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TOURIST ATTRACTION:

Beaches
Just like other coastal regions, Bagamoyo has beautiful whitesand beaches.



The Bagamoyo Church: Built in 1868 and considered to be the first church in East Coast of Africa . A cemetery, where the early missionaries were buried and a small shrine which was built by freed slaves in 1876 are all seen. "We are told that between 1934 and 1991, 35 Dutch priests worked here” The last of this long line of priests from the Netherlands was Father Frits Versteijnen who stayed in Bagamoyo for 30 years and started the first museum in the old Fathers’ House in March 1968.

The second Fathers’ House in Bagamoyo, constructed close to the Mother of all Churches in East Africa, has also fallen victim to the corrosive effects of the coast region’s relentlessly humid climate. Its ground floor was built in 1873, the first floor in 1877 and the second floor in 1903.

Bomani: The German Colonial administration headquarters, as a memorial site for the first German East African Capital. 

Chuo cha Sanaa: (College of Arts): Is the only major arts college in Tanzania, teaching various fields: dancing, music, drama and painting. It is situated along the Kaole road, close to Kaole ruins.

Kaole Ruins: date from the 13th century and include what is thought to be the oldest mosque on the East African mainland.



Bagamoyo Museum: It is a small museum, which displays Bagamoyo history in relation to its contact with foreigners. It has old photographs, documents and relics from slave trade. On the same compound there is a small chapel know as Anglican church of Holly Cross. The church is famous for being a place where the remains of David Livingstone were laid before taken to Zanzibar en route to Westminster abbey for burial.

Mwembe Kinyongo: The place that people who found guilty of misconduct, during the German colonialism in Tanganyika, used to be hanged. German Grave Yard:  the historical place where the German soldiers were buried. Ruvu River Delta: well know as Ruvu River basin, an ornithological paradise with a variety of bird species, Hippo's and other reptiles can be seen here. It is only reached by boat.

Mkwaja Saadani :



National Park. It has been recently upgraded from game reserve to become the 13th National park in Tanzania. Saadani is Tanzania's only coastal wildlife sanctuary, the national park transformed from old Saadani Game Reserve, Wami River Delta and the South Mkwaja Ranch, which was bought in 1997 and donated to the Tanzanian government. The park has now the total area of  almost 1,000 sq. kilometers. It is located 50 kilometers north of Bagamoyo Town. Mkwaja Saadani National Park contains a distinctive and rare habitats, (unique in East Africa) is the beach with salt grass flats along the Indian Ocean.

At least 24 species of large mammals are found here, including the rare Roosevelt sable antelope, furthermore the beach areas contain one of the last significant East African breeding beaches in for the green turtle.
 
At the Wami River mouth, there is large and still well preserved mangrove swamps. The northern part, where was a cattle ranch, is dominated by coastal lowland mosaic, presenting an exceptional variety of habitats, woodland, forest, coastal thicket, semi-arid scrub, grassland, wetlands, salt marshes, mangroves and beaches. This vegetation has a  considerable number of elephants, buffaloes, large antelopes, and the rare Giant brown bat. On the coast of Indian Ocean, the park, have unique land form, which includes several pristine sand dunes with interesting vegetation types.

The main and much recognizable natural feature of the park is the Zaraninge Forest, 200 square kilometers (50,000 acres) of closed canopy tropical forest. It is one of the larger coastal forests in Tanzania, and part of the "Eastern Arc and Coastal Forest for Kenya and Tanzania Hotspot. The forest dominates the western part of Mkwaja Saadani National Park. this is a part of the park host new species of reptile (dwarf gecko), amphibian (Hyperolius parkeri), an endemic snail and many other species of invertebrates, 8 bird species, and large mammals.

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