Stone Town

Trip Start Sep 29, 2007

Trip End Nov 11, 2007

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Flag of Tanzania Zanzibar Town, Tanzania
Friday, November 9, 2007

We spent the last night of our trip in Stone Town, the old part of Zanzibar Town, the largest town in the Zanzibar Archipelago. It was very hot - even after 6 weeks in Africa we found it nearly unbearable. However, Stone Town was worth it - winding narrow streets between Arab influence buildings. I could have spent the entire time we were there just wandering around the streets. The best time to wander around was first thing in the morning and at sunset - that is when most of the local Stone Town people are out and about. People going to mosques, school kids reciting the Koran or playing in the streets, vendors selling their real wares (not tourist trinkets)...

We stayed at the Zanzibar Coffee House - which has a coffee shop on the main floor and some boutique rooms on the upper floors. All the rooms were really nicely decorated in Zanzibar style and really comfortable

Church at Slave Market Site

. The best part was a rooftop terrace with a 360 degree view over the town which was also very comfortable with low chairs, covered in pillows.

Chris and I did the tourist thing - we visited the Old Fort, built by the Arabs to protect against the Portuguese's, which is now a craft market and the House of Wonders, which was the Sultan's palace but is now a museum. Both were interesting - we learned a lot at the museum about the history of Zanzibar, the culture and language. The best thing we did was visit an Anglican Church that is built on the site of the Slave Market. It was very informative, and disturbing to see. The Bishop who built the church, Edward Steere, was instrumental in abolishing the slave market in Zanzibar. We had a guided tour which included the church and chambers where they kept the slaves before they went to market. The estimated that about 60,000 people were put up for auction every year for about 100 years - this does not include the ones who died before they even made it.

We also went to watch the sunset at Africa House, an over-priced rooftop bar that is the tourist 'it' place to have sundowners and watch the sunset. By this point however I have seen some pretty impressive sunsets, and the appeal of sitting in the hot sun waiting for the sun to go down quickly diminished - we ended sitting inside, in the shade and under a fan, and watching the sunset through the window.

After Africa House we tried to go to the night market for dinner, however managed to get lost and ended up at the local market instead. It was really fun actually - we got chapatis, fish and cakes from some vendors and then stopped on a step to eat

House of Wonders

. Apparently this is what happens at the night market as well, except there are ocean views (it was dark so we didn't miss out) and more tourists. When we stopped on the step people kept staring at us - we figured it was because we were tourists - until we stood up and realized the step was at a mosque. Not sure if they were staring because we were tourists or because we were eating on the steps of a mosque? It was a great place to watch all the goings on of the city though and a fabulous way to spend the last night of our trip.

After a ferry ride from the island to Dar Es Salaam we fly home... the end of the trip. Can't wait for the next one!

Take care.