Zanzibar Archipelago is a collection of small islands off the coast of Tanzania in the Indian Ocean.  Zanzibar is the informal name for one of the larger islands, Unguja.  Four days in advance, Jon, Emily and I decide to spend our long weekend there.  We book tickets on two notoriously unreliable airlines: Precision Air and Fly540.  We are advised to arrive 2-3 hours early because flight time can be plus or minus 30-45 minutes.  Our anticipated layover is 5 hours in the Kilimanjaro airport, however when we try to check in, our flight doesn’t actually exist. Thankfully they rebook us, and we get to Zanzibar 3 hours early!

The air is suffocatingly heavy with moisture and uncomfortably warm.  It’s midday and the skin on my shoulders is roasting.  Our driver Ahmed, Edy for short, arrives in style with an air conditioned van.  And so it begins.

To spare you the details, I’ll touch on some highlights.

Stonetown

The only city in Zanzibar, and as we come to find out, the only source of ATM’s on a cash only island.  Leaving the airport it looks much like Kenya, but as you enter the main town, the architecture is much more decorative and a bit lavish.  The walls and buildings are painted white, although in many areas they have started to peel away.  The doors, windows and wood trimmings are ornately carved and belong not only to the frequent, erected mosques but also the brand new Park Hilton, the aspiring street merchant, and low budget hostel.  The streets are narrow and seem to have been more of an afterthought than an infrastructure.  Small tourist shops overflow into the maze of “roads” which are not even wide enough for cars.  Once you leave the shore and tread the six narrow, uneven, staircases to the terrace of the most cost effective hostel in town, all life disappears under the patchwork blanket of tin roofs.  We end the first night with the beating of heavy rain falling hard on the tin drums above us.

The Food

Taking full advantage of its natural resources, seafood is abundant and inexpensive. Zanzibar is known as the spice island.  Typically known for cloves, black pepper, cinnamon and nutmeg.  Edy books us a spice tour to get the full flavor of the land.  Mr. Spice, self-proclaimed, takes us on a scavenger hunt around his garden.  He cracks open fresh green pepper corns, sweet limes, jack fruit and oranges with bright green rinds.  He crumbles leaves, petals and and seeds to release lemongrass, perfume and natural lipstick.  At the end of the tour we sit down for a spiced lunch including pilau rice, fried cassava leaves, a red tangy curry made with the “lipstick” plant, cinnamon and cloves, and a yellow coconut curry with fresh turmeric root, all settled with a hot cup of pure lemongrass tea. The meals get fishier as the weekend continues with heaping plates of squid, octopus, jumbo prawns, white snapper, tuna, lobster, and crab.