12/12/12 – London Town

Posted on December 12, 2012 by murray

Last night we almost got our whole problem sorted and we ran into a road block we could not solve. Airlines need to do a whole lot in the way of helping people out and not begging off the problems and passing them on. When I asked at the British Airways (the creator of the problem) desk if they could get hold of West Jet and have our flight rescheduled as we would not be able to make our original time, the answer was ‘West Jet does not have a presence in Heathrow so you will have to contact them yourselves.’ Then I tried to phone West Jet in Canada with the hotel telephone. The hotel system would not make a connection. The reception lady secured a cell phone from somewhere, I presume a manager, and we were able to connect. I was put on hold and when I finally did get through the lady at West Jet said she could do nothing with the reservation because I had booked it with Air Miles. She did connect me with Air Miles and when I got that connection I was in formed that it would be another 38 minute wait before I could talk to anyone. The old run around worked, I gave up. I did not want to run up another 38 minute call on some other person’s telephone. I then emailed Air Miles and told them to cancel the flight. I will have to fight with them when I get home.

We did book another flight home on West Jet at a cost of $301.00 each. I guess I will have to try and recover the cost of those flights from British Airways, I am not putting a whole lot of faith into see that cash again. The system is poor and I really think the airlines believe they have a guaranteed market and can do as they damn well please. I think they should concentrate on how to make the customer experience better and the business would come.

It is 12/12/12. We walk out of the hotel to catch the shuttle back to the airport so we can get the tube into town and there is snow on the ground. Real live Canada snow. How they got it all the way here and spread it over ground and cars just for us will forever be a mystery.

At the airport we stash our bags at the left luggage counter and we are off to central London. Debbie has the walking route all planned. We have to make slight alterations because the National Art Gallery does not open until 10am and we arrive downtown at 9.

We start out walking by Buckingham Palace, it is a nice building and all and has tons of history but I have seen it a couple of times and in reality it is really quite boring. Nothing happens there except the changing of the guard and I have yet to be there when that is happening. Today is not much different except we see a horse drawn carriage enter the grounds, pick up a passenger and leave. OOOH! (Note from Debbie: I liked going by Buckingham Palace!)

Passing through Piccadilly Square we head towards The National Gallery and on route we encounter some commotion at Leicester Square. They are setting up for tonight’s world premier of ‘The Hobbit.’ This immediately catches Debbie’s attention but alas, we are not able to even think about attending as we have had trouble enough with our airplanes and do not wish to shake an already rickety apple cart.

The National Gallery is FREE. They do have a donation box but we do not have any Pounds so I guess it is free to us. There are several rooms displaying 19th and 20th century painters so that is where we start. The Impressionist paintings and those of that time are our favorites and they are always worth a stop. The paintings that stopped me this time were painted in the 1500s in Venice. The painter is Canaletto. His paintings are about a meter by a meter and a half. Scenes of Venice canals of minute detail. I cannot imagine the amount of time it took to paint them. There were also a couple of painting by Leonardo and Michelangelo most of which I could not get crazy over but there was a sketch by in a room of its own drawn by Leonardo that we both stood for an minute or so and had a good long look.

Harad’s was our last stop. It is just past noon and the store is stupid crowded. We had a look at a few things but did spend too much time there. Even though it is world famous it is really just a department store. (Note from Debbie: I liked walking through Harrods!) Then as we are walking out we walk through the art gallery (store). Mounted on one of the walls not even in a prominent spot is a print of Mao by Andy Warhol. The price tag is 57,500 Pounds. I have never seen an Warhol original on sale before. I ask the girl if she has two because one would not suite our house, she says she only has one so we thanked her for her time and left.

The day runs smooth until we pass through security at Heathrow. Debbie had missed a couple of liquid container in her carry on luggage. In Canada they would have asked to see the items in question and that would have been that. At Heathrow they take apart the entire bag. Every single item is removed and looked at.Some of the items are swabbed and the swab tested for explosive whatevers. They did offer to repack the bag but since Debbie carries her bag as a back pack if it is not pack properly the items all sag to the bottom of the bag so we decline the help and go about the task ourselves. I do not want to be on a plane with a nut but sometimes the methods used by this security agency or that are absolutely ridiculous. If you ever pass through Heathrow make sure your carry on is EXACTLY as it should be or you will suffer the same fate.

