Day 4, The spice farm, Stone Town and going home

The Palace Museum in Stone Town

Day 4 and we were up early since we had arranged an earlier transfer so as to visit a spice farm and do a very quick tour of Stone Town before flying home. This is actually the day when I took the pictures, having been far too lazy to do so beforehand. I only figured out later that there was obviously some humidity on the lense, hence the slightly hazy quality of the pictures. Being middle-aged I just assumed my lack of reading glasses was responsible for how they looked. That, and the ridiculously small viewing screen. I am still waiting for a kind soul to donate an i-Phone so that I can take magnificent pictures and do all sorts of other things at the same time.

Even the ashtrays are decorated with fresh flowers

A bowl of hibiscus and frangipani flowers outside the spa


Neatly raked sand at Mapenzi Beach Resort. Not sure what time they get up to do this, but it's always spotless

A hut overlooking the beach, with comfortable chairs and a hammock if you're in need of a short nap

There was a brief panic when we couldn't find the beach cards; really didn't want to spend $50 on a fine, but it turned out we had given them to a different pool attendant and once he was tracked down they were safely returned

They were here all along?

Muraji appeared at 9.30 and we set off at breakneck speed for our first stop - a spice farm. On the way we saw a government-owned coconut plantation as well as a rubber plantation. I was once again struck by the incredible beauty of the tropical forest and the huge baobab trees, although I had expected more birds. At the hotel we only saw house crows - they seem to have taken over there. The hotel has put up strands of what looked like fishing line between the beams holding up the thatch. I think this is to keep the crows out. The only wildlife we saw was a gorgeous bush baby that appeared on our roof one evening (I thought it was a cat until it leapt 6 metres into an adjacent tree!) Apart from that we saw some egrets and a couple of herons, but then we didn't actually go looking for birds or animals at any time (good thing too since the binoculars were also left at home by mistake)


Muraji, our fearless driver/tour guide. Please note the road... this one heading in to the spice farm

The spice farm initially appeared to be a small clearing in the forest with a little thatched "sales" area - the spices are packaged into little packets and it took some time to understand the options (if you buy this and this I give you this free) Clearly my education in spices is lacking, I was somehow entirely unaware that spices come from trees (hence the forest)

Spices neatly packaged and laid out for you to buy

Some of the local children rushed out to see us but became quite shy when I started taking pictures. I bought quite a few spices including vanilla pods, saffron (officially the world's most expensive spice and apparently grown on Pemba island) black pepper, coriander, as well as some of the perfume bases - ylang ylang and jasmine essence. The smell of fresh vanilla is quite intoxicating and nothing at all like the bottled essence in supermarkets.

Then off to Stone Town to buy a few gifts before heading back to the airport. We went via Bububu, the highest point in Zanzibar at around 120m with a great view of the town. Unfortunately I didn't get a picture, the phone camera showed a tiny speck in the distance...

Stone Town harbour and the park

Stone Town is a World Heritage site, with very narrow winding alleys rather than roads. We entered near the House of Wonders, Beit-El-Ajaib, built by the Sultan Seyyid Barghash as a grand palace for ceremonial purposes. It was also (according to Wikipedia) the birth place of Freddie Mercury. We had to park the taxi and walk - it's spotless and wasn't too crowded.

House of Wonders

Muraji took us to a contact of his who owns a store where we could buy some gifts for the children (and a cute t-shirt for the border collie's firstborn, Michael)

Brian and Muraji in Stone Town

After some shopping and sight seeing it was time to make our way to the airport for the flight home.

Departures is easy to find - it's on the pavement outside the airport. Checking in was relatively painless but unfortunately the airconditioned restaurant is not accessible once you have cleared customs. We were pleased to find out that we didn't have to pay any departure tax (no-one could clarify this for us beforehand) and there's no smoking area either.

The dutyfree shop is fairly basic and I was glad we had done our shopping in Stone Town. We bought a couple of books, some water and snacks and found a spot to wait. Although there are a few asthmatic standalone airconditioning units in the departures lounge all the doors to the runway were open so they weren't really much help.

After a while we saw an Avis jet landing (Avis airlines?) and it was only when we were boarding that we realised it was advertising on the 1Time plane. We had yet another long delay with a passenger being offloaded and luggage removed, and they had also double-booked seats with the manual seating system so it took a while to find 2 seats next to each other. The cabin crew was very helpful but the mid day heat and humidity on a runway near the equator is stifling.

We landed around 40 minutes late, then headed through the new arrivals area (ready for the influx of tourists for 2010) where there is a duty free shop to wait for our luggage. This was the longest part of the process and when I spotted "Delayed" next to our flight information on the screen I sent Sarah a text message to let her know we had, in fact, landed.

Safely home, another trip over. Well worth it, but a bit too short