Bagamoyo Historical Tour - Everyday

This day trip was about the history, culture and daily life of Bagamoyo. Our driver, Jimmy, promptly picked us up at the correct time and did a skillful job of driving in sometimes difficult conditions. He also played nice music and spoke food English. We picked up our guide, Sadiq, in Bagamoyo, and he was extremely knowledgeable about the history and culture. Asking him questions was sometimes a challenge, though. We spent the day exploring, a good 4 hours plus lunch. Our highlights were the port in Bagamoyo, and the Kaole ruins. The car ride home home took a long time, no fault of the driver

I had a wonderful time on the Bagamoyo tour. I was picked up promptly and driven to Bagamoyo where I was met by my guide, Idriss. He was absolutely brilliant. Super knowledgeable and great fun. We went to 4 different sites and there is so much history here. It is a very interesting tour which helps to understand the history of this part of east Africa. I would highly recommend and Idriss was a brilliant guide

It was a fantastic experience ever

An unforgettable experience in Dar es Salaam with Dove Adventure! I recently spent three days (January 23rd–25th, 2026) in Dar es Salaam, and the experience was top-notch, thanks to Dove Adventure. I coordinated everything with Annastancia, who provided excellent service from start to finish. One of the highlights was their recommendation to visit Bagamoyo on the 24th—an extraordinary experience made even better by our guide there, Idrisa Mtoro. His knowledge and passion really brought the history to life. I also want to give a special mention to Derick Mosa, our driver-guide for the entire three days. He was professional, reliable, and overall excellent. I highly recommend this agency to anyone visiting Tanzania. Professional, well-organized, and truly memorable!

Our Guide ZAHARAN was extremely engaging, informative, and professional‼️ first he took us to Prison Island and give us an education about that island and found a spectacular place for us to snorkel followed by boat ride back to the mainland and a very informative tour of Stonetown with a delicious Swahili lunch‼️

Fantastic Dove trip yesterday to Bagamoyo. The guidebooks don’t do justice to the town’s history, beauty or atmosphere: the Kaole ruins date back to the 13th century but the area feels like a much more ancient settlement, while the busy fishing beach and cargo port is a mixture of modern and traditional and the Roman Catholic Mission is beautifully tranquil: if you’re lucky you may hear a choir practicing in the church grounds, as we did. The buildings associated with Zanzibar and Tanzania’s slaving history are haunting, though for what should be monuments of international importance, quite shockingly badly maintained in some cases. Guide Sadik is equally at ease introducing an attraction or leaving you to explore places and features on your own, and is happy to answer all questions: if you are interested in something specific he’ll be happy to angle your tour toward this. There’s also a delicious lunch, the odd shopping opportunity and a comfortable drive there and back courtesy of Derick (despite the hair-raising evening traffic in Mbezi beach and Mikocheni – some of the antics there break records, even for Dar!)
We’ve been on several Dove expeditions before and always found them engrossing – the crew really pay attention to the details that bring Tanzania alive for visitors, not always easy around Dar es Salaam, where folk are accustomed to tourists having a cursory look before making for the safari parks. However, these tours really get under the surface of the area. Thanks again, all.

This was one of the best and most comprehensive historical tours I have taken. Not only did I have a knowledgeable and engaging guide, but the content and context of Bagamoyo’s history and its placement in Tanzania. History was so fascinating and captivating. I would absolutely recommend this tour to anyone visiting Dar Es Salaam as a way to better appreciate the complex colonial history of Tanzania.

My third Dove Adventure tour, this time in the capable hands of guide Sadik and friendly driver Jimmy. Jimmy picked me up from the apartment at 8am and proved to be an excellent companion for the 2 hour drive from Dar to Bagamoyo, patiently indulging this happy bird watcher by stopping several times as we neared our destination so I could check out the beautiful Carmine Bee-eaters that were perched on cables overhead. We met Sadik, who knows his local history inside out, at the Caravan Serai museum where he explained the town's former role as a locus of the slave trade in the region and later as capital of German East Africa. We then had a packed day visiting the Kaole Ruins, the Old Boma, the Bagamoyo Museum, and the Roman Catholic seminary and church - from which emanated the joyous sound of a children's choir singing in multi-part harmonies. We stopped for lunch - I had a tasty plate of Tanzanian pilau - at one of Sadik's favourite eateries, and finished up the day with a visit to the beach to see the local fishermen in action. The drive back took three hours through the Saturday evening Dar rush hour, and I was dropped back at the apartment just before 9pm, exhausted and satisfied. Once again, highly recommend Dove Adventure tours!

