Travel Log part 2: Exploring the Zanzibar Archipelligo

Oren displaying a starfish we found in the shallows near our hotel.


Bujumbura--Addis Ababa--Congo Brazzaville--Kinshasa--Addis Ababa--Dar Es Salam--Zanzibar--Addis Ababa--Kigali--Bujumbura.  That is the routing that we took to go for a week of meetings in Kinshasa and a week's vacation in Zanzibar.  While it was tiring, I would say that it was worth it.  The complicated routing is due to the fact that there are few direct flights in Africa, and we were booked on Ethiopian Airlines which is mainly routed through  Addis.  I will say it is a generally a  good airline and the service was great on board.  We generally relaxed except on the last day when we had to leave Zanzibar at 3 in the morning.  We were routed back to Addis on a small turbo-prop plane for over 3 hours.  It was more disappointing to find that this same plane was to take us back to Bujumbura where we did encounter some bad weather enroute.  The worst of it was that when we did arrive, the plane, about 80% full with 60 passengers did not have enough storage capacity for all of our baggage.  So a full half of us found that our baggage had not arrived with us in Buja and we had to come back the next day to get it.  Despite all of that, though, I would say the trip to Zanzibar was well worth the bother, as Rebecca will explain below.  (I may add some comments from time to time)...

We landed in Zanzibar at the airport close to the main metropolis called Stone Town.  We drove an hour there across the island, finally arriving at the sleepy town of Bwejuu on the East Coast of Zanzibar at about 4 pm. Our lodging was actually located a few kms out of town, up the beach. The friendly staff of Upepo Boutique Beach Bungalows was on hand to welcome us and show us to our little thatch-roofed house. It just had one large room with 2 big beds and an ensuite bath, but it was perfect for a family. The towels were creatively decorated with fresh red hybiscus and yellow flowers. And there was a covered porch area where we could sit and relax outside. The whole place included only two bungalows and a restaurant with a capacity for about a dozen people (but we never saw other guests there besides ourselves and the other couple staying at Upepo).

We explored further and found some locally made beach lounging chairs facing the ocean under a set of little evergreens shaped like beach umbrellas. A nice local hammock hung in front of the restaurant. And overhead coconut palms rustled in the breeze-- a line of them stretching all along the beach north and south.

We visited Zanzibar in the off season so we felt like we had the beach pretty much to ourselves. As we took a walk along the shore at high tide we discovered that there were several other beach hotels on either side of ours, but all of them small, hosting maybe one or two couples in similar kinds of accommodations. The kids and I had to get in the water and we were shocked to find that it was as warm as bathwater! We'd heard that there was a shallow coral bay area fringing the beach, and obviously the water had been baking in the sun for a couple of days. Still it was fun to swim.

We ordered dinner at our hotel restaurant and were delighted with the food there, that night and every night. Zanzibar is a great place to go for culinary tourism! We enjoyed fresh fish and calamari, prepared in sweet, cardamom coconut sauce or spicy masala. The kids loved the whole grilled ocean fish rubbed with Zanzibar spice (with lots of chips on the side). For desert a few nights we enjoyed Zanzibar pancakes with chocolate (fresh crepes). And all the food came decorated with frangipani flowers, beautifully presented, freshly prepared.

Grilled Parrotfish

We were tired after our meetings in Kinshasa and two days of travel, so we had a good long sleep the next morning. We enjoyed a lovely breakfast of a sampling of 5 different tropical fruits, omelets and fresh bread, alongside delicious spice tea. And then, after playing in the sand for a bit, and making plans for the rest of the week, we decided that it was time to explore the ocean right in front of us at low tide.

We all set out with our rubber shoes and walking sticks provided by Upepo. The first hundred meters were challenging because there seemed to be a line of quicksand that wanted to suck our feet down into muck and suck our shoes off of our feet. Paul's rubber sandals proved to be unequal to the task of this shore walking and broke very quickly but luckily I and the kids had decent water shoes. Because after the quicksand, we then got to a place where the spiny sea urchins loved to nestle in among the sea grass. But as some compensation, there were many other creatures to look at too At first, we just saw little brown fish and hermit crabs and long tube-like anemones. But as we walked further we came to some places where real coral was growing. Tiny blue and green fish skittered in and out of the holes. There were enormous red starfish to pick up and big fat grey starfish that had no arms, but were basically fat pentagons. .Later we found classic anemones, with black and white zebra fish hiding inside of them. Oren and I went out farther than Paul and David, because of Paul's shoes.

