Weather and Climate in Morogoro

Before I begin discussing the weather and climate here, I should note that I have only been here seven weeks and that is not really a good sample size of what the weather is like here, so read this post with that in mind.

When we first came to Tanzania, it was very hot and very dry. There was a lot of dust everywhere. I had heard that rain has been scarce throughout the country in the last few years and a lot of greenery has died off because of that.

Generally, days were very hot and sunny with a few clouds. Most people rest and stay out of the sun from about 11 until 3 or 4 (my estimate). Walking home for lunch (and then back into town after) can cover me in a lot of sweat. It’s kind of gross, but everyone here is sweaty all the time, so it’s not that big of a deal.

The mornings and evenings, however, are generally quite cool, though I would not go so far as to say they are cold – which some locals would try to tell you. If it weren’t for the mosquitoes that come out then, it would be a very nice time of day.

Soon after we arrived, we were told that the short rainy season (which typically begins in November) would arrive early because of the El Nino effect. A few weeks into my stay, we started to get some brief spurts of rain. It would come down for a few minutes. Sometimes it would be hard. Sometimes it would spit. We had about a week of rain and then a couple weeks of a lot of sun. This week we had a couple of pretty big downpours. I read somewhere that there have been landslides triggered in Tanzania due to the large amounts of rain that have been falling after such a long time without them.

For about a day after each big rain, it gets a little humid here and the dust dies down. But due to the heat, the water evaporates and the dust comes back very quickly.

These rains will likely (according to my friends here) continue to December or January. Then from March to May there will be a lot of rain. I’ve been told that sometimes the downtown streets completely flood at that time. After those rains, it’s pretty dry again until the fall.

Lately the weather has been cooler and I’m hoping this continues for my traveling (which starts in just over a week!). Hopefully the rains don’t pour down on me when I’m camping.

Anyway, that’s a brief snippet of the weather and climate here. It is by no means scientific and based solely on what I’ve seen and heard from people who live here.