Zanzy!

No better night to reminisce upon our trip to Zanzibar than today. We have had three days of almost constant rain, and sideways blowing rain with lots of wind. Mel was dying yesterday without her normal afternoon walk so today I decided to brave the storm and well... I am not sure it was worth it! But at least she finally got to move her legs instead of spending her full day sleeping and lounging!

Anyways back to Africa... The flight had some stunning views with clear sights of Mount Meru and then the majestic turquoise blue colors of the Indian Ocean from the sky was incredible. We arrived and had the difficult task of trying to estimate how much money we would need for the time we were staying in beach side on the eastern side of the island because there are no ATMs and cards are not accepted. We failed at that, but more on it later.

We drove about 40 minutes across the inside of the island and along the coast until we reached Michamvi area, where Zeru Zeru was located. We had our own beach bungalows and each person had a bicycle to use. It was a 5 minute ride to the beach in one direction and about 10 minutes in the other direction. The bicycles were not in the greatest of condition, and our first few rides we had some adjusting to do. One of the seats would not stay up right and when we passed over the massive speed bumps the person riding would have a surprise!

Almost right after we got settled, we hopped on the bikes and headed down to the beach. The tide was coming up to high, so there was not a lot of beach space. We jumped into the water. The temperature was so warm, warmer than in Hawaii. It was so refreshing and I think the water temperature might have been higher than the air that late in the afternoon. The water was an amazing light blue/green color!

The other side of the bay

was where to catch the sunset! It was just beautiful.

Foot Pool

Zeru Zeru had recently been taken over by a new Italian owner and there was no restaurant at the hostel, but the new owner would cook for us upon request.. Menu was whatever you asked for or what he suggested. He told us his pasta was the real Italian pasta, "not that supermarket shit"... The area surrounding Zeru Zeru was some scattered homes, small kiosks where people were selling fruit, vegetables, and one corner had a market to buy some snacks.   The beach was lined with small resorts. The beach was very quiet and there were very few people. There were often groups of children playing on the beach together. It was really cute.

The world famous restaurant The Rock, accessible at high tide only by boat.

Our usual routine was to go for long bike rides on the beach in the morning, choose some shade to relax under during the hottest hours and go for a swim, and then cruise around, hit the pool, and then head to the other side of the bay for the sunset and for dinner with our head lamps for cycling on the super dark roads after the sunset. After we got back to our hostel, we would play a round or two of shit on your neighbor, then usually tucked in for bed around 10pm! It was so quiet and peaceful at night. One day, we tried to make it down to the next village  but with the condition of the bikes, the heat, and humidity we gave up! It felt like we were getting no where on the heavy, squeaky bikes! 

The woman at the hostel served us the standard Tanzanian brekky, that after almost 3 weeks we were a bit over. We had 2 crepes, a fried egg, with some toast, and fresh fruit! The fruit was my favorite part, usually it was mango or papaya. Then Tanzanian coffee or tea. Oh and on the table at each meal is the Tanzanian tradition, ketchup, and hot sauce. ALWAYS on the table, no matter what you were eating! This always made us giggle every time they put it there.

We were spending 4 days in Michamvi Bay and realized after two that we weren't quite going to make it on funds because we read on booking.com that the hostel owner would accept euros, however when we arrived he said he really preferred if we didn't pay in them.. Not realizing we would be cutting things close, we were like ya, no problem. Anyways, to survive we were looking for little restaurants or even shacks on the side of the road that served meals for cheap. While we didn't find any in the area, we did find a lady one day who sold samoasas. Someone came by to help us communicate we asked if she could make a bunch of them for us to have for lunch and pick up the following day. I think each one was around 10 cents or super cheap! So we would eat fruit and samosas for lunch and then eat at a restaurant for dinner. Most of the restaurants in the area were around the same price, but the game changer was the one that accepted our Euros and gave us change in the local currency! Without finding that place we would have had to make a trip to the ATM. The family was always super excited to see us as we then placed an order every afternoon. We also got some Passion Fruit Fanta's and some other snacks at the other corner store and that was the perfect treat for a "long" day in the African sun!

Sea Urchins mixed in with the sea grass

The bummer about swimming in ZNZ was there are tons of sea urchins. So at low tide, to walk out to the water maybe 300 meters away, takes 15 minutes trying to be super careful not to step on one of those buggers! The other bummer about our location was the intense changes that came with the tide. during high tide it was perfect, minus that most of the beach had disappeared. All of the villagers near our hostel were so friendly, the kids all saying "Jambo" (hello) to us, Joel giving out his famous fist bumps, and everyone thinking the guys were Spanish and them being annoyed and saying they weren't Spanish!! haha. All of the restaurants are all so relaxed with lounge chairs and tons of pillows and hammocks everywhere, the true beachy relaxed feeling.

The negotiations to buy this pineapple started at 5$! I think we got it down to 1.50

I shouldn't have been so surprised, because ZNZ is a super touristy destination but they overcharge so much. A beer on ZNZ was the same price as a beer, trucked in to the plains of the Serengetti! Meals were also so much more than what we saw in Moshi. This is a big reason why our counting went a little bit south.

