Photo: Christine und Hagen Graf from Fitou, France (CC BY 2.0)
A self-guided audio walking tour of Bagamoyo on the Tanzanian coast, from the Catholic mission at the north end of town south along the old streets to the Old Fort, with a short drive to the ruins of Kaole. Bagamoyo was the end of the caravan routes from the interior: ivory and enslaved people were brought down to this coast and shipped on to Zanzibar. The Holy Ghost Fathers founded the mission in 1868, the first Roman Catholic mission on mainland East Africa, to ransom enslaved people and settle them; its first church of 1872 is where David Livingstone's body was laid for a night in February 1874, on its way to Westminster Abbey. The walk continues past the cathedral of 1910 to 1914, the grotto begun in 1876 by freed slaves, the Block House of the Abushiri rising and the Caravan Serai, where the caravans arrived, to the German Boma of 1895 to 1897, the seat of colonial government, the customs house and the fish market on the dhow shore, the place of the hangings, the Old Fort and the German cemetery. At Kaole, south of town, stand the mosques and pillar tombs of a Shirazi-Swahili trading town far older than Bagamoyo, where a Muslim community lived from the thirteenth century.
14 narrations, yours to keep — no subscription, no expiry. Works offline once downloaded, and if it isn’t for you we’ll refund it.
Going somewhere with no signal? Put the guide on your home screen first, then download it from that icon while you are on wi-fi — that way you download once, and it works in airplane mode with no roaming charges. Show me the order →
Every claim in this tour traces back to a named source — excavation records, the heritage authority for the site, and the primary texts themselves. Nothing is copied from other guidebooks, and anything we can't source doesn't make the recording.
Each stop is built from OpenStreetMap · 18 features in this old town (the field-surveyed mapping database behind Apple Maps), Wikidata · 1 cross-referenced entries (peer-reviewed structured records), the heritage authority below, and the primary historical texts where they exist.
Cross-referenced against Modern excavation publications · academic peer-review.
Every sentence is checked against those sources before it is recorded. If a claim can't be traced, it doesn't make the audio.
Every tour is reviewed by a person before it goes on sale. Stop selection, the route and anything ambiguous come back to the editor for a decision, and those questions routinely send a stop back for another accuracy pass. Nothing publishes on a machine’s say-so.
Spot anything inaccurate? Email [email protected] — fixed in the next pass.
Holy Ghost Catholic Mission, First Church and Livingstone Tower, Cathedral of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Mission Grotto.
Dunda Block House, Caravan Serai, German Boma, Old Customs House, Old Fish Market.
Hanging Place, Old Fort, German Cemetery, Kaole Mosques, Kaole Pillar Tombs.
The mission founded in 1868, the first Roman Catholic mission on mainland East Africa, set up to ransom enslaved people and settle them.
The tower of the mission's first church of 1872, where Livingstone's body lay for a night in February 1874 after its journey from the interior.
The compound where the caravans from the interior arrived, built to bring the porters' camps around the town under control; a museum since 2003.
The seat of German colonial government in Bagamoyo, built between 1895 and 1897, when the town was the first headquarters of German East Africa.
One of Bagamoyo's first stone buildings, its thick coral-stone walls around an inner courtyard, begun as a trader's house.
The two mosques of the Shirazi-Swahili town of Kaole, the older from the thirteenth century, built in coral stone south of Bagamoyo.
Tap "Start Walking Tour" and allow location access. The map shows all 14 narration points.
Follow the suggested route or explore freely. GPS tracks your position. Reach a site and the narration plays automatically.
Each site has its own narration. 14 narration points.
Narrations play when you reach each site. No buttons, no track numbers. Walk naturally — the stories find you.
Premium narration that sounds like a documentary. Warm and knowledgeable, not a textbook reading.
Every narration is drafted, cross-checked against primary sources, then passed through a second editorial pass that strips unsupported claims. Dates, names, and citations verified.
See all narration points on the map. Tap any point to hear it early or replay it later.
Every narrated point in Bagamoyo — the Caravan Town and the Kaole Ruins, each with its own narration.
Spend an hour or a full day. Skip sites, revisit favourites, take breaks. The tour adapts to you.
14 narration points, including Holy Ghost Catholic Mission, First Church and Livingstone Tower, Caravan Serai, German Boma and Old Fort. That is about 13 minutes of narration in all, and you walk between the stops at your own pace.
Yes. It plays in your phone’s browser as you walk: no guide, no group, no app to install and no fixed start time.
Three ways, all built in:
The map-tap option means you can stand anywhere — even at home before you travel — and play any narration. GPS just makes it hands-free while you’re actually walking the site.
No. Use the “Download for offline” button before you go, and the entire tour — audio, maps, narration text — works without any data connection. Tap-to-play and the map both work fully offline. GPS itself doesn’t need data; only the download does.
Add the icon first, then download from the icon. On iPhone a guide downloaded in Safari cannot be seen by the home screen icon, so downloading first means downloading the whole thing twice.
Putting it on your home screen — iPhone or iPad (Safari):
On Android (Chrome): tap the three-dot menu at the top right, tap Add to Home screen (some phones say Install app), then confirm. On Android either order works.
If you opened this link from inside Instagram, Facebook or Gmail, you are in that app’s built-in browser. It cannot add anything to your home screen, and a guide downloaded there is thrown away when the app closes. Open the link in Safari or Chrome first.
Two backstops. First, the map shows every site — just tap the marker for the place in front of you. Second, you can manually queue any narration even when GPS is off. The platform never assumes GPS works; it’s the convenience layer, not the gate.
The audio runs ~1–2 hours total, but you walk at your own pace. 14 narration points across the site. Most visitors take 2–4 hours; some spread it over multiple visits. Once you buy it, it’s yours — there’s no expiry and no subscription. Come back next year if you like; the link in your receipt always works.
One purchase covers one device session. Most couples share earbuds and use a single phone — the audio is paced for that. If you want everyone listening on their own device, each person needs their own purchase. We do not gate sharing aggressively; we trust visitors to do the right thing.
Full refund if you never trigger a single narration on-site. Partial refund based on how far you got. See the refund policy for specifics.