Lake Hotel

Mwanza


This hotel is ageing and very tatty, but its shortcomings are easy to overlook if you've just disembarked from a 24-plus-hour haul on the Central Line train. Upstairs rooms – complete with trickling hot-water shower, fan and mosquito net – are better, and management lets three people sleep in a double for no additional charge. The cheapest rooms don't have hot water.


Lonely Planet's must-see attractions

Nearby Mwanza attractions

1. Robert Koch Hill

0.11 MILES

Smack in the city centre is Robert Koch Hill, with an attractively decrepit German-built mansion at the top. To get here, push through the bustling market…

2. Old German Mansion

0.12 MILES

Sitting atop Robert Koch Hill, the old German mansion is a Mwanza landmark with great views of the city and lake. Abandoned, it is a fun 'adventure';…

3. Bismarck Rock

0.34 MILES

Mwanza’s icon, Bismarck Rock, is a precariously balanced boulder atop the lovely jumble of rocks in the lake next to the Kamanga ferry pier. The little…

4. Maasai Market

0.35 MILES

Mwanza has a Maasai Market, with a couple of dozen Maasai selling beaded jewellery and medicines on both sides of the footbridge.

5. Mwaloni Market

1.02 MILES

Mwaloni Market, under the roof with the giant Balimi ad, is quite a spectacle. The city’s main fish market, it also has lots of fruits and vegetables,…

6. Saa Nane National Park

1.68 MILES

The rocky island 500m off Capri Point is Saa Nane National Park. Even though it’s just 0.76 sq km and home to only monkeys and impalas, visiting costs…

7. Jiwe Kuu

2.53 MILES

One of the more interesting rock formations around Mwanza is Jiwe Kuu (Big Rock), which some people call the Dancing Rocks. Many round boulders sit atop…

8. Sukuma Museum

9.75 MILES

The Sukuma Museum in Bujora village is an open-air museum where, among other things, you’ll see traditional Sukuma dwellings, the grass house of a…