We were not the only people out there. A lot of villagers were out to harvest things from the sea. We ran into a group of young teenage girls several times and they seemed to be looking for octopus on the outer edge of the reef area – maybe a kilometer out from shore. It was a tough walk for them because they had to really pick their way through coral colonies and eventually dodge fairly deep pools to get out to the edge. We finally picked our way back to the shore, and found that we had been out for more than three hours! There was some sunburn, and some sore feet to show for our efforts, but it was very fun! We went out to explore the reef several more times during the week, and Paul even took Oren all the way out to the edge where the big breakers hit on one afternoon--about a mile walk out from the high tide mark.  (But Paul came back with urchin spines in the bottoms of both feet – very painful!) David and I enjoyed exploring things at a slower pace. And towards the end of the week, Paul and I each took a little time to try snorkling a bit with Oren's gear (not perfect). I did see a lion fish about two feet from me (luckily I saw it before I touched it!) I also saw some great butterfly fish and angel fish and a black and white eel. There was so much more detail to see from under the water than from above and it was a very fun experience. But what was sad was the realization that people (including us) are tromping all over the coral every day, breaking off pieces and damaging things that we can't even see that we're stepping on. Tourists are certainly a big part of the problem, since we provide the market for the octopus and parrotfish that people walk out on the reef to catch. And Zanzibaris need to make a living. I think that there will need to be some serious analysis of the problem in the near future in order to preserve the marine wealth of Zanzibar – in order to maintain the tourist wealth.

We fully enjoyed a day at the beach with no distractions but then we planned several other excursions on the other days. On Wednesday, we got up early and took a taxi down to the southern town of Kizimkaze to see the dolphins there. We took a dhow fitted with a small motor out onto choppy water under grey skies. It was kind of an ominous beginning to the tour. Even Oren was alarmed by the swell which rocked the boat fairly violently. On the other hand, the water in that bay was crystal clear and various shades of turquoise and lapis, and we could see at least 4 meters straight down to the bottom. All along the way, the skipper (a kid of 25 or so) was on his cell phone, obviously trying to track down the dolphins through his colleagues. . We got to the place where the dolphins usually pass, and they were clearly not present at that moment. The skies were getting heavier north of us and it looked as if this might be a failed expedition. But then we got one more call on the cell, and the skipper revved the engine and turned the boat around the way we had come. About 6 other boats were converging on one1 spot and then suddenly there they were! Five dophins cresting just above the surface in perfect unison.

Paul had already suited up with swim fins and snorkle and the guide said, Go, go! So he just jumped off the side of the boat and started swimming out. And he was right with the group of dolphins – almost a dozen all told. Under water, it was pretty magical and calm, watching the dolphins swim underneath the humans, not in any particular hurry. On the surface, things were a lot more chaotic, the boats trying to keep up with the swimmers without bumping into anyone or anything, also trailing the dolphins, and at least 15 people in the water at any given time, swimming in all different directions. The guides had already told us that the water was too rough for kids (which we felt as well) so we just went in to swim with the dolphins one at a time. I tried it once, but I'm no good with a snorkle, so I just used my goggles. I was right on top of the dolphins for thirty seconds and then they started surfacing around me and I thought I might touch one – and then I drank some sea-water. So they got away from me at that point, but it was pretty amazing to see first hand. I have to say that Paul is a stronger swimmer and he did really well all three times that he jumped in to swim with them. Again, there are issues of conscience about this method of interacting with the marine life – but the dolphins did not seem to be really bothered by all the attention.

Giant Zanzibar land crab

On our way back, the sun came out and the water got calmer. Oren was really grieved that we didn't let him swim with the dolphins. Also, Gramma Jean gave the kids a beautiful book on coral reefs and Oren has been thrilled at the thought of visiting a real coral reef (wading through shallow water looking down on coral didn't really count in his mind). So we put David's life-vest on him and his goggles and he jumped with me into the shallower water near shore. We only had less than 10 minutes of our time slot left, but still we were able to look down on a real coral garden and see some beautiful fish and a wide variety of coral and anemone and other things too far below me to see clearly. Oren was desperate to dive down and see things but I wouldn't let him take off the life-vest. I think we'll help Oren swim better and learn to really snorkle and set a goal of doing some serious snorkling with him before we leave the African continent.

