Ilha de Mocambique is the old capital of Portuguese East Africa and it has many beautiful colonial buildings which are protected by the island's World Heritage site status, there is a palpable sense of faded glory here. This stunning little island, roughly 3km long and no more than 500m wide, has been linked to the mainland via a narrow road bridge since the 1960s, but it still feels like it is a very separate place where time has stood still.
The northernmost tip of the island is crowned with the intact San Sebastio fortress, a vast structure that once housed 2,000 officers and soldiers in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Jutting out into the azure waters of the Indian Ocean from the fort is the tiny chapel of Nossa Senhora do Baluarte dating from 1522. The Sao Paulo Palace, a restored red structure in the heart of Stone Town, is also well worth a visit, as is the small maritime museum downstairs.