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Tuesday 21st September
An earlier breakfast than we had been used to was followed by packing our heavy and cumbersome rucksacks instead of the routine extra snooze. Checking out we said our farewells and were shown where to catch the Matatu (think of the tiny Toyota minibuses) to Stone Town by the owner of the resort. Another fine example of the friendliness of Tanzanians as he passed us his card stating if we had any problems or questions to just give him a ring.
We left the resort and walked up the long dusty road towards the bus stop, passing the newly built developments on our right and the shacks and rubbish on our left. The walk was proved longer than it should have but we were both way laid by our bags, our first real trek with them on. A bit of tinkering and eventually I found a comfortable balance but TJ, her small frame not helping, was finding the weight difficult. We eventually got to our destination, our bus there to greet two sweat drenched travelers with little or no moaning from an aching TJ, good girl!
We boarded and started our journey down the coast of Zanzibar to stone town, a distance of around sixty kilometers, not a long way but made timely due to the numerous number of stops that the small Japanese van made. Each stop the conductor would dangerously jump out of the moving van ushering everyone on board and helping with the bizarre range of luggage before running alongside of a pulling away vehicle and again jumping on before it gained too much speed. It was an interesting journey seeing the beautiful Zanzibarian landscape but more interestingly was seeing the way all of the people helped each other. As people joined the bus everyone would help them in, move to let everyone sit and amazingly look after complete strangers babies and children. It was incredible to see two huge young African men get given a woman's six month old child to hold for the whole journey, all this was done without a blink of an eye and the two men were more than happy to take care of such a cute baby. I couldn't help but think of England and how this situation would never arise, a sad result of our over protective society.
As we arrived in Stone Town instantly you could see the differences in buildings and infrastructure compared to the rest of Zanzibar. Gone were the shacks and new resort hotels of Nungwi, replaced by old moroccan style buildings with narrow allies and huge ornate wooden doorways. One thing remained the same however... The sun was shining! As we stepped off the Matatu we were greeted by the usual crowd of taxi drivers and those wanting to 'help' us find our hotel, we politely refused and busied ourselves with strapping our lumbering packs on to our backs. After a little bit of wandering around the crowded street we eventually got our bearings, our hotel wasn't far and we headed off through the narrow streets. Stone town was something quite different, as we wandered the cobbled paths, shop keepers beaconed us in; street sellers called out their different wares and produce; the different smells radiated from each corner, some bad others divine.
We had been turning corners, avoiding the occasional moped and many bicycles, for a little over half an hour before we finally gave up and admitted that we were lost. None of the streets were named and the building so compact that getting bearings from landmarks was nie on impossible, we started asking the locals for directions and everyone looked puzzled when we showed them where our hotel was supposed to be. The heat of the day was intensifying and we were both struggling with our heavy packs, having to stop very five minutes to adjust TJs straps. Eventually we turned a corner to see a man being filmed, finding this very odd we stopped and observed only to be approached by a jolly looking fellow who asked if we needed help. We told him our situation and that we could not find our hotel, the Warere townhouse, he too seemed puzzled and kindly enough produced his mobile and gave them a ring for us. Soon we were on our way in the right direction after a nice chat where we discovered that the man being filmed was in fact the local mayor, maybe a chat about roadsigns may have been in order!
After departing the Matatu we had been walking through Stone Town for a good hour eventually ending up in the place that we had started, our cursed map showing the wrong location of the hotel. A further ten minute walk an we were eventually taken through a few dodgy alley ways by a friendly taxi driver to our hotel. We were exhausted, sweaty and sore from our unnecessary trek but pleased to finally lose the weight off our backs as we were greeted by the friendly manager. He chuckled at our plight stopping every sentence to have another smile, grinning he showed us where we were on the map before chuckling again as he showed us to our room. Our room was small and basic with Old Zanzibarian furniture, smashed mirrors in the shower, a bizarre layout with a sheet sperating the toilet to the bedroom and mattresses that didn't fit the bed. The bed sheets werent particularly clean but the bed was comfortable... To be honest I think we would have taken just about anything right then, that and the price being the only reason we stayed there.
Putting the room behind us we ventured out to explore more of Stone Town, without our rucksacks. As we left the hotel we were again reminded of our location by the chuckling hotel manager, I'm sure he was constantly high and given directions into town. Leaving the hotel we could really see that the location was in a secluded square behind a derelict church, amongst rubbish and dirt paths which led to the road to the docks, not the most ideal location but it was safe enough and not far from everything. We wandered down the road to the seafront passing the locals eating, chatting and generally sitting around watching life pass them by. We eventually passed a bar called Freddies, named and dedicated to Zanzibarian born Freddy Mercury and decided that a much deserved drink was in order. As the sun began to set we both enjoyed watching the locals have a remarkably skillful game of football next to another group who were back and front flipping off a tyre onto the sand. After three or four drinks we wandered up the now dark coastal street in search of dinner, finding it eventually in a quiet curry house. We had been amazed not only with the architecture in Stone Town but also the difference in people, Stone Town was an extremely welcoming and beautiful place to be.
Wednesday 22nd September
A long discussion the night before resulted in the decision to leave Africa early, we had originally planned to stay in Stone Town for four nights and Dar for another four. After much reading we decided that there wasn't that much to see and do in both places, that coupled with the want of clean sheets and a bug free room! We'd decided on another night in Zanzibar and one night to experience Tanzania's capital, a little rushed perhaps but we both felt the added days in Asia would be more beneficial. A quick phone call to change our flights and a wander down to the docks to book our ferry over to Dar and we were all set to spend our last day wandering around Stone Town. The sun was again out and we enjoyed stolling around the warren like streets, each building beautiful in it's own right and all with wonderfully ornate wooden doors.
A trip to a small art gallery proved a fantastic idea as we were treated by wonderful artwork of the local buildings and people, ranging from bright acrylic paintings to intricate pencil drawings. Here we also were able to see a collection of all the different spices that are grown and exported from the island, it was great to see all the spices in it's original and finished form. As the afternoon wore on TJ was beginning to struggle with all the walking, she had a nasty bite on her toe that had swollen up severly and was making walking very painful. With this we decided to relax on the seafront with a drink or two in the old Englishman's Club, now a hotel, it had a wonderful balcony where we sat and chatted as the sun began to set. The building was beautiful and the inside had been restored to it's former glory with marble flooring and a wonderfully grand spiral staircase and typical huge ornate arched entrance way.
As night set in we wandered around the night food market taking in the wonderful smells of the freshly caught seafood, much to Tejal's disgust! We got chatting to another family from America who had seen us on their travels around East Africa (I think we might stick out a bit, mixing it up!), they recommended against the food, saying it was yesterdays catch, we dually took their advice and headed to a nearby gujarati restaurant to appease TJ's veggie needs. Amazingly they weren't that friendly and the food was pretty mediocre, a stark change to what we had been used to. After a few drinks we found ourselves back in our hotel sleeping through the noises of the alleyways and the call to prayer of the nearby mosques, we had an early start with a long ferry ride across to Dar Es Salam. Stone Town had been an interesting place a wonderful mix of East African and Arab culture, it had been my favorite place in Africa mainly for the stunning architecture and interesting history. We were both however getting increasingly excited at the prospect of Singapore.
Mark & Tejal xxx
- comments
Suzanne Lovely to hear about your final days in Africa and looking forward to reading about Singapore. Missing you both and thinking of you often. We have just come back from our few days in Dubai - beautiful hotel, fantastic weather and we went in the sea every day!!! Let me know your landline number so that we can call you in the next couple of days. Love Mum xxxxx