Do not search for “what to see in Dakar”. Ask yourself what you feel like doing.
Dakar Region has one flaw: it offers too much. A World Heritage island, waves all year round, a salt lake fringed with dunes, fishermen’s cliffs to the south. The trap is trying to fit everything in and spending your day in traffic jams. Our advice fits on one line: choose a mood, then an area, then a length of time. This page is built in that order.
For the city neighbourhood by neighbourhood, read Things to do in Dakar. For the geography of the peninsula, read Dakar Region. Here, we get moving.
Live in Senegal? The region is your store of getaways less than an hour and a half’s drive away. Keep Gorée for a weekday and set off early to get back before the late-afternoon rush. A resident account unlocks the resident rate: up to 30% off depending on the activity. Just passing through? Think in time, not kilometres: ten kilometres or so can take three quarters of an hour at rush hour. One area a day, one or two trips out of the city, not five.
By mood
Sea and board sports
The waves work all year round, on one side of the peninsula or the other depending on the swell: this is the territory of surf lessons & camps, at daybreak in Ngor. A few minutes by pirogue from Ngor beach, Ngor Island has two faces: calm coves on the village side, a reef pounded by the swell on the surf side. Off the Corniche, Madeleine Islands National Park can only be visited on a supervised trip, with the park’s permission. For the rest: boat trips (sunset, islands & sport fishing), sport fishing and diving & snorkelling. In the heart of town, Anse Bernard is the only beach in the city centre.
Swim only on authorised, supervised beaches, in Ngor and Yoff in particular; on the Grande Côte, from Guédiawaye to Lac Rose, you walk, you do not swim.
Memory and culture
Gorée Island, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1978, and its House of Slaves (Maison des Esclaves) make up the capital’s most booked outing, best done with a guided tour. On the Plateau, the Théodore Monod Museum of African Art and the Museum of Black Civilisations complement each other. To the west, the African Renaissance Monument and the Mamelles Lighthouse look out over the whole peninsula.
On the faith side, the Great Mosque of Dakar, in the Médina, and the Mosque of the Divinity, tucked into the Ouakam cove, can be visited in modest clothing. For Dakar’s iconic markets, one market per trade. To get hands-on: Senegalese cooking classes, drumming workshops, African dance classes, crafts & traditional skills and Senegalese wrestling. All tours: guided cultural tours.
Nature and wide open spaces
Around 30 to 40 km to the north-east, Lac Rose (Pink Lake) is the region’s most popular getaway: salt harvesters, dunes running down to the ocean, a colour that is stronger in the dry season. You can explore it by quad and buggy, by 4×4 in the dunes, on horseback or by camel or on a pirogue trip. In town, the Hann Forest and Zoological Park, created in 1903, is Dakar’s great breath of fresh air: come for the forest.
Wellbeing
A traditional massage, a yoga & meditation session, or a beach and relaxation day on the south coast, in Yène or at the foot of the ochre cliff of Toubab Dialaw. The whole section: wellness & relaxation.
With the family
Tortoise Village (Village des Tortues) in Noflaye hatches and raises African spurred tortoises, an endangered species, a stone’s throw from Lac Rose. Hann Park takes two to three hours, half a day with children. To go further: family days & children’s outings, animal parks and amusement & play parks.
