A weekend in Zanzibar

So I just got back from my weekend away at the small island community of Zanzibar. I don't know how they get away with it to the point that they even bother at all, but people are constantly trying rip travellers off. We arrive at Mercury's, a tribute to Freddy Mercury in restaurant form, and they guy trys to charge me extra for my drink. One little slice of awesomeness is the drink itself. Its called the 'Toronto Tumbler'. How cool is that?

After our drinks, we all pile into the van and take off for our hotel. An hour and half later, we arrive. We literally spent more time in the van than on the plane. Then the hotel staff try to get us to pay them for our rooms that were already paid for. But we eventually smoothed things out.

Zanzibar is roughly 90% muslim. So it really isn't to any surprise that our hotel turned out to be muslim. You know what that means? NO BOOZE! But I survived, like I always do. The beach and the hotel were absolutely gorgeous.

Our first full day was mainly spent on the beach. After breifly walking in the Zanzibar Channel, I did not reapply sunblock fast enough and before I knew it, my little feet became a lovely shade of crimson.

The rest of the day was spent searching out any sliver of shade to keep my poor tootsies safe. But I was far from the worst of the burn victims. That award goes to Megan, with her full body burns. But everyone came back atleast a little peachy, so we weren't alone.

Next day, we went to the Island of Pemba to try our hands at snorkelling.

About to go snorkelling

After taking the usual precautionary Gravol, I jump on board the boat. Once we reach our desired spot, we all jump in. The waves were REALLY choppy. I really started to tire myself out just trying to stay close to the boat. After a while, I got back on board for a break. Not too much later, everyone else followed suit. And not too long after that, I was reminded of what I had for lunch...twice. I immediately went into the fetal position and stayed there until we were on dry land. And in this case, I wasn't alone either. All but one of us was sick. That is how choppy it was. Another huge annoyance was the jellyfish. Everyone was stung atleast once. But most of them were really small. So lucklily, none of us had to squat on another. Once on land again, I went straight to my room and hid under the covers for a good two hours.

We had dinner that night at Cinemon. A very posh seaside establishment catering to Russian mobsters, their trophy wives, and the ever so swanky backpackers. I had the pumpkin and feta salad . Seriously, I've never had so much pumpkin in my life since coming to Tanzania. And I don't see any pumpkin patches anywhere. I'm deffinately googling pumpkin recipes when I return home.

The next day we went on a spice tour, city tour, and I went on a monky tour. I really liked the spice tour. We saw various spices in their initial state. Didn't care for the city tour too much. The monkies were adorable, as they should be.

While I was checking out the monkies, the rest of the group were still in town. That is when the driver decides to drive away with all of their stuff in the van. They found him eventually. I'm not entirely clear on what went on with that.

Until next time...

AC