Zanzibar Magic

Day 23, 19 February 2011

We still wake up early expecting the warm ‘’washy wash’’ and tea to be brought to our tent/bed, despite the fact we are now in a hotel room with a flat bed and solid doors. So at 6am we duly woke up, but no tea!

With much lethargy and fuss we had managed to re-pack the bags the night before. However I swear the only things we have packed was the grime from mountaineering embedded in our clothes, but these bags and their stretching seems indicate otherwise.

An early breakfast, with extra strong coffee and we prepared for the transfer to Kilimanjaro international airport. When walking around the hotel you could not but help to notice that the different guests seemed to be spilt into two categories, the sprightly, energised guest preparing to climb vs the hobbling, groaning reduced life forms of guests who had visited the mountain.

The transfer was fine, then going through initial security was fine, until we noticed that no one was at the desk to check anyone in. A substantial queue had formed and a had rumour started that there were passengers from the previous morning flight who were overbooked and were placed on this flight. After some good rugby tactics and scouting/ flirting by W, we were checked in via the business class desk and given our seats.

We are now good at concealing the size and weight of my day pack for fear that someone will ask to weigh it. I ran into problems with the second security gate with my wedding ring again! W and I cannot figure why mine sets the detectors off and hers does not.

We flew into Zanzibar international and still had to get checked for yellow fever vaccinations and entry despite it having been a domestic flight?

During the drive to the Coral Rock, we commented about some of the similarities between the sights of Vietnam and Tanzania. You can see lots of new construction and new buildings shouldered beside ‘slum-like’ houses and children wearing clothes that seem to be 8th or 9th hand me downs. Interestingly, the children all seem to happy and smile and wave all the time as you drive past in the car. They still squash more people onto a car then seats are available.

If you didn’t have a transfer or did not know where the hotel was, you would never find it. You turn off the major highway (a two way road) into a village town of houses built out of coral rock and about one room big. There are no signs and no way of knowing if you are being taken somewhere dangerous until the car pulls up in front of the resort.

The room we’re n is basic but beautiful, with an amazing private beach view you would find hard to beat. This part of the island faces the Indian Ocean and has very large tidal beach, so at low tide you can walk for 500m out to pure beach and then at high tide the water rushes in to crash against the coral rock foundations. The erosion has us intrigued as the edge overhangs by about 3m, luckily the buildings are a bit further back, we think.

We agreed today was ‘I don’t care’ day. Many beers were ordered, a massage booked for tomorrow, washing handed in and the atmosphere soaked up. This culminated in us falling asleep during the afternoon and then completely missing dinner. Another similarity to Vietnam.

Day 24, 20 February 2011.

After waking up feeling somewhat seedier then previously remembered for while. We got up and started to return to the real world. We checked emails and enjoyed breakfast from an open air restaurant hut. The day was spent lounging and relaxing. It certainly is much closer to the honeymoon idea then climbing out of tents at strange hours of the night.

We also feel clean again. The massages included a scrub, so now dirt embedded from Meru and Killi has been forcefully removed. The laundry came back pristine, 2 whole garbage bags for 20,000 TSH! (about $13 Australian). Don’t know how long it will last though.

Day 23, 21 February 2011

Beach excursion day.

We booked a beach excursion for today so at about 8.15 we were picked up and driven to a remote beach and put on one of the local boats to explore a remote island beach.

The boat ride was idealic in an old wooden skiff (W commented she was happy that at least there were life jackets easily available). When we arrived at the beach there was almost no one around except a family at the other end of the beach 100m away, and some local women collecting pippis from the sand.

The sand was pure white and the waters deep blue. We went for swim and splash and settled in to read some books in the shade of cave.

Just before lunch we went snorkeling. We jumped back on the wooden skiff and then eased our way around the side of the island to coral reefs. Although hard to compare to the great barrier reef, there were great mounds of coral to explore and many fish to see. The amount of coral rock that has built up on the island is quite substantial. We were there for about 2hrs just swimming and snorkeling.

Back to thee beach for lunch, the menu;

Hot rock cooked lobster, prawns, fish, calamari and octopus
Sides of fresh potato wedges, rice and special sauce
Desert; fresh fruit including coconut, watermelon, mango, pineapple and chocolate

Seems tough doesn’t it?

Karma however said there was price to be paid. We had bought some more sunscreen locally that said it was SPF 60. We applied it liberally, often and covered up every time we sat out of the water. We still came back looking like lobsters. Where W and I applied the sunscreen from Australia, no problems, where we applied the local sunscreen on our backs and legs, big red problems. My back and W’s legs are looking very angry at the moment. Lots of coconut butter has been applied, but tonight’s sleeping is looking questionable. This is after we were admonishing all of the Europeans for hanging out in the sun without any cream on!

Day 25, 22 February 2011

Sleeping with sunburn is not fun. At least now we can call it a real holiday.

Today is get ready day. We are tidying up and doing the admin of reviewing emails and getting the blog ready for posting. There are heaps of photos to be sorted and accommodation for Stone Town needs to be determined/ booked.

(Lots of sleep and lazing also).

Bring on Stone Town!