Travel in Mozambique

a coastline rich in history and culture

Mozambique is a vast and under-developed country, with an incredible 2300 km (1380 miles) of beautiful tropical and sub-tropical coastline along the Indian Ocean and vast areas of wild and remote hinterlands.

This part of the coast played an important role in the great Indian Ocean trade from around 300 AD, notably exporting gold from Zimbabwe and silver from the mines inland from Sofala.

The country was colonised by the Portuguese between 1498 and 1975, during which time its development was restrained compared with neighbouring states. Since independence Mozambique has suffered enormously from internal strife since independence.

Although now largely stable, the lost decades have left the country a long way behind, especially in terms of travel infrastructure. It remains very much a frontier territory for tourism, with vast untouched wildernesses, but very few decent places to stay.

As alluring as that may seem, the reality is that extensive travel here can be expensive, difficult and unreliable.

The main exceptions are a handful of superb beach lodges along the vast frontage onto the Indian Ocean, which can be easily accessed by air from Johannesburg in South Africa.

Lodges in the Bazaruto area can be directly reached by air from the safari areas of Kruger, providing one of the best and easiest safari and beach combinations on the continent (to rival the classic Serengeti and Zanzibar combination).

The safari areas of Mozambique (Gorongosa and Niassa being the best known) are both made largely inaccessible by the almost complete lack of visitor facilities.

Most people come to Mozambique simply to visit one or two beach lodges, usually after exploring the safari areas of South Africa, Botswana, Zambia or Zimbabwe.

The best time to visit Mozambique is generally considered to be during the May-Oct cool dry season, when rainfall is relatively low and night-time temperatures drop to a reasonably comfortable 15C (59F).

International flights

The beach lodges of Mozambique are usually accessed by air from Johannesburg into either Pemba (north), Nampula (northcentral) or Bazaruto (southcentral).

The southern beaches can be accessed by air into Maputo, but those areas are as often accessed by road from South Africa (Kruger or Natal).

Internal flights

Scheduled internal flight services in Mozambique are rarely needed in trips and are not renowned for their reliability.

Several of the high-end beach lodges are connected to the international hubs by private or shared charter flights, either in light aircraft or helicopter.

Road travel

The main roads in Mozambique are generally not too bad, although they do suffer from the usual chaotic local traffic and infamous potholes. Lesser roads, especially those away from the coast, are often challenging during the dry season and virtually impassable during the rainy season.

We tend to keep road travel down to a minimum, connecting the various mainland beach lodges to their nearest international flight hub and occasionally connecting between reasonably nearby lodges.

More extensive overland explorations, either up the coast or inland, are not something we generally recommend.

Where to stay

The usual way to go about choosing where to stay during your trip is to start by selecting the areas you would like to visit, then looking at the various options in each area.

In all honesty there’s such a limited range of options in most areas that you won’t have to work too hard making lodge selections.

beach extensions to safari in South Africa