Dakar

Walk. The Gorée embarcadère is about 400 metres east of the cruise berth, inside the port complex. The public ferry runs roughly hourly from early morning to late evening, with extra crossings on cruise days; the trip is twenty minutes each way. Tickets are CFA 5 200 (about USD 8) return for foreigners, sold at the kiosk on the day. Queues build before each departure — arrive thirty minutes early. Bring your passport; checks are spot but real.

Yes, and the rest of the island is the unexpected bonus. The Maison des Esclaves — the slave house with the famous Door of No Return — is a fifteen-minute walk uphill from the Gorée ferry dock. Entry is CFA 1 000 (USD 1.50); a guided talk in French or English runs every thirty minutes or so. The island itself is car-free, sand-streeted, painted in faded ochres and blues, and best given two full hours: the IFAN historical museum, the Castel battery at the top with cannons and a view back to Dakar, and a plate of fish at one of the beach restaurants.

Yes — it is fifteen minutes by taxi west of the port, on a hill at Ouakam. The monument is fifty-two metres of Soviet-cast bronze; you can walk around the base for free and pay CFA 6 500 (USD 10) to climb to the viewing platform inside the man's head. Combine it with a stop at the Mosquée de la Divinité in the cove below — five minutes further west. Round trip with a waiting taxi is about two and a half hours from the gangway.

Yes, with the usual urban-market alertness. Marché Sandaga at the corner of Avenue Lamine Guèye and Avenue Émile Badiane is the big one — fabric, leather, fake football kits, hot pepper paste in jars, and dense crowds; pickpockets work here, keep your phone in a front pocket. Marché Kermel two blocks south is calmer and indoor — colonial-era iron-and-glass rotunda with flowers, spices, baskets, and tourist-grade trinkets at the perimeter stalls. Bargaining is expected; first price is roughly double. French gets you further than English.

Only if you have a full port day and the lake is pink that week. Lac Rose (Lake Retba) is a salt lagoon about thirty-five kilometres north of Dakar, sixty to ninety minutes by road depending on traffic on the autoroute. The colour comes from a halophilic algae that blooms in the dry season (roughly November–June); during the rains it turns brown. Salt harvesters wade in to chest depth and shovel salt into pirogues — a real working operation, not a show. Allow five to six hours total. Independent taxi is CFA 35 000–45 000 for the round trip; ship excursions run USD 90–140 and add a 4×4 dune segment.

The West African CFA franc (XOF), pegged to the euro at roughly 656 CFA per EUR. Card acceptance is patchy — fine at the big hotels (Pullman, Radisson, Terrou-Bi), the airport, and the chain supermarkets, cash-only at markets, the Gorée ferry kiosk, taxis, and most restaurants outside Plateau. Euros are accepted at tourist sites at a worse rate; USD is not widely useful. ATMs at SGBS, Ecobank, and Banque Atlantique on Avenue Léopold Sédar Senghor dispense CFA against Visa and Mastercard. Small notes are useful for taxis and market change.