If one image defines São Tomé and Príncipe, it's Praia Banana: an almost perfect crescent of golden sand on the north coast of the island of Príncipe, framed by coconut palms leaning over turquoise water against a backdrop of green rainforest. For most people it's the most beautiful beach in the country, and it became famous worldwide when it appeared in a well-known Bacardi rum advert in the early 1990s.
The magic of Praia Banana is the way you discover it. First you see it from above, from a viewpoint high on the cliff (the very spot where that advert was filmed), with the curve of sand and palms laid out like a postcard. Then you walk down to the beach, hidden among the trees, with its small bar, its sun loungers and its calm, clear water, perfect for swimming and snorkelling.
This guide explains how to get to Praia Banana from Santo António, what to expect from this legendary beach in the historic Roça Belo Monte, and how to combine it with Príncipe's other treasures: the cocoa roças, the Obô rainforest, the Bom Bom resort and other unspoilt beaches. It's one of those beaches that on its own justifies the long trip to this remote, idyllic island in the Gulf of Guinea.
Praia Banana became world-famous in 1991, when its curve of sand and palm trees starred in a well-known Bacardi rum advert, and it has been the iconic image of Príncipe's beaches ever since. The beach lies within Roça Belo Monte, one of the great cocoa plantations built on the island during the 'brown gold' boom of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when São Tomé and Príncipe became the world's largest cocoa producer. Today the roça is a charming hotel, and the beach is the jewel of an island that was declared a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve in 2012. The full story is on our history page.
Read the full history ↓The country's greenest and most unspoilt island: an autonomous region and biosphere reserve, with a forgotten town that was once the colonial capital, and the roça where Einstein's relativity was confirmed.
Read the history of The island of Príncipe →No exact prices: a scale from $ (budget) to $$$$$ (luxury), with 2-3 options per category.
Origins, formation and what the sources say.
Praia Banana opens onto the north coast of the island of Príncipe, the smaller and more remote of the two main islands of São Tomé and Príncipe. Like the rest of the archipelago, Príncipe is volcanic. It rose from the floor of the Gulf of Guinea millions of years ago and is part of the so-called 'Cameroon line', a chain of volcanoes running from the mainland out into the ocean. That volcanic origin explains its sheer cliffs, its sharp peaks and small sandy coves like the one that forms Praia Banana.
When Portuguese navigators reached the archipelago around 1470-1471, the islands were completely uninhabited and covered in dense equatorial forest. For centuries the north coast of Príncipe, with its hidden coves and lush vegetation, stayed almost untouched. Only fishermen came there at first, and later the cocoa plantations that climbed the nearby hills.
The perfect curve of Praia Banana comes from that untouched nature: a crescent of golden sand lined with coconut palms leaning out over turquoise water. Hidden beneath the forest and sheltered by cliffs, the beach went almost unnoticed for a long time, a secret treasure on an island the world barely knew. Its fame would arrive unexpectedly in the late 20th century.
Praia Banana lies within the grounds of Roça Belo Monte, one of the plantations built on Príncipe during the great cocoa boom of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In that period São Tomé and Príncipe became the world's largest cocoa producer, and the islands filled up with 'roças'. These were huge estate-villages with a manor house, a hospital, a chapel and workers' housing, devoted entirely to producing the 'brown gold' that supplied Europe's chocolate makers.
Belo Monte, perched in the hills of the north coast with spectacular sea views, was one of these plantations. Like every roça, its output depended on the gruelling labour of the 'serviçais'. These were contract workers brought from Angola, Cape Verde and Mozambique on terms so close to slavery that in the early 20th century they sparked an international scandal and a boycott by British chocolate manufacturers.
As cocoa declined over the 20th century, and above all after independence in 1975, many roças were abandoned. Belo Monte, however, got a second life. It was restored and turned into a charming hotel that makes the most of its colonial architecture and its prime location above Praia Banana, linking the memory of cocoa with the island's new nature tourism.
Praia Banana became internationally famous in the early 1990s, when the rum brand Bacardí chose the beach to film one of its adverts. The footage was shot from the viewpoint at the top of the cliff and showed the crescent of golden sand, the leaning palms and the turquoise water. It travelled the world and made Praia Banana the very image of tropical paradise, even though almost nobody knew exactly where it was at the time.
That commercial turned the beach into an icon. The viewpoint where it was filmed is still one of the most photographed spots on the island. From there, visitors first see the whole beach spread out like a postcard before walking down to the sand. The link with advertising, and the idea of a 'beach from the ad', has stuck to Praia Banana ever since.
That fame, together with its real beauty, made Praia Banana the best-known beach in São Tomé and Príncipe and one of the main reasons to travel all the way to remote Príncipe. Unlike the country's wilder beaches, it gained some infrastructure through tourism (a small bar, sun loungers, kayaks), but it never lost the intimate, peaceful scale that makes it special.
After São Tomé and Príncipe became independent in 1975 and the Region of Príncipe gained autonomy in 1995, the island chose a development model built on conserving its extraordinary nature. That path led to 2012, when the whole island of Príncipe was declared a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. The listing recognised its almost untouched forests, its endemic species and its marine ecosystems, including the beaches where turtles nest.
Much of the island's heritage restoration and sustainable tourism is linked to the South African tech entrepreneur Mark Shuttleworth and his company HBD, which invested in restoring historic roças and opening low-impact luxury hotels. As part of this work, plantations such as Belo Monte were restored and given new value, and beaches such as Praia Banana came to be looked after as part of Príncipe's natural and tourism heritage.
Today Praia Banana brings together the best of that history. It has the natural beauty of an untouched volcanic cove, the memory of cocoa embodied in Roça Belo Monte, the aura of a legendary beach left by the Bacardí advert, and the protection that comes with Biosphere Reserve status. Walking down to its golden sand, with the palms leaning over the turquoise water, puts you in touch with the nature, history and legend of Príncipe all at once.
