West Coast (Suriname) Voyage Tips and guide

The West Coast region of Suriname comprises the three coastal districts between Paramaribo and the western border with Guyana: Coronie, Nickerie and Saramacca. It's a region celebrated for its bird life and the Bigi Pan nature reserve can be an absolute highlight in any Suriname travels. There are a few towns and some choices as far as accommodation goes, but this is a place away from the crowds and often overlooked by visitors.

Map of West Coast (Suriname)

The major towns in these districts are covered in more detail further below.

Coronie sits between the districts Saramacca and Nickerie. With just 3000 people living on an area of 3900 km² it is the least populated district of Suriname. It is very fruitful and famous for its coconut palms. Most people live on a thin strip along the coast to which the largest freshwater swamp of Suriname borders. Angling is very popular. Traveling on the Oost-westverbinding you see people who have a line out anywhere.

Nickerie is at the mouth of the Corentyne River that forms the border between Suriname and Guyana. The district covers 5,353 km² and has about 35,000 inhabitants. The county seat is Nieuw Nickerie, located on the River Nickerie. Another place of some importance is Wageningen. While between locals the place name is pronounced "NEE-KEE-ree", for international English speakers they often change it to "nigh-KEE-ree" (with an English "long I" on in the first syllable).

The main source of livelihood is rice cultivation and in addition fishing on the Corentyne River and Nickerie. Livestock is mainly cattle, but also sheep, goats, chickens and doksen (ducks) are cultivated. The population mainly exists of Hindus, but also Javanese, Chinese and Creoles live in the region.

The area consists of polders constructed during the Dutch colonization. The polders are protected against flooding by a seawall at the mouth of the Corentyne River in the Atlantic (zeedijk).

This district lies more or less between the rivers Saramacca in the east and Coppename in the west. Traditionally it is an area with dozens of small family farms.

The Northwest Suriname region is at the west of the coastal road (Oost-west verbinding) that crosses north Suriname. The 237 km from Paramaribo to Nieuw Nickerie take about 4 hr. Beware of slow trucks and agricultural vehicles, which take up much of the width of the road. The road is largely well-paved, except for the section immediately before arriving at Nieuw Nickerie, which is extremely deteriorated and ripe with potholes. Be aware of speed bumps which are signed as drempel. These can be very high to force reducing your speed to nearly null. Most bumps are constructed as twins at the entrance and exit of communities and junctions. The road is not marked with traffic lines. There are a number of small settlements littered along the road with supermarkets and gas stations. There is a security checkpoint about two thirds of the way to Nieuw Nickerie. Be prepared to present your passport and entry papers to the officer there.

Wageningen is about 50 km east of Nieuw Nickerie passing endless polders with paddies. This town is not on the Oost-west verbinding but is located 3km south.

There are also shared taxis (usually vans, sometimes called "buses") from Paramaribo to Nieuw Nickerie, which will pick you up anywhere in Paramaribo and drop you off anywhere in the Nieuw Nickerie area. Anyone in the tourism industry can probably give you the number of one of them.

Both the state bus service and private mini-buses run between Paramaribo and Nieuw Nickerie. In- and outbound state buses typically leave multiple times a day (starting at 06:00), although the schedule can vary depending on demand and vehicle availability. In Nieuw Nickerie, tickets can be purchased up to 24 hours in advance. At the Paramaribo bus station, "Heiligenweg" tickets can be booked at least a few hours in advance. The ride from Paramaribo to Nieuw Nickerie using the state bus will take you about 4 hours, including a break at a paid restroom (the cost is around SRD20). A single ticket, as of December 2025, costs SRD150.

Coming from Guyana travellers have to cross the Corentyne River by ferry at Moleson Creek to enter the Nickerie district. As of December 2025 the ferry costs US$20 one-way or $30 round trip. MAKE SURE TO BRING ENOUGH CASH: Unless it's different on the Guyana side than the Suriname side, they don't take cards and there are no ATMS nearby even by car. Both ferry terminals are located in the countryside. In the past it was reported that the ferry allows 30kg (66 lb) free and charges USD1 for every kilogram over. The 30 minute trip sometimes runs two or three times in one morning, but often only once, probably around 10:30am. See the "Get in" sections of the Guyana and Suriname articles for more information. The terminal at Suriname side (South Drain) is about 30km south of Nieuw Nickerie, which can be reached over a paved road (40 minutes). There's shared transport (mini-buses that will drop you at your exact destination) available at 400 SRD per person in December 2025.

• Canawaima ferry, ☏ +597 212331, +597 212332.  

On the sea wall at Nieuw Nickerie is an alternative for pedestrians to cross the Corentyne River. This back track is illegal but is silently tolerated by both governments. Smuggling is not uncommon. It's up to you to take the risk and to agree a price with a boatswain. Some locals claim that the boats are unsafe, and could sink or get your things wet.

