Welcome to Dakar
Surfing in Dakar
Dakar is a rare thing, a capital city where the surf is a fifteen-minute drive from the centre, and the geography is the reason to come rather than an accident of it. The peninsula runs west into the Atlantic and its two shores face opposite ways.
- 4spots
The north shore takes North Atlantic swell from November to March. Ngor Rights and Ngor Lefts break either side of the channel off Ngor island, reefs with urchins and rock under them, and Yoff Beach is sand a few minutes east and the place a first week happens. The south shore is Ouakam, under the Mosquée de la Divinité, and it wants south-west swell from May to September. Between the two you are never more than a quarter of an hour from the side that is working.
What the numbers say is that neither side is generous. Ngor's cleanest month is seven days out of thirty, and Ouakam is filed inconsistent with no seasonal pattern. This is a forecast coast: the good days are excellent and they are picked out in advance rather than stumbled into.
The water surprises everyone. Fourteen degrees north, and the Canary Current drops it to 19 to 22°C in March before taking it to 28 to 29°C in late September. The cold arrives with the swell.
And then there is the city, which is the part no other entry here can offer. Dakar has restaurants that are not your camp, live music most nights, markets, a ferry to Gorée, and a scale that means a non-surfing partner has a week of their own rather than a week of waiting.
Welcome home.
Why Dakar?
Two shores, and never more than a quarter of an hour from the working one
Most surf destinations give you one coastline and ask you to hope. Dakar gives you two facing opposite ways, so the question in the morning is which side rather than whether. That does not make it reliable, because the wind still decides and even the best month is seven clean days out of thirty. It makes it flexible, which on a week booked in advance is worth more.
Where is Dakar?
Getting there
Blaise Diagne airport is about an hour from the peninsula, and Dakar is under six hours from Paris with no time difference worth adjusting to. Ngor, Yoff and Ouakam sit within fifteen minutes of each other at the western tip, and camps cluster around Ngor and Yoff.
Best surf spots in Dakar
See all spotsSurf camps in Dakar
See all surf campsNo surf camp listed yet for this destination.
Join the Bookawave adventure
Get our exclusive guides, good deals and surf trip inspiration.
No spam, just surf.