I was in Tanzania in February which is a bit of a slow time so I was the only person on the tour and got to ask a ton of questions! Derick picked me up from my hotel in the city center of Dar Es Salaam for the 90 minute drive to Bagamoyo. I really enjoyed the ride out and it's a great opportunity to see how big the city is, see how people live, and catch some other sites like the Tanzanite bridge. Sadik was my guide in Bagamoyo. He was born and raised there and was very knowledgable. He took me to all the historical sites like the Kaole ruins, Old Boma, the Old German Fort and the Mission and was patient while I took photos. I was pleasantly surprised that he also took me around the city's modern cultural sites including the fish market, a school, and the downtown area. Both Derick and Sadik made the tour very comfortable and enjoyable. I even forgot a camera filter in the car and Derick was kind enough to bring it back to my hotel the next day. I don't recommend doing that, but really appreciated their graciousness the whole day. I learned a lot of history during this tour and highly recommend it if you're into that!

We expected a private tour for 4 but were in a shuttle bus for 10 and that was fine with six other lovely people. Bagamoyo is a long uncomfortable ride from Dar Es Salaam and our tour guide, although knowledgeable, spewed facts and history along the way, but was unresponsive to questions asked by the visitors. The ruins themselves, were just not worth the ride, nor were the stops along the way on the return drive. The poverty along the way was heartbreaking, but there was little discussion about the humanity. The other issue was that Viator had booked had booked everyone at different price points, and then a couple just hopped on the bus and paid significantly less than everyone else.

Very well organized and executed. Our guide Sadik was very knowledgeable about the history of Tanzania and Bagamoya incl. nature, economics and actual pollitics, much more than expected.

Dove Adventures did excellently well. The driver and tour guide were very homely and friendly. The tour guide was very knowledgeable about the sites and the history. They took their time to take me round and ensured I had a memorable experience.

Fantastic daytrip from Dar Es Salaam. Driver (Derrick) was prompt, good company and safe. Sadiq the guide was incredibly informative about all periods of history and culture and gave a very thorough overview of the fascinating town's past and present. He was extremly kind and patient, and very intuitive. Bagamoyo and nearby Kaole are a treasure trove of different historical periods and made a beautiful and tranquil escape from the hustle of Dar Es Salaam.

We enjoyed the Bagamoyo Historical Tour we did with Dove Adventure Travel. They were extremely easy to coordinate with to arrange the tour. They were also able to provide airport transfer to and from our hotel in Dar es Salam which was helpful. Our driver Chris was punctual every time and had a nice new propane fired Landcruiser to drive us around in. The Bagamoyo Historical Tour was excellent - we left about 9 am and were back to our hotel before 6 pm, with the whole day dedicated to seeing all the historical sites of interest around Bagamoyo with our lively guide Prince. There is a great deal to see in this small town, and it really gives you a good sense of all the history of the place. We also enjoyed lunch (not included in the price) in a local restaurant in the historical part of town. I was really impressed with the Dove Adventure Team.

We had a phenomenal day at Bagamoyo thanks to Sadiq who gave us an in-depth explanation of the history of the place. Sadly most of it was dark history. Bagamoyo with Sadiq Should be on every visitors trip to Dar. Thank you Dove Adventures for the day tour, the whole experience was significantly beyond my expectations.

Fantastic tour that I recommend everyone who's interested in African history. Bagamoyo is a very fascinating, and beautiful, place. the guides are great and very informative.

It was a great tour, so informative and even a bit off the beaten track. As we learned from our guide, though overshadowed by Stonetown in Zanzibar, Bagamoyo every bit as integral to the history of the country from 12th century to slave trade to colonialism - even the first world war -- and of course decolonisation. Bagamoyo has all the features found in Zanzibar except the tourists so if you want to see a relatively untrammeled but tourist friendly site, this is the one. Plus on the way you will enjoy local food, insights into cultural and hospitality courtesy of an excellent and personable guide.I highly recommend this tour!

The history of Bagamoyo is very educative and heart touching, it was after our meeting that we had a day to visit this somehow forgotten historical town in Tanzania, I say forgotten because our guide Sadick said it was the first harbor to be built and then late shifted to Dar es Salaam which has prosper economically leaving Bagamoyo in almost the same old infrastructure style. Dove Adventure was recommended from the hotel we stayed, Holiday inn Hotel and appeared to be very honest, reliable, very good air conditioned cars for tours, fast responding with very knowledgeable guides both for Bagamoyo and Dar es Salaam City, best price and I recommend it to other travellers.

During our work meeting in Dar es Salaam we had an opportunity to visit Bagamoyo, an interesting town very rich in history and culture, Sadick was our awesome guide and he carry Bagamoyo history in his heart and brain this is not an activity to miss if you are in Dar es Salaam and looking how to spend a worthwhile day, Jumbe from Dove Adventure was able to arrange our trip in a very short notice with very reasonable cost and we were all satisfied for his fast professional services.

The tour company very kindly accommodated me for a tour of Bagamoyo on very short notice. Godfrey used the drive from Dar to share with me some of the background not only of Bagamoyo but the history of Tanzania as a whole. The guide who joined us once we arrived was clearly very knowledgable about the area and patiently answered what questions I had - although he gave such thorough explanations I rarely had any! It was a great way to end my trip to Tanzania.

A very nice and informative trip. The guides godfrey and shaffiq were very good company. I have learned a lot on the history which is a great help to understand nowerdays tanzania

Great again! The first capital of German East Africa