When to go to Pemba Island

Best Time To Go To Pemba Island | When To Go To Pemba Island

When going on holiday to Tanzania the chances are the aim of the trip is to either go for a safari, or to the beach or both. For the beach, generally, the best weather is from December to March and again from July to early November, with the optimum months being July to September. November and April see light rains. If you are travelling to Pemba Island, the chances are you want to have a really off the beaten track beach experience. Beach experiences in our view are never much fun in the rainy season of April/May!

Interestingly though, Pemba Island has it’s own little micro climate… Although it is generally more or less 30 degrees across the board, the rainy seasons are rather less defined than on the beaches closer to the mainland like Zanzibar. There is a spike in rainfall in April and May and these should be avoided. However, in the “dry” season, where Zanzibar may have around 8 days of rain per month from July – September, Pemba Island has around 12. This is constant from July – December, with January and February seeing significantly less rainy. Out of the non rainy season months, it seems that the rainfall is also the least in January and February – around half of rain falling in the “dry” season… So this could be a good time to go! For fishing enthusiasts, you can get barracuda, king mackerel and giant trevally all year round. From June – November you can catch wahoo, yellow tuna and small bonito. In November, it is pelagic and the billfish species season and from December – April you can catch sailfish and marlin.