If you live in Africa or keenly follow Africa news, you may easily relate the term “Great lakes region” more with political instability than with tourism and travel. Yet this region has enough unique and interesting attractions to make it rank alongside the traditional African safari destinations as a preferred holiday destination.
Strictly speaking, the “great lakes” refers to the series of lakes in or around the Eastern Africa Great Rift Valley.
Lake Victoria is the largest of the African great lakes, and is shared in unequal proportions by Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. It is also the largest Lake in Africa, and the third largest fresh-water lake in the world (by surface area). The Lake is one of the main sources of the great River Nile, and a source of livelihood for many communities living around it.
The other great lakes include:
- Lake Albert at the Uganda-DRC border
- Lake Edward at the Uganda-DRC border
- Lake Kivu at the DRC-Rwanda border
- Lake Malawi (shared Malawi, Tanzania, and Mozambique). It is also the second deepest and third largest African lake.
- Lake Tanganyika (shared by Tanzania, DRC, Burundi and Zambia). Lake Tanganyika is the the deepest lake in Africa, and the second deepest lake in the world.
- Lake Turkana at the Kenya-Ethiopia border