Dinner at the Giraffe Restaurant on the non Britain side of the security system and we are headed to Canada. Good bye London.

 

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Delayed!

Posted on December 11, 2012 by murray

Twice now.

It is not often that we run into airline problems when we travel but twice on this trip an airline has made changes and it has affect our connections. As we mentioned before Air Botswana completely canceled one of our flights and put us on an alternate flight to J’berg which would have landed after out connection had taken off. Yesterday, after trying to check in on line and getting the message ‘ all flights have been flown’, we checked the British Airways site and discovered that the flight time had been changed and this time we would not make our BA flight to from London to Vancouver.

In anticipation of a bigger screw up than a schedule change we are up early and at the airport more than 2 ½ hours ahead of the scheduled departure. Debbie’s premonition was correct, not only is the time of the flight changed, our names have been removed from the flight list.

Arriving early is a good idea. The first fellow we see has no idea as to how to proceed. All he knows is that we are not on the flight docket. Second guy has a go and gets nowhere, the manager shows up and there is stress on his face. First he gets us on the impending flight to London. We should be ½ way home with this. He doesn’t believe there is enough time between flights to make the connection to Vancouver so he rebooks us on the same flight for the next day. All of the drama is taking place on African time, pole pole (poley,poley), which means slowly, slowly. I am not sure there is such a word as ‘stat’ or the like in Swahili, at least we never heard it if there is. Our seats secured there are several other items that have to be resolved. First, the boarding passes. Again, pole pole, the fellow that is assigned to print those out for us is off helping one of the other agents do something else so we wait. My anxiety grows.

Customer service here does not seem to run the same way as at home. In Canada we are taught to focus on the problem and the guest at hand and only when there is a resolution do you move on to the next task. Here the newest problem seems to get the attention and the unresolved task is set aside. Oh, they eventually get back to us and I do not even know if the task that took them away is solved but we are again the focus.

Now we have to change our arrangements for the next two days, first our hotel reservation in Vancouver. The Manager dials the number of the Days Inn and gets a connection. The connection is bad and there is some discussion about whether or not the reservation is for today or tomorrow. We are in East Africa and several hours ahead of Vancouver time, by time we are already in Dec. 11, Vancouver is still in Dec 10. Before this can be sorted the connection is lost.

A different phone is attained, and with a bit of kafuffle the SIM card is changed and a new connection is made. This time I am given the phone and voila we have switched the reservation. Boy this pole pole thing is hard for us (or at least me).

Debbie met a nice young fellow born in Somolia, living in Tanzania, and holding a Canadian passport. He is returning to Canada to visit his family for Christmas. He offers us the use of his phone to call Westjet to see if we can change our flight for one day later. We make contact and of course ‘All agents are busy right now we will answer your call in the order in which it was received.’ We get the call to board, so as of right now we do not have a flight home. But we are off to London!

As opposed to our trip here we are flying in the daytime and it is relatively clear. Our route takes us over Nairobi so we see one of the dormant volcanoes close to Kilimanjaro out our side of the plane, quite an impressive pimple on a flat landscape.

Then.  A short while later, we pass over the Libyan and Sahara Deserts. Debbie and I are glued to the window. I did not ever expect to see a desert on this scale and there they are. No one else seems to be enamoured but we take it all in. It is truly a sight. To see it from an altitude of 12,000M gives a perspective that could never be realized on the ground.

There are several manmade marks made on the sand and we wonder what they might be. We think we see pipelines, roads, wind farms, but we cannot be sure of any of it. Then we notice white spots amongst the golden sand and some black spots as well. Debbie figures out we are looking at low clouds and their shadows a very stunning illusion. It takes about 2 hours to fly over the entire desert and we do not leave our window.

