The Spice Islands- Zanzibar!

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ZANZIBAR ISLAND

So after all the wild animals in the national park, the truck drove us down to Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania's busy capital. We were only here though to catch the ferry to Zanzibar one of the Spice Islands off the coast of East Africa in the Indian Ocean.
What an absolutely beautiful place and I recommend it to everyone. Stone town is in the South and it's where we spent our first night. With its 19th Century buildings closely packed together forming winding alley ways all through the town its easy to get disorientated- every narrow street leads you somewhere different but the recurring carved wooden doorways trick you to believe you've been that way before.
Zanzibar was one of the last places in Africa to abolish slavary, this was highlighted when we visited the old slave chambers (although in comparison to Cape Castle's holding chambers these were less frightening).
Stone Town was also a home to David Livingstone for a while before his last expedetion and was birthplace to Freddie Mercury, and we happened to go to a bar named Mecury's for a drink.
Further north on the island we toured around the governments spice plantations, the guide showed and gave us samples of the growing forna including turmeric, cardamen, cinamon and ginger. Apart from spices, they also showed us the cotton from trees and lipstick from pods.

The next three days we moved further north to the white sands and crystal seas- and im not elaborating. I thought I could be in the Caribbean or Seychelles. I was stunned by its beauty and how no one had ever mentioned it before! It was so relaxing, lazing about on the beach or swimming in the warm sea. One day we took a little boat out to snorkel some coral reefs off the shore of a private island, on the way Dolphins swam alongside the boat and there were some cool fish. I think I may have screamed a little when I first saw Dory lol (from finding nemo). We also saw trumpet fish, black and white stripy fish and an octopus.

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