Top 5 things to do in Dar Es Salaam
- Enjoying the beautiful beaches
This is our top thing to do in Dar Es Salaam as the city is surrounded by beautiful beaches. Within 15 minutes from the city centre you can be relaxing on a beautiful beach.
2.Exploring offshore islands
When people are looking for things to do in Dar Es Salaam they often start to look offshore. There are some beautiful islands off the coastline all reachable by boat within 20 minutes. These islands include Sinda, Mabudya and Bongoyo and are a perfect day out for all the family.
3. Museum Dar Es Salaam
National Museum – This is an amazing place to learn about African heritage, since it offers testimonies of human evolution from 6 million years ago, along with the exclusively Tanzanian cultural heritage, Shirazi civilisation and even the testimonies from European colonial period – British and German
Village Museum- represents a collection of traditional Tanzanian dwellings, together with villagers who show off their traditional way of life and tribal dances. This museum is 9km away from the city centre and you can reach it by Mwenge dala dala running from New Posta. The Village Museum opens from 9.30am till 6pm.
4. Souvenir Shopping
If you are seeking souvenirs to remind you of your time in Tanzania we recommend the Mwenge Wood Carver’s Village- this selling area and workshop opens from 8 am till 6 pm every day, and one can even watch carvers at work.
Other places for souvenirs are the Tinga Tinga galleries. Tingatinga is perhaps the synonym for Tanzanian culture and arts. These popular paintings are distinguished by animal and flower motifs and they are made by enamel paints on canvas and bright oil colours. The most prominent tingatinga artist was Edward Saidi Tingatinga and buying paintings in his style is a great thing to do in Dar Es Salaam
5. Eat traditional food
Tanzanian cuisine is varied, and implements spicy food and a lot of coconut milk. Due to the large number of expatriates living in Dar es Salaam, growing number of international food restaurants is noticeable, thus, particularly Indian, Chinese, Turkish and Italian food is offered.
Some typical local food you’ll find in Dar es Salaam’s restaurants is wali (rice), ugali, chapatti (Tanzanian typical bread), nyama choma (meat with wali and ugali), and shish kebab. Among snacks, there are maandazi, kebab, samosa and some kind of rice bread called mkate wa kumimina. The most common drinks are tea and coffee. Mnazi/tembo is a typical infusion of Dar es Salaam.
