Beach destination · Mafia
Mafia Island
South of Zanzibar, off the Rufiji Delta, Mafia keeps a slower clock.
4 nights
Oct, Nov, Dec +3
Drive access only
About
About Mafia Island.
South of Zanzibar, off the Rufiji Delta, Mafia keeps a slower clock. Its waters form a protected marine park — one of the richest in East Africa — where coral gardens, turtles and a tangle of reef life thrive with barely a boat in sight. From October to March, Mafia becomes one of the few places on earth where you can reliably snorkel alongside whale sharks, the gentle giants of the ocean, as they feed in the shallows just offshore. On land the rhythm is unhurried: baobabs and Swahili fishing villages, green turtles nesting on quiet beaches, and a handful of lodges that have chosen seclusion over scale. There is little to do here but dive, drift and decompress — which is the whole idea. Mafia pairs beautifully with a southern-circuit safari, and rewards the traveller willing to go a little further for a wilder, emptier coast.
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