“Swimming OK, staying not OK”: Behind the fight for equitable beach access in Mauritius and beyond

I’m kneeling on the sand with a hoe in hand as the sea breeze blows in my hair. With a group of about 20 other people, I am planting veloutier argenté on the beach. This native shrub, whose small leaves shimmer in the light, protects the coast from erosion. It is September 2020 and this is Pomponette, a beach in the south of Mauritius that we’re trying to save from privatization.

Mauritius is a small tropical island of around 700 square miles (2,000 square kilometers) off the southeastern coast of Africa. The main island of a larger republic that includes Rodrigues, Agalega, and formerly the Chagos Archipelago (now in the crossfire of negotiations between Starmer and Trump), Mauritius has been colonized by the Dutch, Portuguese, French, and British before independence in 1968. Colonizers brought enslaved people from East Africa and indentured laborers from India—my ancestors among them—to work on sugarcane plantations. Traders from Southern China and other parts of India also immigrated here in the 20th century, adding to its complex social fabric.

Last summer, I set out on a small public access experiment along the western coast of Black River, one of the most popular tourist areas. Home to the island’s largest nature reserve, Black River Gorges National Park, and some of the oldest fishing villages established by disenfranchised Africans, such as Case Noyale, it’s a coastline with mangrove estuaries that you can explore by kayak. At the southern tip, Le Morne Mountain ranks among the country’s most scenic hiking spots—and a UNESCO World Heritage Site as a former refuge for runaway enslaved people in search of freedom.

My experiment was this: How easy would it be to walk from La Preneuse, a stretch of coastline lined with luxurious villas, to the busy public beach of Tamarin?

As Mauritian locals, we have our own relationship with the beach, one that’s less about cocktails on plush sun loungers, and more eating biryani on stackable plastic chairs in the sand. For generations, the beach has offered Mauritian families a rare third space of respite: From the cane field, the factory, and now, the office.

It’s where old stories of the werewolf Touni-Minwi (‘Naked Midnight’) come alive by the bonfire and nights are spent camping under the stars while drinking local cane rum. But for many years now, the longstanding relationship between locals and land is under threat as these beaches become increasingly inaccessible.

“We strongly believe that protecting landscapes and maintaining public access actually strengthens tourism When local communities continue to feel connected to the coastline, they remain proud of it and naturally become its best ambassadors.”

- Carina Gounden, organizer and activist, MRU 2025

Beach access is a growing issue worldwide. Recently, several reports have drawn attention to beach access in the Caribbean. In January, travel journalist Lily Lebawit Girma reported that only one percent of Jamaica’s beaches remain publicly accessible. The 1956 Beach Control Act, enacted during the colonial era, has allowed the Jamaican state to lease or sell 99 percent of the coast to private developers, many of whom have built all-inclusive resorts and luxury villas. In the Dominican Republic, real estate developments are also restricting locals’ access to the beach, as reported by Moraima Capellán Pichardo in 2022.

The situation here is strikingly similar. I’ve come to learn that access is a transnational issue that affects many small, colonized or postcolonial islands with enduring legacies of unequal land ownership—and strong tourism industries.

In Hawaii and Puerto Rico, while the law protects public access to the beach, gentrification continues to create conflicts between local beachgoers and property owners over issues such as whether a pool is infringing on the beach. In the same Indian Ocean region as Mauritius, complaints from Seychellois locals about hotels restricting their access to public beaches were reported a decade ago, but no recent reports. Meanwhile, in French Polynesia, the problem seems more serious, with only three public beaches left on Mo’orea Island after a wave of coastal privatization.

La Preneuse to Tamarin is only a one-hour walk. I decided to stick to walking on the sand, bypassing inland shortcuts—and quickly discovered this wasn’t as easy as it should be. The Mauritius Beach Authority lists 134 public beaches. According to a 2024 report by the Law Reform Commission titled Criminalization of denial of access to public beaches in Mauritius, these beaches cover only 48 out of the 200 miles (322 kilometers), or less than 15 percent, of our coastline.

Meanwhile, hotels and private villas have leased nearly 40 percent—about 75 miles (120 kilometers)—of coastline from the state. The classification of the rest is unclear, though it likely includes forests and agricultural land. On this ‘expedition’, I had to walk through the gardens of several villas that blocked access to the water’s edge, shimmy along narrow concrete ledges beside hotel or villa pools, and even climb over the rocks that several property owners had intentionally piled onto the public strip of sand in front of their villas.

And for that hour, I was the only brown local around. I drew a few odd looks, even though my walk was perfectly legal. I even came across passive-aggressive signs. The most absurd one, in front of a hotel, read: “LEASED BEACH: WALKING OK, SWIMMING OK, STAYING NOT OK.”

Here’s where things get complicated. Even in front of hotels and villas, the law states that any part of the beach “between the high-water mark and a distance of 100 meters from the low-water mark” remains public—even if the upper section of the beach has been leased out. It’s written in black and white in the Beach Authority Act of 2002. A similar law exists in the Seychelles and Hawai’i.

The Law Reform Commission’s report proposes to criminalize attempts to restrict access to the beach, even if it’s just the narrow strip of sand under the high-water mark, where anyone is allowed to sit. Staying should always be OK. No sign or security guard should intimidate beachgoers.

In another part of the world, multiple Supreme Court rulings in Hawaii, such as those in 1994 and 2006, have upheld the public’s right to beaches. It has curbed attempts by private property owners to restrict access, including claims that the vegetation that they planted could replace the natural high-water mark in demarcating the public beach.