• 5.955556-57.0394441 Majoor Henry Fernandes Airport (ICK  ^IATA, also known as Nieuw Nickerie Airport). asphalt surface airstrip, connections with Zorg en Hoop Airport in Paramaribo ORG ^IATA  
• 5.766669-56.6333312 Wageningen Airstrip (AGI  ^IATA). asphalt surface airstrip, connections with Zorg en Hoop Airport in Paramaribo ORG ^IATA  

Blue Wing Airlines, Caricom Airways ^{[formerly dead link]} and Gum Air fly on these airstrips.

The best way to get around on your own is by (rental) car. You need a 4WD on some dirt roads. There are also taxis (you need to call) and possibly a few buses.

On the shores of the Saramacca River, about 40 km west of Paramaribo, is rural Groningen. It's a nice place to visit if you want to escape from busy Paramaribo. Birdwatchers come from all over the world to study and admire the surrounding Saramacca district's toucans, parrots and cocks-of-the-rock. On the somewhat pathetic independence square you will find a large number of monuments that commemorate anything and everything: Javanese farmers, Boeroes, Surinam's independence, the abolition of slavery, etc. Near to the water is the tea house, a kind of kiosk which is a popular place for a picnic. Good food can be obtained at the adjacent restaurant Café River Breeze, a Javanese warung with a stunning view over the Saramacca River. Since the opening of the Hamburg-Uitkijk bridge in 2011, it is possible to drive a pleasant circular tour; from the Oost-West Verbinding, over the Saramacca bridge, via Groningen to Hamburg-Uitkijk and then back to the Oost-West Verbinding.

• 5.79257-55.474321 Café River Breeze, Groningen, ☏ +597 8789480, [email protected]. This is a nice Javanese warung overlooking the Samaracca River. They serve good food  

Nieuw Nickerie has about 14,000 inhabitants and that makes it the third largest settlement in Suriname! It looks like a village and in the centre is a freshwater canal full of water lilies that leads to the central Brasa square. 13:00-16:00 the town looks deserted as everything is closed, but it comes alive again until 19:00 when calm returns. So, Nieuw Nickerie is not exactly a swinging place. The main reason for tourists to visit this town is Bigi Pan (see below), although the sea wall is worth a short visit.

From Nieuw Nickerie the A.K. Doergasawstraat leads for 8 km direct to De Zeedijk (the sea wall). This wall is 7.5 km long and is called Klein Scheveningen (little Scheveningen) as you don't need much imagination to imagine a Dutch dike. You can find the backtrack to Guyana here where a lot of people hang around. North of the backtrack is a Hindu temple where the retired female manager changes the robes of the large number of religious sculptures on a regular basis. At the end of the wall is the local open air cremation place where Hindus from all over the country cremate their deceased relatives. This is a wonderfully nice place. It is said that here you can marvel at the most beautiful sunsets of Suriname.

• River Breeze Hotel. Good budget stay right downtown. Known to many locals by the name of the attached restaurant, OkopiBamboesie. Air conditioning, cold showers. 1,000 SRD for nice double on upper floor with window, 800 SRD for musty windowless room on ground floor. (updated Dec 2025)
• Concord Restaurant & Hotel. Also spelled "Concorde". Another budget stay downtown. Starting from 900 SRD. (updated Dec 2025)

Listings below may be badly out of date.

• Thien Thien, Westkanaalstraat, Nieuw Nickerie. Lovely Chinese food. 
• 5.96077-57.0279561 Lounge café Zeedijk, Abdul Ghanieweg 74, ☏ +597 897-3035, [email protected]. Tu-Su 16:00-02:00, closed on Monday. The lounge bar is on the second flour and has a large terrace from where you have a magnificent view on the seawall and the Atlantic ocean.  
• 5.94575-56.992631 ^{[dead link]} Residence Inn, R.P. Bharosstraat 84, Nieuw Nickerie, ☏ +597 210951, [email protected]. This hotel looks over Brasa Sq and has a terrace with a pleasant breeze. USD65 (breakfast included).  
• 5.94573-56.991032 Hotel Pak Hap, Emmastraat 9, Nieuw Nickerie, ☏ +597 212381, [email protected]. Mainly a business hotel. Tour reservations possible. dorm USD35, dbl USD65, Presidential Suite USD120.  
• 5.94306-56.992293 New Kow Loon, A.K. Doergasawhstraat 76 (On the corner of Oost Kanaalstraat), ☏ +597 231942, [email protected]. This is a lively place on the market, combining a restaurant with a hotel. Rooms are simple but adequate and breakfast is included. The restaurant serves a broad range of Surinam dishes, from different cuisines. Dbl from USD35.  

Totness is the district capital of Coronie. The name Totness as well as the names of other nearby hamlets, like Friendship, Mary's Hope and Burnside descend from English and Scots who settled here in the 19th century. It is a very laid back area with nice buildings along the main road and near the central square of Totness. If you only want to have lunch in Totnes you can go to Totness Palace, a Chinese restaurant, in the center. Along to Oost-westverbinding is opposite each other a Javanese warung and Kate's snackbar.