We get to spend the night in London and have a plan to go into downtown tomorrow morning. We will walk for 3 or 4 hours and then head to the airport for our flight to Vancouver.

What we thought would be an interesting day has turned into just that- a little stress, a little poley-poley, a whole lotta sand and a bonus half day in one of the great cities of the world.

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Enroute

Posted on December 10, 2012 by debbie

We wake up in opulence. Five star.

We walk this morning through Stonetown for the last time and stop at a shop where Murray bought a Coke the other day. The Muslim owner had discounted the Coke 100 TSh as neither had change, so we decided to go buy another Coke today and pay him back for his kindness. He recognized us right away and we sat in his grocery shop while we sipped the Coke.

He tells us the shop is busiest in the mornings and we get a first hand look at why. He sells samosas, chapatis and potato curry and other delights that folks buy for their breakfast or early lunch. It is a constant stream of customers.

The shop owner has a helper who serves the customers and the owner handles the cash. His “till” is a plastic bucket that he keeps close at hand.

We chat and then say our goodbyes and walk along the water for the last time.

We arrive at our hotel in Dar es Salaam, connect to try to check in with British Airways online to find all sorts of weirdness with our booking and flights home. Tomorrow will be an interesting day. We will see you in Canada………sometime!

We go to sleep in plainness. Two star.

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Walking Stonetown

Posted on December 9, 2012 by murray

Before we left I had read over and over how ‘dangerous’ Africa is. We have spent almost 6 weeks in Tanzania and have got braver and braver each day. A good lot of the days here we have led a sheltered life on safari but we have spent time on our own and we seem to be doing quite well.

Last Thursday we heard of a woman who, while walking alone along the Matemwe beach in Zanzibar, had her camera stolen by two men that ran by. We have been taking our regular precautions and have not felt threatened. When we arrive in each place we leave our cameras in our bags and only bring them out to take a shot or two and then immediately return them to our bags. After some time observing the place, and the other tourists, if it seems OK we will let our guard down a little but still try to keep our spidey sense engaged.

We have found Africa to be no different than other places we have traveled. There are far more people that visit here without incident than those that have met with adverse adventures. If you intend to come to Africa you have to keep your wits about you but you have to get out and see the place or there is not much use in venturing this far.

We wander the streets today finding ourselves in the locals market, in the very heart of residential Stonetown with crooked, narrow lane ways, laundry hanging to dry, kids playing in the dust, just two Canadians saying “Jambo” to all we meet.

Sunday in Stonetown and everyone – locals and tourists – are down on the beach. Kids are swimming, a group of budding acrobats are practicing flips, pike flips, and aerial somersaults down the beach and sometimes into the water. Young women have doffed their black over dresses and walk the beach in street clothes. Young men flirt with them.

We stop for dinner at the Stonetown Cafe. Debbie takes some of her magic pills that allow her to eat gluten and cheese and we order pizza. A fellow patron from Kosovo, the waiter and us have a long talk about this that and the state of the union. It is good fun.

After searching for 3 days, we have finally located live music at the Serona Hotel. We finish off our evening listening to the Culture Musical Club playing Taarag music.

Our path back to the hotel takes us past Forodhani Gardens. At the gazebo there is a break dance circle and the kids are entertaining a crowd. Their athletic ability is astounding and the concrete surface is a lot less forgiving than the sand on which we had seen young men flipping onto a couple of hours earlier.

We wind our way back to our hotel and prepare for the start of our journey to the ice and snow.

 

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Mr. Mitu’s Magical Adventure

Posted on December 8, 2012 by murray

Murray and I pile into a van with eight other tourists and head out of Stonetown to a spice farm. Mr. Mitu’s Magical Adventure has begun!

After driving into the hinterland of Zanzibar, we arrive at the spice farm where we are guided for a look at how various spices and fruit grow. It’s very hot in the vegetation and I am covered in sweat within minutes. One of the first spices we encounter is lemongrass. We sniff the leaves and know right away what it is.

