Emerson Spice Hotel

Right in the middle of historic Stone Town, which is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and an eight-minute walk from the sea, you stay in a restored Swahili mansion. To create it, the American Emerson Dewey Skeens restored three dilapidated buildings and joined them into one house around an airy courtyard. Each room has its own Swahili furnishings and its own colours, all have air conditioning, and in the bathroom hand-woven Kikoi are laid out for you, cotton towels, in other words. You eat in the hidden Secret Garden behind the old walls, at the seafood grill at lunchtime or in the evening, or up in the Tea House on the roof. At sunset there are sundowners up there with a view over the rooftops of the town, followed by an eight-course menu of fish and seafood. On days like that, then, you’d better have just a light lunch.