Day 12 (Dec 12) Transport by Road, Sea and Air

Zanzibar

We set off to Zanzibar first thing in the morning. We arrived to board our scheduled boat and were received by one of the “officials” who told us to buy fresh tickets because our boat had apparently left an hour earlier. We later discovered that this is a scam from the boat companies to get you to buy another ticket. We quickly wised up to that and told the swindler to go to hell.

Violet excited to meet other South Africans

We boarded and as we sat we noticed a South African looking lady who settled in-front of us. It turned out she was and we broke into conversation with her. Violet was a city girl who got tired of the rat race. She and her husband decided to pack up and travel Africa for 2years (they rode on bicycles between Malawi and Tanzania) and that trip settled them in Zanzibar. Violet is involved in a project to bring African musicians to Zanzibar annually in February. Check them out on www.busaramusic.org

On our way to Zanzibar we were surprised how vast Dar is. It spans several kilometres visible from the sea. 

After 90min we got off the boat to a 40+ degrees heat and proceeded to do all the border formalities. Zanzibar and Tanzania are one country with duplicate political administrations like Hong Kong China and mainland China which we visited 2 months ago. We headed straight for a bar called Mercury that overlooks the sea for a quick lunch before a walkabout of Stone City. This is where the slaves from the mainland were kept before shipped out to Omar and other places. 

Zanzibar old town

 After a brief tour of the city in the smouldering 100 degree heat we headed back to Mercury to wait for our boat back to Dar and it was not to be, we were told our boat has just left and all along when we were at Mercury overlooking were boats come and go, there was no single boat that left, nonetheless we were told to go to the office and negotiate!! NEGOTIATE!?

Now picture this, we are right in front of it and we are told it’s gone! Can you believe that crap!

After fruitless negotiations at the office with no refund we decided to go to the airport. Onboard a taxi to the airport to try and catch the last flight out, to our shock, the taxi driver knocked down a cyclist with his side mirror and he carried on like nothing happened. We quizzed him and he suddenly could not speak English or understand what we were talking about.

The flight to Dar is 25minutes

The taxi we caught in Dar to our Hotel had a puncture and Tumi quickly got his hands dirty to replace the tyre while Thendo sat in the car waiting.

Dinner tonight was at a more appeasing place called Karambezi in Seacliff.

We enjoyed the food so much that we had to be the last people to leave the restuarant.