Lemongrass

Lemongrass

We meander through the growing plants looking and tasting ginger, cinnamon, star fruit, bread fruit, cloves and other wonders. My fav, of course, is cocoa.

Cocoa

Cocoa

The yellow outer bit is cut away to reveal a cluster of pods which contain the cocoa bean.

After the tour we are taken to our lunch spot and there are spices available to purchase. Of course we buy some. Lunch is rice cooked with spices; a sauce with turmeric, potatoes, coconut milk and tomatoes; and boiled spinach. It is surprisingly tasty and it pours rains while we ware eating. We all pile back into the van and head back to Stonetown. Murray and I hop out at the central market and Mr. Mitu’s Magical Adventure is over.

We wander the streets of Stonetown searching out the old Slave Market area and the old Persian Baths. Finding ourselves near the water and in need of a break from the sun and the heat we stop in at Amore Mia and have gelato. A much needed respite as the temperature is hovering around 38 C.

We had been warned numerous times about the touts in Stonetown and we have not been bothered too much by them. A firm “Appana Assanti” (No Thank You) deters them from further following and conversing with us.

We hide out the rest of the afternoon heat in our air conditioned room. We venture out again at 6:00 for supper. We walk to Luzuli and enjoy tuna for Debbie and chicken coconut curry for Murray. The maitre’d is the owner’s brother and we have a great chat with him and the cook about snow and heat and Canada and children. This young fellow is as old as our daughter and has a 10 year old son. He was married and had a child when he was 16. His parents have the final say in choosing a bride for him but he was allowed to suggest a prospective wife and they approved.

We started the day with and adventure, but every minute of every day is an adventure here in Stonetown.

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The Last Stop

Posted on December 7, 2012 by murray

Must be getting use to it, neither of us hear the 5am call to prayer today. It’s OK because today we leave and the taxi is due to arrive at 10am. Seif the driver arrives right on time and we say good bye to Rebecca and Dustin at the hotel, drive through the gates and we are on the road.

We are on the highway and the driver asks me if I have 1,000 TSH, he has to give it to a friend. I gave him the bill, worth about 66 cents. Within a kilometer a cop flags down our taxi, he looks at the license in the window and approaches the drivers side window. He asks to see Seif’s drivers permit, as Seif hands if over they shake hands and the 1,000 shilling bills disappears. Magic. I think not.

We drive a little farther and an oncoming taxi flashes its headlights. Seif says there is another policeman ahead. Sure enough we get pulled over again.  This time I did not see cash exchange hands as I think Seif explained that he had already been hit up and he had no more money. On our way to Matemwe this happened and I was suspicious but this time it was quite obvious what took place. I know I cannot agree with the events but I have idea what can be done. Except maybe to pay the police more, it would probably not help because the behavior has already been established. In the long run it costs all us ‘rich’ tourists money because these kick backs have to be paid for some how, they are included in the cab fee.

Stonetown is hustle and bustle compared to Matemwe. Loads of people and loads of tourists. Our driver knows about where the hotel, The Jafferji House and Spa, is but not exactly. He stops a couple of times and asks and he finds that cars cannot go to the hotel. We jump out of the cab close to the street that the hotel is on, avoid the ‘helpers’ that are standing about and walk about 100M to the front door of the hotel . Our reservation is all set up and the asst. manager of the hotel, Mr. Robert, informs us that because the hotel is not full they have upgraded our room to the “Jafferji Sultan Suite”. I thank him very much and we are shown to our room. 2 1/2 floors up we squeeze through a 1/2 wide door and the fellow says this is your room.

First he shows us the outdoor sitting area, large enough to entertain 10 or 12 guests. Then he shows us the outdoor TWIN (you know; save water, shower with your steady stuff) shower with a view of the ocean over the adjacent roof tops. He takes us back to view the bedroom and en suite.

The bedroom is a dance hall with a king size bed, the adjacent washroom has an indoor single shower, a tub, dual sinks and a toilet. I had emailed Donna, the hotel manager a couple of times and don’t know what I said but I must have been polite enough because this room is pure luxury.