Anyways I loved the beach days, I read like one and a half books, and had lots of beach naps, met some beach puppies, and just experienced true relaxation.



Then it was onto visit the city of Stone Town for our last day. I loved Stone Town. It is so full of life, diversity, and beauty. We wanted to organize a tour of a Spice Farm. As we were walking around we met a man who offered us a price much better than what they were saying at our hotel. We were a bit sketched out by the situation because he was showing us his tourist information card, etc. Anyways he said we would stop at a local place for lunch, and then take us to the Spice Farm. It was already quite late, I think we got into the taxi at 130pm, we were starving. The TNZ brekkys don't hold one over for many hours. Anyways, we are driving and driving and Joel asks the man when we are stopping for lunch. Then he says he forgot, Joel is super angry or shall I say hangry with the man, but we say we don't want to go back now because we can only go to the Spice Farm until a certain hour according to the guy. So we are all a bit on edge, and then we arrive and we have another tour guide at the spice farm. Our previous guide drops us with him, and we have already paid him.. We have no idea  if him and the taxi friend will just take off after our sketchy deal.

The Spice Tour and our tour guide was awesome!! It was so interesting so see all of the different things they can do with the plans, trees, and such from our spices. Like nutmeg can be used to make alcohol, why vanilla is so expensive (because it must be hand pollinated), the million different things they can do with the cinnamon tree, and the tons of natural remedies they use from the plants. (Cinnamon is the bark of the tree) We also had a guy who was along to cut little pieces from the trees and gave us a show of the natural lipstick, climb the coconut tree and so on. The best station was the exotic fruit station! As we were super hungry, we devoured so much fruit. I think our little bellies were completely full of fruit after the station. Jack fruit, the super big fruit with kind of a bumpy looking outside that hang from the tree are super delicious! I never would have imagined, I always kinda associated them with durians, but I was so wrong!

Delicious and Massive Jackfruit

nutmet, the alcohol part

Spice Tour fun

Fordham Gardens

After our tour finished up, we wandered our way around Stone Town. We were outside the Freddie Mercury house, and wandered through the little alley ways, and then around the beach and the pier. The local kids and teens were having the best time doing all sorts of flips off the dock into the water. Then on the beach, another group of kids were doing acrobatic stunts off of a tire in the sand. This was all with the famous dhow's in the background and the gorgeous sun setting. It was definitely a favorite moment of the trip for me. Just being there soaking it all in! We had heard about a food stall place that was recommended for dinner, however I was highly disappointed. It was super pricey when you added the different small things up together, and everyone seemed to have more or less the same thing and the only people there were tourists. That isn't exactly how I like to travel as many may know. If there are no locals, I don't think a place is authentic to the place you are visiting.  Anyways as we were looking for another place to have a small meal on our way back, we saw some little girls eating some soup type thing in a window.. We asked them what it was, they weren't really able to explain what was in the soup, but I think Joel negotiated to pay 40 cents for 2 bowls, so what was there to lose? What was there to gain? Maybe food poisoning? hahah the cutting board with meats chopped with just sitting around with flies all over. The dishes washed in a pot with very very dirty cloudy water, but hey we all made it through the night. We never quite understood what it was. Some sort of Tomato base, with tamarind sauce, fish balls, some crunchy noodle type stuff and some veggies. We were not in love with the taste, but it was some food.

Freddie Mercury House

Sugar Cane juice made fresh for .50 cents

Enjoying the sunset and amazing atmosphere in Stone Town

The tomato base, vinegar ish, tamarind paste, fish ball, etc soup.

Will we make it? YES

meat anyone?

The next day we walked around the market again which was really close to our hotel. We bought some spices to bring back and some different flavored teas. We had a long lunch at a delicious place with amazing fruit smoothies. I think mine was Passion Fruit and Jack fruit, then little dishes of curries, skewers, etc. Two little girls seemed to have been dropped off? or something on the bench next to join which connected to our table. As time went on they slowly kept sliding more and more towards us. I moved all of our bags from the bench and sure enough they eventually were sitting with us. First just giggling, staring, then they were trying to use their little drawing tool to make perfect circles... Joel asked for the paper and showed them how to do it. They giggled as we tried to communicate. Eventually someone came by again and picked them up.

The girls, inching closer and closer to our table

Not piri piri but pili pili

We had arranged with our taxi driver, Chaz from the day before to take us to the airport and negotiated a good price. As Chaz made a turn, the air conditioning vent part flew out of it's place onto Jorge's lap. We all tried really hard to contain our laughter but just couldn't. Chaz was distraught but we reassured him that if the positions were switched, we would also be laughing in our own car. We assured him also, should he ever be able to visit Portugal, that we would take care of him and not to take life too seriously! Anyways that left us giggling our entire trip home!

Our flights back with Ethiopian Airlines were fine. Our layover in Ethiopia wasn't the best because the airport doesn't have enough facilities for all of their passengers with layover, but other wise all was good.

I did love Stone Town and the Indian Ocean but ZNZ might have been a bit overrated in my humble opinion!

Now it is time to dream about the next journey! Malta, we are headed your way in April!

Lots of Love from the rainy rainy Portugal!
Nicole, Joel and Mel