Diani Beach
Seventeen kilometres of white sand south of Mombasa, with a reef that keeps the lagoon calm and a tide that twice a day takes the sea half a kilometre out
- When to go
- September 25° · 23 rainy days
- Per day
- €€€price 3 of 5
- How many days
- 5days
- For you
- 6 questions →
- Nearest airport
- 29 km Mombasa
- Right now
Diani is the beach you come to after the safari, and that is the right order: five days of white sand, a lagoon behind the reef and hotels in coconut palms, with a tide that sets the schedule — at low water you walk to the reef, at high water you swim. From Nairobi you fly in an hour to Ukunda airport, bypassing Mombasa, and that is what to know before booking.
The beach is seventeen kilometres long and the hotels sit along it in a row, from Tiwi in the north to Galu in the south, each with its stretch of sand and palms; behind them is one road, Diani Beach Road, with restaurants, shops and malls, along which tuk-tuks and boda-bodas run for a few shillings. The tide here is big and it surprises: at low water the sea withdraws half a kilometre and leaves sand and pools you walk through to the reef, at high water it reaches the palms. The tide table from the hotel decides when you swim, when you go to the reef, and when you go nowhere.
The sea beyond the reef is for snorkelling and diving: the Kisite-Mpunguti marine park in the south, an hour and a half by road and an hour by boat from Shimoni, with dolphins and the reef around Wasini island, is done as a full day with lunch on the island. Kitesurfing is at the southern end of the beach, from December to March and June to September, when the wind blows steadily. The Kaya Kinondo forest behind the beach is a sacred grove of the Digo people, with a guide from the village and colobus monkeys that are seen without the forest too — along the road, on the rope bridges strung across it for them.
Ukunda, the village on the road, is where the people who work in the hotels live and where Swahili food is eaten for a tenth of the hotel price. In the evening you do not go onto the beach, not from fear but because of the dark and the sellers — the 'beach boys' offering everything are part of the beach by day and are learned to be ignored without irritation. Anyone wanting quieter goes further south, to Galu or Msambweni; anyone wanting restaurants to the middle of the beach; anyone wanting real Kenya to the Ukunda market on Tuesday.
What to see in Diani Beach
The reef at low tide
When the sea withdraws, you walk half a kilometre over sand and pools to the reef, with a mask and water shoes. The tide table is in every hotel; go two hours before the lowest water and come back before it turns.
Kisite-Mpunguti
The marine park in the south, with dolphins, the reef around Wasini island and coral gardens for snorkelling. A full day: an hour and a half by road to Shimoni, the boat, a crab lunch on Wasini. Booked the day before.
Colobus monkeys
The black-and-white colobus that live in the remaining forest by the beach and cross the road on rope bridges. Seen in the morning in the palms above the hotels; Colobus Conservation runs a short tour for a donation.
Kaya Kinondo
The sacred forest of the Digo people behind the beach, World Heritage, entered with a guide from the village and with shoulders covered. An hour, about the trees and how a forest is kept by belief rather than a fence.
Kitesurfing at Galu
The southern end of the beach, with schools and wind from December to March and June to September. The lagoon is shallow and calm, which makes this one of the easiest places on the coast to learn.
- T
The Ukunda market on Tuesday
The market of the village on the road, where fruit, kanga cloth and spices are bought at local prices. By tuk-tuk from the hotel for a hundred shillings; in the morning, with small money.
Two things you probably did not know
Colobus monkeys with white tails live in the Kaya Kinondo forest above Diani beach, and only a few hundred remain. The forest is a sacred site of the Mijikenda people and is UNESCO listed; you enter with an elder as escort.
A coral reef runs the length of Diani and breaks the waves, so the water inside it is calm and shallow. At low tide you can walk out to the reef on sand, and the tide covers it again within a few hours.
Ready for Diani Beach?
Within reach from here
Places sorted by straight-line distance from Diani Beach — day trips or weekends.
Kenya
→A safari charged by the day, not by the trip — a reserve whose gate fee doubles in July, while a whole trip costs only half as much more
Tanzania
→The Serengeti, Kilimanjaro and Zanzibar in one country — and three different bills: the safari by the day, the mountain by the night, the island by an insurance paid at the door
South Africa
→A country of long distances and reversed seasons, driven on the left throughout
Namibia
→A country you drive rather than visit: about four people per square kilometre, gravel roads without end, and a safari done in your own car as in Kruger — only without the fence
All 277 places we write about sit on one page — narrow them down by continent, country, price or what you are travelling for.
Within reach from here: Mombasa, Nungwi and Stone Town
See how much of that actually suits you — or pin Diani Beach if you have been.
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