Birthday in Diani

Gosh I love my birthday!!!! I think the only person I can think of who loves their birthday as much as I do is my (and pretty much all Of Zambias) financial coach, Chano. This girl even bought a government bond whose coupons will be used solely to enjoy on her birthday 🤣🤣 what a Queen! I love it!

This year, I threw a pre birthday pool party at home with 20 of my nearest and dearest, and then we took it to Diani, where I spent 5 glorious days with a lovely friend soaking in the sun, swimming in the Indian ocean (where we almost drowned in a whirlpool channel) and looking for the best sea food.

My desire to see Diani was awakened in 2018 when my former boss and her girls went to celebrate her 40th. We even considered it briefly for a honeymoon destination, but it all worked out that I got to celebrate turning 32 in the beautiful waters of the Indian Ocean with an amazing Drone photoshoot. The amount of core strength that was needed to avoid capsizing into these waters made me so thankful for my years of Pilates back in Johannesburg. Look at the magic that Eve and her photographer were able able to create.

Getting to Diani was one of the highlights of my trip, honestly. I booked the SGR premium class, and it was worth all the hype and more! Costing 20,000 KES for a return trip (as at January 2025), the premium class experience started with me pulling up to the train station, which is really close to the airport and then going through a security check. The security check is pretty standard in Kenya and many airports in East Africa. We laid our bags on a platform and sniffer dogs checked our bags. When that went without any incident (was lowkey hoping someone was dumb enough to carry drugs so I can see what happens haha), I was ushered by a porter straight to the premium class entrance and then into the premium class waiting lounge.

30 or so minutes later, we went to board and oh my goodness! I am forever spoiled! I will never fly to Mombasa again. I’m a forever premium class train girlie.

We started off promptly from Nairobi at 08:00 on the dot and the train travelled at speeds of between 80 and 102km per hour (oddly specific, I know🤣). The seats fully recline into a bed, so I spent all of those hours in a relaxed reclined position, sitting up only to be served breakfast and then also to spot a lone elephant grazing near a homestead. As a conservation comms girly, my thoughts went to the human-wildlife conflict that the inhabitants likely face.

After 5 hours, we arrived Mombasa and set off on the hour plus drive to Diani, a lovely beach town along the Indian ocean, close to Kenya’s southern border with Tanzania ). As you can imagine, it was humid and very hot, so perfect for spending hours in the warm but comfortable ocean waters.

This blog could well end here because literally all we did was wake up, and head straight to the beach because I come from a landlocked country and have lived only in landlocked cities so I don’t know how to act around big bodies of water that allow me to swim in them.

First foray into the waters

I have mentioned several times, or as my beloved friend and sis, Nonye Omotola, host of the podcast Afro Ruby would say “severally”, that I am not a food traveler. I do enjoy food, but I do not actively seek out cool restaurants to try, so I was lucky that my girl the Nairobian Latina curated a list of restaurants to try out , and even went as far as making a reservation at one of them for me. Everything we ate in Diani was nice.

We also wanted to see some of the night life, but when we couldn’t get a table at the Funky Monkey, we decided to try out karaoke, and maaaan I’m glad we did. It was so much fun! My friend actually sings in an orchestra, so with her proper voice, she is not the target market for karaoke, but she brought the vibes anyway. We both did!

For accommodation, we stayed at the lovely Boxo Hotel. Super affordable but extremely comfortable, clean, well run and close to the beach. The pool in the middle added so much character to the place, and on two days, we spent hours doing laps there after the ocean became too angry and wavy.

I would absolutely go back there, but not before I visit all the coastal towns in Kenya, and East Africa in general (Zanzibar, I see you!).