Beyond BLUE

If you ask me, Zanzibar could have welcomed us in a nicer way than it did. It tested us a bit before letting us see its beauties! 

A fully booked boat and a four hour wait at Dar es Salaam harbour, bad hotel beds that make sleep impossible, long, hot rides and rain and wind that gave me a most annoying cold, with coughing and headache inclusive... Yes, yes, I know, the usual travelling disasters. 

Anyway, it was all worth it. The beaches of Zanzibar are for sure among the most beautiful and out-of-the-world places on this Earth. Even Stefan, definitely more of a mountains guy, let himself be seduced by their colours... I can't really describe them, so let the photos speak.

A room with a view

The big Blue... In Tanzania, the high and low tide altitude difference in the sea level is several meters. So every morning, after swimming, you can observe the sea disappear and offer you kilometers and kilometers of a beach playground, made of white sand, shallow pools of water clear as sky, corals, violet crabs coming your way and yellow fish swimming in the shade of rocks... And every night, when the sea comes back, it feels like a storm, the water thundering in big, powerful waves to cover the shore.

What is a sea playground for me, is a field for the local women. They tend their own sea grass fields in this  tidal coastal stretch of sand, collecting the sea grass and selling it to soap producers. This sea grass is jelly like in consistence and of all possible colours...

Sea grass collected, the women bring it to the selling points, crossing kilometers of shallow sea water.

Long walks on the beach/sea being our main activity, we of course collected plenty of souvenirs...

Evening atmosphere as seen from our dining area.

Yeah, this is Jambiani. A small village where an average tourist has nothing, really nothing to do. The villagers tend goats and their vegetable plots, play a lot of football on the beach, go to the mosque regularly... This village is so small that it has almost no shops - you can't buy anything, the villagers are completely self-sufficient. There are also very few restaurants outside of the tourist lodges - nothing there, NOTHING!!!

Only on our day before last did we finally discover a great place to eat. It made us happy, the food in our lodge was really expensive and came in minimal portions that left us hungry. So this hut became our favourite place, playing cards while waiting for our crab in coconut sauce :)

Red Colobus monkeys kept us interested while eating breakfast (this is about 1,5m away from where I am sitting).

You know, after swimming, walking along the beach, eating, reading  and sleeping, there were still hours in the day to be filled. I tried to amuse myself with a fashion shooting (Stefan was forced to be the photographer). But Ibrahim kept disturbing us, furiously demanding cookies... I want cookies, I want cookies, he kept jumping at us! He tried arguing with us (with little effect), he tried hitting us (but he was too small) and finally he settled on our doorsteps and banged at the door. Funny, yet also sad - this is what children learn when they get cookies, pens, hats, T-shirts and candies from well wishing tourists.

And the highlight of the trip? Snorkelling! Off we went with a dhow, our captain Hassan confidently catching the winds, flying off into the big blue... Obviously this is not our photo, but Stefan says this is what he saw. Myself, without my glasses, I have seen a bit less of colours and more of fog :) The quiet of the water, the gentleness of the marine life is enough to get you hooked... 

We made it through the whole week without any substantial sunburns! Feeling pround ...