It is pouring rain when we get to the room but we need to map out a strategy for the afternoon romp around Stonetown. As we finish, the rain stops. We walk out on to damp streets in search of the Radha restaurant. Found it with very little trouble, followed the map from the Lonely Planet. Indian vegetarian food for lunch. Ordered fried dal with rice and roti. Very good and cheap. We thought Stonetown would be more expensive than the hinterland but not so.

Wandering around town is something I enjoy and Debbie usually follows. Today we are on a mission looking for Mr. Mitu’s tours to see if we can hook up with a tour of a spice farm. Spices took over from the slave trade as Zanzibar’s main source of income so we thought we should take a look. Left turn here and right turn there and Mr. Mitu’s shop is right in front of us.  Half the cost of the tour from the hotel and lunch is included. We book in and tomorrow morn we are off to see how pepper begins it journey to our table.

At about 7pm we are getting hungry and it is time to look for something to eat. We have a couple of places on our list so we head to where they are to look at the menus. The Archipelago it is, recommended by Rebecca at the Panga Chumvi, we found it to be a good choice. While researching Stonetown I found there are a couple of permanent music gigs in town so we set out to find one that is suppose to be on Friday nights. It took some looking but we did find the place and all was quiet. A nice man in front said the music would not start again until Tuesday so tomorrow we will check out some of the other places.

Every second building in this town is a mosque. At prayer times there is a pedestrian traffic jam in front of each. With such a large Muslim population I expect that the 5am call to prayer will again become our alarm clock.

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Last Dive Day in Matemwe

Posted on December 6, 2012 by debbie

Ready! Ok go! I lean back and fall, lifting my legs so I clear the side of the boat. Kersplash! I am in the water, the coolness enveloping me relieving the heat of sitting too long in a wetsuit in the sun.

We go down down down to 17 m. I’m checking that Murray is descending not too far away from me. Saedi (Sa-ee-dee) is ahead and is descending too. On this last dive we are going to drift down a channel and see what we can find. The guys hope to see a shark, or a turtle, or something else big.  I will settle for anything but a shark. Not my favorite marine critter.

The current is slow but noticeable. We drift and watch the movie play below and around us. Saedi uses his pointer to coax a leopard eel to stick its head out of its hole. I spot a juvenile Oriental Sweetlips and marvel at the brilliant yellows, oranges and blacks on its body. We find a shrimp of some sort in a hard coral, but because of the current cannot stick around to take a close look.

Saedi waves us over and nudges what looks like a piece of corral. It starts to move and morphs into an octopus! The octopus travels effortlessly a few feet and morphs back into its surroundings. We are all amazed at the octopus’ ability to disguise itself.

I glance over at Murray and he seems to have picked up two clown fish. He must have swum too close to their anemone and they are swimming around his face. These two are not the Nemo sized clown fish but are about 8 cm long, with black, white and orange stripes. They decide they have scared him away and swim back home. I thought he had made some fish friends!

Saedi is pointing madly to the left. I see a rather large octopus gliding over the sand around some coral. It looks to have its legs tucked under him as I cannot see the full tentacle. He glides about 7 m and stops and does his disguise trick.  I have never seen an octopus moving in the open like that.

Before we know it, we are doing our safety stop and then ascending to the surface. The bright sunlight waits us to warm us up and welcome us to the boat.

Walking to school along the beach

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November 29 – Safari

Posted on December 5, 2012 by debbie

Murray and I have been talking about the differences between the safari in Tanzania and the one in Botswana. The areas are very diverse with Tanzania being mostly arid, desert like in the Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater with areas of grasses and trees. Botawana, as we get closer to the Okavango Delta, has water and is green with trees, shrubs and grasses. There are marshes with large pools of water.

Ngorongoro Crater is abundant in game and visitors. It is easy to find the various animals and finding them is made easier by the number of guides in vehicles who radio and talk of where to find the lion or the cheetah. In the Serenget,i the animals were a little more spread around, but were still quite easy to locate. Patience pays off at an animal sighting to watch behavior. Although the animal sightings are numerous and easy, the number of vehicles is also numerous. At one leopard sighting, I counted 23 trucks parked watching a hard to see leopard in a tree.