The rain finally started really coming down as we got in the car and headed back for our hotel – good timing! We had breakfast and then settled under the one covered beach cabana. The kids and I did some water color painting while Paul worked on finishing his Congo history book. It was fun to try to paint at all our different levels. The rest of the day was a slow, rainy day lazy, with a movie, another picnic lunch of apples & peanut butter, a game of carcassone for the adults and a nap for David. We enjoyed just relaxing again.

On Thursday, after breakfast, we took another drive to the center of the island to the Jozani Forest, a protected reserve. It's the home of the only surviving 3000 Zanzibar Red Colobus monkeys (one of the rarest monkeys in the world). The forest itself was beautiful to walk through, with huge old indigenous trees. What was once a coral reef under the sea is now the island itself, and still quite damp. Giant snails, 8 inches long, seem to be produced in great quantities. There are a number of rare birds that live in this forest, but we arrived too late in the morning to see any. Fortunately, the monkeys are much easier to see, feeding in a family group of over 40 individuals. They are quite small but active and fun to watch. Our last stop was past the monkeys as walked into a mangrove swamp. It was amazing that they had even built a nice boardwalk to protect the swamp and the visitors. Paul and I could have spent longer in the forest, but that amount of visiting was enough for the kids, so we retired back to the beach for a lazy, sunny afternoon.

Our final outing on Friday took us up north, about an hour from Bwejuu. Spice production – and partcularly the production of cloves – was once the economic backbone of Zanzibar. Now, spice production is more symbolic for local use.. – and also as an aspect of tourism. We visited a community owned spice farm, a seemingly random assortment of different patches of this and that growing across several hectares, with little homesteads in between. The tour guide was from Stone Town, but he was accompanied by young men from the community who harvested small samples for us to smell/taste/touch. We learned a lot! For example, the lipstick fruit is a small hairy pod filled with tiny seeds which when crushed produce a bright orange-red dye—the source of that bright red color on tandoori chicken. The spices turmeric, ginger and cardamom all come from similar looking lily plants. Vanilla and pepper both grow on vines. Oren loved all the “toys” one young man made for him out of plant products as we walked around. First there was a necklace made from manioc leaf. There was a watch and a small frog made from coconut palm leaves. Sunglasses constructed out of a pineapple leaf! And to “cap” it all off, a full hat woven from coconut fronds. Actually, we each got a different kind of hat, decorated with bright hybiscus blossoms. We were quite the tourist family!

The Spice tour ended with a spice lunch – a chance to sample how many of the spices are used, particularly in spicy rice pilau. There was also cooking bananas in masala, manioc cooked in coconut milk and another spice sauce for fish. The food was really good, though much more local tasting than our more refined restaurant food. To complete the cultural tourism aspect of things, another young man cut up lots of different local fruits one at a time and let us sample pieces of them: pomelo, passionfruit, jackfruit, pineapple, banana and custard apple. It was a unique and interesting way to experience more of Zanzibar.

On Saturday, we had a little time for one last swim before packing up and heading back to Stone Town, since we needed to be closer to the airport for our 4 am Sunday departure. We picked out Stone Town Cafe B&B from the internet, and it was a great, central choice, with a beautifully decorated room. We were right in the old section of town, so it was easy to walk around, explore little shops, peek down narrow alley ways, and admire the fascinating wood carvings and Arabian architecture. I must admit that coming to Zanzibar during low season is great for being on the coast –it's much cheaper and very calm and quiet. However, Stone Town felt a bit like a ghost town, and everyone seemed a bit desperate to do any business at all with the few tourists who were in town. We all really enjoyed Forodhani Gardens with a new playground area for the kids. Lots of local folks were hanging out there as the sun set, and a large group young men were doing insane running dives off of the pier, to the amusement of various on-lookers. After dinner, we tried to get some sleep in our lovely hotel room, and I really regretted having to get out of that super comfy bed at 1:30 am to get ready for the taxi and the long journey back to Bujumbura today.

Stonetown Harbor at Sunset

Paul's closing:  As you know from the beginning, we did back to Bujumbura on Sunday afternoon.  It was great to have Felix meet us at the airport in our car completely repaired and returned from Rwanda!!!  We were actually glad to be able to meet with our prayer and share group at 4pm.  We had a quiet dinner afterward as a family and went to bed, ready to begin our normal routine on Monday morning.  As of this posting we also have all of our suitcases back.