We head on the last bumpy bus from Stone Town to the beautiful destination of Nungwi, the North point of Zanzibar. We take the first and last group photo on the steps of the hotel in Stone Town...
A lovely bunch wouldn't you agree?
The drive to Nungwi takes around an hour or so and the plastic seats on the bus makes things so much more comfortable (read - sweaty and very uncomfortable, very pleased to have been wearing dark clothes or it would look like I'd had an accident) but the drive was so scenic, passing through small villages with huge palm trees and trucks piled high with mattresses and bicycles loaded with huge banana bunches, car horns beeping, children yelling, music playing - man, I love Africa...
We arrive at the accommodation in Nungwi and I see what Exodus have done, they've saved the best for last. This is what Nungwi looks like:
Not too shabby hey? Quite a change from the campsite in the Serengeti that's for sure...
We got settled at the bar whilst waiting for our room to be ready and were quickly approached by a rep at the hotel who was selling booze cruise tickets. We didn't even listen to her pitch, as soon as we heard booze cruise, we were on board. Literally. Five hours later, we boarded a tiny boat to take us out to sea to board a bigger boat packed to the rafters with all you can drink boooooze - party on a boat time!
Little boat to big boat to the bar! Salute!
There's not much to report from the boat trip, easily drank 10+ gin and bitter lemons, jumped off the boat in to the sea only to be surrounded by piano fish, freak out, drink more gin, jump off again, get back on, drink more gin, dance to loud music, watch sun set, attempt to pole dance, attempt to head stand against pole, slip, drink more gin, dance more, attempt to disembark on to tiny boat, freak out, enlist help of every single crew member to get self on tiny boat, swim back to hotel along shore, attempt Dirty Dancing lift in sea, swim out to different boat in attempt to be Somalian Pirate, shower, eat pizza, fall in to drunken slumber. Bliss. Am not missing camping one tiny bit.
Here's the boat best bits:
The next morning, we drag ourselves to breakfast at 9.58am as they stop serving at 10am - made it! Gimme the nutella pancakes! Take selves back to bed to have a sharp word with ourselves, then complete the hard task of finding somewhere to sunbathe.
Sunbathing complete for the morning, we head to lunch, absolutely shattered from the morning we've had so far and sweating gin out of my system! Eat another pizza and flop back down on the sand, ready to be hassled by the beach boys selling booze cruises - no thanks just did one, why do you think we stink of GIN...even this dog is wary...
It's going to be very hard to leave this place...
The last night was fun filled once more, one more for the road princesses! We had dinner altogether as a group one last time and then hit the beach party at Kendwa Rocks for one last night of fun, drinking and dancing to African tunes.
Needless to say we took it too far for our last night and once again got dragged out at 3am...lame. Well Honor and I rebelled against this lameness of going home early by jumping in to the sea once again and going for a swim. And why not? I'm on my holiday.
Rough and sandpaper I awoke in the morning and my first thought was that someone must have spiked my drink, there's no way I drank that much...but I remember demanding cocktails at the bar and admitted guilt. Yes your Honour it was me that drank too much - why do we always go for it hard on the last night of holiday?
Anyway, it was a very long day indeed ahead of us with a flight from Zanzibar airport to Nairobi then on to Heathrow...I loved Zanzibar airport with it's relaxed attitude towards airport daily business.
No sign of a conveyor belt, our luggage was carried off on a parcel trolley, I was convinced we'd never see it again...particularly as the man with the trollet called out 'say goodbye to your luggage' as he wheeled it away...ermmm, not funny.
The plane was supposed to depart at 6.30pm, at 7.15pm we were standing cooling down on the runway (it's allowed at Zanzibar airport) with no sign of any plane, so we asked someone in the airport when it was due to arrive, to which he responded 'the plane should be here anytime from now'...can you imagine that in Heathrow?? Too funny. Love Africa.
Anyway, cutting a long story short, we slept on every flight, only waking up for food or drinks and eventually made it to London:
Where we then began the long journey back to Leeds and to a nice hot shower and a flushing toilet!
Trip of a lifetime, I'm forever in Honor Baldry's debt which unsettles me slightly...
Kwa heri, lala salama and Asante Sana!
