Grand-Bassam Excursion

A colonial capital 43 km from Abidjan

Grand-Bassam lies 43 km east of Abidjan. It was the first colonial capital of Côte d'Ivoire, from 1893 to about 1899, until the capital moved to Bingerville after a yellow fever epidemic. The Nzema people, who dominated the Assinie and Grand-Bassam coast, are credited with founding the town. Its historic core, listed by UNESCO in July 2012 as the "Historic town of Grand-Bassam", is the Quartier France.

What to see

The sources list the national costume museum (Musée national du costume), a ceramics centre, the lighthouse commissioned in 1901, the former post office and the Sacré-Cœur cathedral. A 177 m wharf recalls the time when the port was the town's gateway. The seafront, lined with paillotes, is described as very busy.

Size and population

The commune covers 127 km² and counted 124,567 inhabitants in 2021.

The Abissa festival

Each autumn the Nzema celebrate their new year here with the Abissa, usually in October and November.

Combining Grand-Bassam and Assinie

Our earlier version of this page said Grand-Bassam was 15 km from Assinie. That figure was wrong. Assinie is 80 to 94 km from Abidjan and Grand-Bassam is 43 km, so expect roughly 40 to 50 km between them, which is our own deduction from those two distances and not a surveyed figure: check a live map. We found no sourced fares or travel times for the transfer, so ask your accommodation.

Sources

Wikipédia, Grand-Bassam (distance, capital, UNESCO, monuments, population); Wikipédia, Nzema (peuple) (founding by the Nzema); Wikipédia, Assinie (distance from Abidjan). The two sources disagree on the exact UNESCO inscription day (1 or 3 July 2012).