Mafia Island

Though it lies south of the Zanzibar archipelago and is administered as part of mainland Tanzania's Pwani (Coast) Region, Mafia shares the same Swahili seafaring story. The Mafia archipelago sat on the medieval Indian Ocean trade routes, and the ruins of Kua on neighbouring Juani Island preserve the remains of a Shirazi town of mosques and tombs abandoned centuries ago.

For most of its modern history Mafia was a quiet backwater of coconut and fishing villages centred on the small port of Kilindoni. It never developed the plantation wealth or the tourist crowds of Zanzibar, and that neglect proved a blessing for its reefs and its dhow-fishing culture, which survive far more intact than on the busier islands to the north.

In 1995 Tanzania declared the Mafia Island Marine Park, the country's first, protecting a vast area of reef, mangrove and seagrass around Chole Bay. The park's coral gardens and the seasonal aggregation of whale sharks off Kilindoni, among the most reliable in the world, turned the island into a specialist destination for divers, snorkellers and marine scientists while keeping visitor numbers low.