permanent watering holes nearby for clusters of hartebeest and oribis. The otherworldly landscapes of the eponymous Kidepo Valley are also worth a visit, offering striking views of wadi riverbeds and hot springs that bubble up right on the border with Sudan.