Our story
About Papa Remo
A beach club and Italian kitchen on Love Island Beach — since Remo Lenzi opened the doors.
The family
The Lenzi family
One family has run this stretch of sand from the beginning — the man who cleared it, and the son who built it into what it is now.
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The founder
Remo Lenzi
After a working life in Rome, Remo Lenzi bought a piece of undeveloped land on the beach at Watamu, pitched a tent on it and built a shack. The children in the village called him Papa Remo — and that is the name that ended up above the door. He went on to build Papa Remo Village next door, and other places along this coast.
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The second generation
Roberto and Riccardo Lenzi
Remo’s son Roberto took what his father had started and made it the restaurant and beach club it is now — the kitchen, the beach, and the Saturday night the place is known for. He built it alongside his own son, Riccardo.
Writing in February 2024, on Remo’s ninety-fifth birthday, a visiting journalist found him still on this beach, still talking to the children who gave him the name.
Watamu
A love of this coast
Watamu takes its name from the Swahili for the sweet people, and the Lenzi family have spent their working lives among them.
They built on this coast without disfiguring it — makuti roofs, open sides, the trees left standing — and the kitchen, the bar and the beach have been staffed from this village for decades. Papa Remo is a Kenyan place that happens to cook Italian.
Known for
A name people travel for
More than a thousand people come down to the sand on a Saturday night — from Watamu and Malindi, and from a good deal further than that.
Resident DJ Delph plays every week, with guest acts through the season. On TripAdvisor the restaurant ranks #3 of 63 in Watamu, at 4.3 stars from more than seven hundred reviews.
The setting
Remo Lenzi's place on Love Island Beach
Remo Lenzi opened Papa Remo directly on the sand of Love Island Beach — a stretch of Watamu's coast known for its reef and its clear, calm water.
What started as his own kitchen on the beach has grown into a beach club, restaurant and wood-fired pizzeria, still run in the same spirit it opened with.
The kitchen
Italian cooking on the Kenyan coast
Grilled lobster with garlic butter, hand-made pasta, and pizza from the wood oven — Italian cooking built around what comes off this coast.
Every dish on the menu is priced in full, in the open, so you know what you're sitting down to.
Every Saturday
A dinner that grew into a party
The Saturday night has grown from a dinner crowd into the biggest beach party on this coast — a barefoot dance floor on the sand, and resident DJ Delph.
Elsewhere
What others have said
A few of the places Papa Remo Beach has turned up.
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Award
#3 of 63 restaurants in Watamu
TripAdvisor4.3 out of 5, from 700+ reviews
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In the press
“Papa Remo is one of Watamu's classic beachfront restaurants. Set right on the sand, it gives you exactly what people picture when they imagine a beach lunch here: ocean breeze, white sand, palms, sunbeds, cocktails and a view that does half the work before the food even arrives.”
Iconic Beachfront Restaurant
KlicKenyaAug 2026
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