Things to do in Benguela

Nature · Benguela city

The city beach, running along the front with palms, bars and the whole of Benguela on it at weekends. It is the reason Angolans talk about this city the way they do.

Local tip: Late afternoon is the hour — the light on this coast is exceptional and the heat has gone. Swim where others are swimming; the Atlantic here has real currents and no lifeguards.

Neighborhood · Lobito

A long natural sandspit curving out to shelter Lobito's bay, lined with houses, restaurants and the town's best addresses, with the port on one side and open ocean on the other.

Local tip: Drive the length of it once to understand the geography of the whole province — the spit is why there is a deepwater port here, and the port is why there is a railway. Sunset from the ocean side, dinner on the bay side.

Landmark · Lobito

The terminus of the Benguela Railway: the point where a line that runs to the Congolese border meets the Atlantic. A century of Central African copper has passed through here, and after two decades of near-dormancy it is moving again.

Local tip: Go and look at it precisely because it explains everything else. Ask before photographing — it is operational infrastructure under concession, not a museum, and Angolan sensitivities about photographing installations apply.

Nature · South of Benguela city

Two bays on the road south: Baía Azul the clear-water swimming one with mufete under thatch, Baía Farta the working fishing port whose name — 'plentiful bay' — is a straightforward description of the Benguela Current's productivity.

Local tip: Baía Azul on Sunday for the fish and the water, Baía Farta early on a weekday if you want to see the catch land. Take cash; neither is a card economy.

Culture · Benguela city centre

The eighteenth-century church at the heart of old Benguela, from the era when this was São Filipe de Benguela — a Portuguese slaving port whose wealth came from the highlands behind it. The old town around it still reads as that city.

Local tip: Walk the old centre in the morning while it is cool. The colonial-era street grid is unusually intact for Angola, and a local guide will tell you what the buildings were used for, which is the part the architecture does not say.

Landmark · Between Benguela and Lobito

The town on the river between the two cities, with the province's airport, an old iron bridge and the irrigated valley that feeds both. The hinge of the whole province, and where a lot of the new building is happening.

Local tip: This is where to look if you want new-build housing at a lower price than either city, and where to look first if the Benguela–Lobito commute is the thing you are trying to avoid doing twice a day.