Ngezi Forest Reserve

14.4 km² of rare forest on Pemba, running down to the pristine beach at Vumawimbi.

Declared a reserve in 1950 after much of the area had been cleared for clove cultivation, Ngezi is one hour by tarmac road from Pemba’s Karume Airport. It combines vegetation types found nowhere else in Eastern Africa — coral bushes and thickets, thick grasses, riverine forest of Mtomondo, Mvule, Mtondoo, Mwavi and the endemic Pemba palm. The forest line runs unbroken to the cool beach at Vumawimbi.