In Savuti, Khwai and Moremi, in Botswana, the animals were more difficult to locate. But we do locate them and are able to watch some extraordinary behavior. The trucks can only communicate, via radio, with other trucks from the same company, there is no common channel. So in low season, we are the only Letaka truck in the area which makes it harder yet to locate the elusive game. Guides do talk whenever we meet another truck, but again, in low season these encounters are few. The game in Moremi is more abundant than in the other two areas. This is due to the lack of rain in Savuti and Khwai and the poor vegetation. Moremi, located in the Okavango Delta, has lush elephant and giraffe fodder and green grasses for the impala, zebras, buffalos and the antelope family of animals. Unlike Tanzania, the number of vehicles we encounter is a minimum.

The guides have different approaches to accommodate the areas and numbers of animals. In Tanzania it is easy to spot animals from the road so we do some “fishing”, go to Pascal’s favorite fishing holes and see what we can see.

In Botswana, we notice right away that Pat tracks animals. He has to. How else do we find a cat or a wild dog on our own? The animals routinely ply the dirt roads, so the tracks are visible. When we do locate an animal we stay and watch its behavior, sometimes sitting for an hour. This pays off as we see remarkable happenings – lions killing an elephant, wild dogs hunting two impala, a baby leopard eating an impala high up in a tree, an old elephant making the peace between two young elephants. Pat is extremely knowledgeable about birds, trees, flowers, insects, reptiles, not just mammals. When the sightings of mammals and birds (his passion) are few, we start to learn about insects, grasses, landscape and the geological history of the area.

Pascal paced the safari very well; I presume he has learned this over time. When we started out he knew it was our first time in Africa and we stopped at every animal. They are all new to us and he understood. We have just arrived at the gates of the Tarengire National Park, right inside the gate are a few Thompsons Gazelles, Pascal stops and we click away on madly taking an inordinate amount of pictures. We sit and ogle the tiny antelope and marvel at their beautiful coats. Over time Pascal knows that we spend less and less time with the Gazelles until by the last day we drive right by and will only stop for cats, elephants, giraffe and the like. The last day we only spend a good amount of time at unusual sightings like a male lion feasting on a wildebeest.  Pascal, in Tanzania, has the knowledge, but he does not pass it on so readily as Pat. I am quite sure that most people on their first safari experience information overload and will not retain the details even if told. So our more mature guide picks and chooses the information he releases and if we ask he expounds upon the base he has provided.

The safari we spend with Pat has a slightly different pace. He knows we will see so many impala that they will become commonplace so we stop but not for very long. Just as Pascal knows, Pat know the value of patience when we do come upon a promising situation, we wait and wait and sometimes wait longer, or maybe leave the site to return later, but with a little persistence we have been there at the events that are mentioned above.

In Tanzania, we use a Toyota Landcruiser that is enclosed. Windows and doors, perhaps to protect us from the dust that is everywhere on the roads. The vehicle has a pop up roof with a sun shade so we can stand to take unobstructed photos.  In Botswana, the Landcruiser is completely open. If it rains, we don rain gear, if a lion is close, we don’t stand up – we become one with the vehicle. It was quite scary being 3 meters away from a male lion with nothing but air between him and us.

Both Tanzania and Botswana are unique destinations with their own personalities, just like the safari guides, one not better than the, other just different

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Zanzibar

Posted on December 5, 2012 by murray

So this is Zanzibar. I imagine it is quite a bit different than it was 50 years ago when I first learned of its existence while I was collecting stamps. It has been on my list of places to visit since that time even though I had yet to develop a travel lust at the age of 9. But, here I am sitting on a beach that could well have been pictured on one of those stamps.

Zanzibar it quite a big island and it is able to maintain areas with distinctly different characters. We have stopped at one place so we can only talk first hand of it, Matemwe, but the reports of other areas come from fellow travelers and each sounds different.