• 5.8819-56.335244 Staatslogeergebouw, Johan Kraagstraat, ☏ +597 235154. This hotel is located in a beautiful old building that reopened in 2013 after a long time of renovation  

a visit to this small town is not really a must do. Once this town was the centre of mechanized rice cultivation, a project of the Agricultural University of its namesake of Wageningen in the Netherlands. After independence in 1975 it collapsed and the gigantic complex with silos remains desolate. Still, a visit to this town can be pleasant as people are very friendly and hospitable. A statue of the (legendary) female slave Alida can be found on a square near the closed rice processing factory. A red spot indicates where her breast was cut off thanks to the jealous wife of a planter.

• 5.76914-56.690275 Guesthouse Hira, Sanicalaan, Wageningen, ☏ +597 453083. 6 rooms and is a good place to get acquainted with the Surinamese culture. Excellent food. SRD100.  
• 5.76584-56.689166 Hotel de Wereld, Molenweg 9, Wageningen, ☏ +597 233149. Named after the famous hotel in Dutch Wageningen where the German capitulation was signed in 1945. It’s a motel-like hotel from the 1950s. €20.  

Bigi Pan nature reserve is just east of Nieuw Nickerie township and is 135,000 hectares of open water, mudflats and mangrove forest, where visitors can spend the night on any of several stilt lodges clustered towards one side of the main lagoon. The water level is influenced by the ocean tides where salt seawater, as well as fresh inland water, alternately streams in and out.

It's a great place for bird watchers, with 72 bird species breeding here and dozens of visitors. A highlight for even the casual visitor is the Scarlet Ibis, a bird so bright pink that it has to be seen to be believed (it can be found almost all year, but is more difficult to see during the dry season from April to August). For the past decade or so (as of 2025), the lagoon has also hosted hundreds of relatively-dull-pink American Flamingos (roughly Nov-Apr). The most serious birders will want to book a birding-specific tour, but even the regular tour packages often include a fair amount of birdwatching in their boat excursions - bring your own binoculars if you can, though most guests get by without them. Herons, ospreys, storks, kingfishers, and other water birds are also abundant, making a daily feast of the fish, frogs, crustaceans and insects.

If your lodge offers night tours, you have a good chance of seeing nocturnal reptiles like tree boa snakes and spectacled caimains (a small relative of the alligator, more common in the wet season). Fishing is also easy here, and it's not so rare that fish will jump into your boat! It was once common to see monkeys from the canal on the way in, though as of 2025 it's reportedly now uncommon due to an illegal burn in the area having turned that part of the forest into a savanna.

• 5.95908-56.862831 Bigipan Adventures (Stefanie Eco Lodge), ☏ +597 878-3651. The OG of Bigi Pan guides, Stephanie now has her own stilt lodge, a delightfully modest outfit located in the open water of the main lagoon. This is likely to be the place you stay in as part of a budget Bigi Pan tour booked from Paramaribo, but you can also contact Stephanie directly. These days it's staffed by a few young men personally trained by Stephanie, all of them skilled boatsmen and serious nature guides (and good cooks to boot). A typical package includes an attached room with mosquito net, balcony, and ensuite bathroom; three meals a day with unlimited coffee/tea/cola with ice; at least two or three daily boat excursions to look at birds and scenery, a nighttime boat outing to look for snakes and caimans, and anytime free access to hammocks and sea kayaks. Arrival to the lodge is usually by included boat transfer (including birdwatching along the Jamear Canal) from Stephanie's private pier on the Nickerie River, hidden among the mangroves in the Longmay area east of Nieuw Nickerie town. Tours booked from Paramaribo run about €200-250 per person for two days and one night (about 24 hours at the lodge); tour agencies reportedly pay the lodge €95 per guest per night, exclusive of transport from Paramaribo or Guyana.  (updated Dec 2025)
• Akira Resort is a newer operation whose lodge looks like a dystopian Waterworld city compared to Stephanie's neighboring wooden lodge, and caters mostly to retirees at about twice the price of Stephanie's. The resort offers more privacy and space with its separated chalets, and more comfort, though Stephanie claims the air conditioning system isn't working as of December 2025.

There's no malaria in Suriname's coastal districts, but mosquitoes can be a nuisance in the whole country. Nickerie is no exception. During the day this is usually no problem but a good repellent is highly recommended. Also, protect yourself against the sun, especially on open water where a breeze can reduce your awareness of being irradiated.

On dirt roads, as well as on paved roads, big holes may become invisible after heavy rainfall. Be alert and respect speed limits.

• Guyana, Gouverneur Straat & West Kanaal Straat 10, Nickerie, ☏ +597 211019, fax: +597 212080. (updated Dec 2022)

If you're not bound to a fixed itinerary consider a trip to Guyana, which is just across the river. When you're travelling by car, you'll find the car ferry at South Drain, an otherwise unexciting town about an hour southwest of Nieuw-Nickerie and at the end of a rather bumpy road. If you're not planning to leave the country, move on to vast and wonderful Surinamese Rainforest or head back to Paramaribo. If you don't stop there but follow the "Oost-West verbinding" (the main road) all the way to its other end, you'll find yourself in Albina in Northeast Suriname - a starting point to go turtle watching or on the French Guiana.