Zanzibar, Stone Town & Beaches

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Anneke only would climb the Kilimanjaro if we went to Zanzibar afterwards to Relax on one of the beaches.......so we did!
Arriving in Stone Town after a long busride from Arusha and then the fast ferry, it was a hassle to find a good place to sleep. Most places were full already so we ended up at this crappy place just outside the centre of Stone Town. At night we went to the Forodani Gardens, along the shore, It is a great place with many food stalls and half the population of Stone Town and almost all tourist will gather there in the evening.
Great place to eat fresh seafood.....but with me being vegetarian and Anneke not liking seafood we were not the biggest buyers of the streetfood. We had an OK meal but the atmosphere there was just great.

We would spend a full day in S.T walking around the maze of small streets and enjoying some coffe, the sights, food and watching people. A nice and lazy day end we ended up drinking cocktail around sunset at a nice bar on the beach.

The north was supposed to be a good place for diving so we ended up going to Nungwi (the backpackers-place in the north) A nice place, with some good beaches, a nice outdoor bar with campfires in the evening and a volleybal net to get som action at the end of the day.
We went diving the 2nd day to Nemba Atol (a small island of the coast of Zanzibar) some bad weather heading there and even a rain storm when going back on our 2 hour boat ride but in between the diving and snorkling was pretty good.
We spend another lazy day at Nungwi before we went to the otherside of Zanzibar to Paje/ Bweeju

At Paje we met up with Cynthia ( a colleague of mine) and Matthijs and we had a good dinner together and shared some good stories and beers that evening.
Next day I tried to do some Kite-surfing.........but the kite crashed on the water after 15 minutes and it turned out to be severely damaged. So here ended my first day of Kiting.
I had better luck the next day, and slowely got the hang of it and had a great end riding a couple times back and forth.
That morning we also went on a bike trip to the lagoon. The four of us took of with a guide and to our surprise it was great snorkling around the lagoon. We could walk in from the shore so Anneke didn't need to worry about getting seasick this time!
After another day Kite surfing (wich was great) we went on a trip to swim with dolphins. (anneke skipped because of the seasicknes) but we ended up swimming with a couple dolphins before those dolphins were tired of getting chased by all the boats and tourist that morning. A great experience to see them underwater but out of the water it got crazier and crazier with all the boats moving around for the best spots near the dolphins.
We ended our stay with a great Swahilli dinner organised by Bellevue Guesthous in Bweeju. Than we left to stone town again to arrange a flight back to Nairobi. Since we didn't want to spend 3 full days to get back to Nairobi by boat and busses we were happy to find a flight so we could stay for 2 more days at Zanzibar.
First it was good to be back at Stone Town, enjoy the good food, cocktails and bars again.

Our last couple days we spent at Jambiani, finally we had a bungalow with sea view and we stayed in this quiet place with the personell there being the kindest and nicest tanzanians we met there.
With the bad weather we didn't feel like hanging out on the beach so we went to visit a small cave in the area. The rest of the day we filled by playing some games, teaching the locals some dutch, some reading and sipping a beer around the campfire.
A nice end of our trip to Zanzibar and the Kili

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Photos

Stone Town by night
At the Forodani Gardens

Relaxing in Stone Town
We couldn't afford to sleep at the luxury hotels but they are nice to buy a good cup of coffee and enjoying the views

Comments

[joerik]

lekker hoor!
Jaloers!