Matemwe is a quiet east coast village with a reasonably nice beach.  The beach is being more and more developed so I do not expect it will be quiet for long. The local folks fish a bit, farm seaweed, and work in the lodges. Everyone is friendly, both tourists and locals.

There are two main traffic thoroughfares here. There is a small dirt road that is dusty and because it is 50M from the water and sheltered from the sea breeze it is very hot to travel on. The other, the beach, is huge; I’m guessing it is 3km long and anywhere from 5M to 30M wide depending on the tide.

I have worn shoes only once, the day we walked along the dirt road and immediately removed them to walk the return route along the beach. It is the longest period of time in my life , I think, I have gone without something on my feet. Four days without donning footwear other than flip flops and I only wear those to walk on the gravelly roads and to get into or out of the water where there are rocks. Debbie and I walk the beach every day and we walk in bare feet. The sand is white, white and does not retain the heat so the walking is easy.

You can swim at high tide but it is a bit shallow at low tide and you have to be careful about stepping on a sea urchin.

Most of our last couple of days has been spent in our bathing suits with a t-shirt, then dress for dinner. Most restaurants here don’t really care and we are keeping our clean clothes for the city.

The big disadvantage to this place is the lack of snow which would preclude any chance of skiing.

We went diving yesterday and return to the underwater world today. The diving is good and we see a lot of different types of fish.  Our first dive is at a spot called the aquarium and it is the first time Debbie and I see a frog fish.  It never rains, it pours and the dive master finds 2, one green and one red. I guess it looks somewhat like I imagined after seeing some pictures in this book or that but they are so big. Debbie will say I am exaggerating but I think they are about 30cm across. They are so camouflaged, both are tucked up against coral and have all the same lumps and bumps of their inanimate hosts and the colour is an exact match. They do have eyes and fins which of course give them away but only when you know they are there.

The last two days we have been diving with an older French couple. Older than us if you can imagine that. They have lived up to the international reputation of French people and they are quite rude. Both have underwater cameras and when the dive master points out something of interest they literally use their elbows to get to the front of the line to see and take pictures. There are only 4 of us in the group so it would not take long to hang back and wait a turn. For the most part after visiting France I did not find the people to live up to their reputation. I think this is the case in most countries but it only takes a couple of incidents and a sweeping generalization can be established. Even if queuing was not their strong point they are quite nice and we did seem to meld into a good dive group after the first couple of dives.

There are people from all over the world staying in Zanzibar. On the dive boat today there are three ladies from Holland, two young people from South Africa, one from Australia, two Brits, two French folks, two from the U.S., and two from Canada. That seems to be the way everywhere we run into a group of tourists.

I do not know how the people choose to come here but I can see why one might come back. I do know how we chose to travel here. Some months ago Debbie asked me; “If we only had one other place to go and then we did not travel again where would it be?” Reflecting back to my stamp collecting days and remembering the exotic places that I learned about because of the philatelic activity I had a very strong desire to visit Zanzibar and here we are.

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Wish I Had My Underwater Camera Housing

Posted on December 4, 2012 by murray

 

Early morning on the beach

We go scuba diving today – scuba safari. Nerves, of course, but still excited to be in the ocean.

One Ocean has a couple of boats and today we are 14 divers and snorkelers on the big boat. Our dive group has four divers and Marine, our dive master. The crew is very efficient and the ship deck is organized and run well. We gear up and PLONK! into the water.

Eels. Marina said there are lots of eels on the first dive, and there are. Right away we notice the difference between these eels and the eels we see in the Caribbean. There are whitish ones and orangish ones here.

Nudibranches are frequently spotted. White with black and blue with black ones. They are large – 4 cm long.

We see fish that we know the shape but the colouring is different.  We see our favs – clown triggerfish, clownfish and butterfly fish.

Marina finds two octopi and one is quite large. They are hiding in holes so are only partially visible. It would have been cool to see them outside their holes, but we would have had to wait until dark.

I remember why I love diving so much and rue that fact that I did not bring the underwater housing for my camera.

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