I’m no newcomer to this issue. My 20s, between 2016 and 2024, were shaped by my participation in the beach protests led by the activist group AKNL. Aret Kokin Nu Laplaz, which translates to “stop stealing our beaches,” is a registered NGO and organization in Mauritius. Their approach to protesting is joyful: They welcome locals, tourists, and expats to picnic and camp on beaches threatened by privatization.

We’d bring food to share and musical instruments to play. AKNL’s symbolic protest site is Pomponette Beach in the south, where I, along with many others, have helped plant native trees. In 2016, it was deproclaimed as a public beach when the state granted a lease to a South African real estate developer that was mired in controversy over the lack of transparency surrounding its lease and arrears. This sparked AKNL’s decade-long fight—culminating in Pomponette Beach being restored to public status in 2025.

While AKNL continues to organize beach clean-ups, it has, following the victory of Pomponette, evolved from a grassroots protest movement into a lobbying group, MRU 2025 (MRU stands for “Mauritius”) that advocates for coastal protection with the state.

While most luxury hotels are locally owned, ownership is concentrated among a few family conglomerates that emerged from the island’s colonial plantation economy.

“We strongly believe that protecting landscapes and maintaining public access actually strengthens tourism,” Carina Gounden, one of AKNL’s organizers, tells me. “When local communities continue to feel connected to the coastline, they remain proud of it and naturally become its best ambassadors.”

What’s next for MRU 2025, formerly AKNL? The organization is now advocating to transform an entire stretch of the southern coast into a seven-mile (12-kilometer) protected ecotourism trail from Gris Gris Beach to La Cambuse Beach. “What we are proposing there is not simply a conservation project; it is a different way of thinking about tourism and territory,” says Gounden. She notes that the south of the island still has relatively fewer hotels than the rest of the Mauritian coast and “preserves striking natural landscapes.”

Gris Gris is one of the few areas of the coast not protected by coral reefs, with clifftop views of crashing waves. The trail would pass landmarks such as the bridge-like volcanic rock formation over the sea known as Pont Naturel, the blowhole Le Souffleur, and the secluded, verdant beach of Le Bouchon.

The connection between local people and the beach is a more intimate one than just beachtime pleasure. In 2025, Fabian Pierre Louis, a young man from the Afro-descendant fishing community of Black River, starred in a documentary, Bann Vag Laliberte (Waves of Freedom) by Christopher Amurat— Mauritian singer, filmmaker, musician, and decolonial thinker. It explored how his community is resisting gentrification—when we chat on WhatsApp, Pierre Louis tells me that “the quietest beaches, where we’d go to feel at peace, are now hard to get to if we want to camp with friends.”

For Pierre Louis, Mauritian beach culture is about community and ancestral connection. For generations, his family has played the ravann (goatskin drum) and danced the sega—a dance that originated from the ritual music of Madagascar and mainland Africa—on the beach at night to honor ancestors who survived slavery. He enjoys meeting tourists who mingle with locals, but also believes that real estate developments that deepen income inequality lead to “sadness, resentment, and a sense of materialism” in his community.

I’ve known Amurat, the documentary’s director, for years through our involvement in the island’s overlapping arts and environmental activism communities. “In an alternative future, tourism could look fundamentally different,” he tells me. “People could host foreigners directly in their own home. This would create deeper, more meaningful connections between visitors and local communities. Tourists would learn to respect culture not as a product to consume but as living practices to engage with authentically.”

Even if homestays are more common on Rodrigues than on Mauritius, he argues that this shift is crucial to the decolonization of Mauritian tourism. While most luxury hotels are locally owned, ownership is concentrated among a few family conglomerates that emerged from the island’s colonial plantation economy. According to the historian Jean-Claude de l’Estrac in Terres: Possession et dépossession (2020) [Land: Ownership and Dispossession], most private land in the country belongs to just 10 Mauritian families of French origin. This enduring colonial pattern of land ownership remains closely tied to the tourism industry. But a shift toward bed-and-breakfasts, homestays where travelers share meals like rice and saltfish with local families, and village tours led by residents would help distribute tourism revenue more evenly among Mauritians.

One surprising revelation during my research is some Mauritian hotels that are part of local conglomerates do see accessible beaches as central to the guest experience. When I eventually reached Tamarin Beach at the end of my walk, I felt re-energized by the lively scene: Noodle shacks, shaved ice vendors with their homemade tamarind syrup, children playing football, elderly women in sarees napping on inflatable mattresses, tourists suntanning on towels, and surfers emerging from the waves.

On the other side of the road is Veranda Tamarin, a cozy three-star hotel. “Being located opposite the public beach in Tamarin Bay allows our guests to experience a genuine slice of Mauritian life. We want our hotel to reflect the spirit of the village and the surfing culture of the west coast,” Emma Rioux, the hotel management’s spokesperson, tells me. I agree. From Mauritius to Jamaica to Puerto Rico, beaches should be about the rhythm of the lives of the people who call them home.

My hope for the future of tourism here is the same as Amurat’s: Equity and more opportunity. It may be hard to imagine, yet the persistence of Mauritian activists has yielded small but meaningful gains. The state meanwhile has been inconsistent, wavering between safeguarding the coastline and national heritage and yielding to real estate interests. The refusal of a coastal real estate permit around Le Morne Mountain in 2025 was hailed as a victory for conservation. However, by 2026—under pressure from an economic crisis tied to the Middle East conflict—billboards promoting MUR4 million (USD$85,000) villas have returned to the area. Our fight is far from over.

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