Parklands

Nairobi's South Asian quarter: temples, dosa counters, hospitals and cheap solid hotels, three kilometres from the CBD.

Parklands is where Nairobi's Gujarati, Punjabi, Ismaili and Jain communities have lived and traded for a century, and it still smells like it — cardamom, frying bhajia, incense from the temples on Limuru Road. It runs from Museum Hill roundabout out along 1st to 6th Parklands Avenue and Ojijo Road towards Highridge and Westlands. It is denser and scruffier than the leafy western suburbs, with far better food per shilling than anywhere else in the city. If you eat vegetarian, this is the single best base in Kenya.

The centre of gravity is Diamond Plaza and Diamond Plaza II off 4th Parklands Avenue: a car park ringed by a food court where you queue at counters for pani puri, dosa, kulfi and Nairobi-style chilli chicken. Two people eat properly for KSh1,200 to KSh1,800. Around it sit fabric shops, phone repair kiosks, gold dealers and travel agents selling Dubai flights. Weekends are chaotic and parking is a blood sport. Come on a Tuesday evening if you want the food without the elbows.

Two of Nairobi's best hospitals — Aga Khan University Hospital on 3rd Parklands Avenue and M.P. Shah on Parklands Road — mean a steady flow of medical travellers from across East Africa, and that shapes the hotels. There are lots of them, they are functional rather than pretty, and they are cheap: KSh4,000 to KSh9,000 buys a clean en-suite room with breakfast, and KSh12,000 to KSh18,000 gets you a genuine four-star. Serviced apartments for families with a patient in hospital are a whole local industry here.

At nine at night Parklands is half asleep in the residential streets and busy on the commercial ones — supermarkets open, chemists open, boda stages loud. It is not a nightlife district; Westlands is fifteen minutes on foot from Highridge and that is where people go. Skip Parklands if you want quiet greenery or a pool with a view. Take it if you want to eat exceptionally well, be near the museum and City Park, and pay two-thirds of Westlands prices for a comparable room.

Where to stay in Parklands

Book on or just off 3rd and 4th Parklands Avenue: you are within walking distance of Diamond Plaza, the Aga Khan hospital and a matatu into town, and the buildings are newer than the Ojijo Road end. Highridge, at the Westlands edge, is the compromise pick if you want Parklands prices with Westlands bars a fifteen-minute walk away. Expect KSh4,000 to KSh9,000 for a decent mid-range room with breakfast, KSh12,000 to KSh18,000 for the better properties with pools. Avoid rooms facing Limuru Road or Forest Road — both carry heavy traffic from 06:00 — and avoid the cheapest guesthouses clustered right at the Ngara boundary, which are noisy and mostly cater to trade rather than travellers. Confirm your hotel has its own parking; kerbside parking here is a daily argument.