Goree Island Day Trip from Dakar, Dakar, Senegal

The main reason I’ve come to Senegal is to see Goree Island. After going to Cape Town in 2019 and learning so much more about slavery than I ever did in school or real life, I was driven to try and learn about what happened, how and why. I knew this was a port where slaves were shipped to the Americas, and I wanted to see it for myself.

Getting to Goree Island and exploring it are at once easy and difficult. First, as I mentioned in my last post, the museum isn’t open every day. Officially, it’s closed on Monday, and open Tuesday – Sunday from 10:30 – 6:30pm with a lunch break from 12 – 2:30pm, when it’s closed.

Before going to Senegal, I joined a couple of Facebook groups, one of them is called Senegal Travel Tips. There’s not a ton of activity, but it was useful for questions like how do I find a guide for Goree Island? (Note, I think the group does have a lot of tour guides as members, and if I learn anything about Senegal, they are excellent sales people!) I knew I didn’t want to pay for a day tour (those can cost hundreds of dollars and it’s just not necessary since you can take the boat from Plateau on your own), but hiring a local guide seems recommended both because you’re supporting the economy, and because you’ll have a deeper experience by doing it. ...... (follow the instructions below for accessing the rest of this article).