Ancient city
Trip Start
Jun 20, 2008
1
16
19
Trip End
Jul 16, 2008
Where I stayed
Lamu,
Kenya
Friday, July 11, 2008
I apologize to polish roads, as in comparison to those in Kenya, they used to be brilliant (and we cursed them so much). I have no idea, how buses survive such conditions. I see, drivers try to sail on the road and escape all the potholes which are there in plenty. Soon after I started to be seasick as it doesn't happen often...
We arrived before sunset and were quickly rushed into the boat. Stephen tried to calm them down a little, as seems they are behaving like escaping from fire. "Breath, darling, breath..." They smiled. Their tactics like that - quickly stock all the people into boat and go. As time is their money, we in seconds ppeared there already heading towards the island.
Lamu is truly gorgeous. The streets are so narrow that you can hardly pass each other without turning a little. But the combinations of the buildings, freely walking donkeys (apparently, there are around 3000 donkeys on this island), and relaxed atmosphere makes it special.
We decided to stay at least a whole full day...
Soon the night arrived, and moon in the company of the stars was playing on the dark towns walls. Part of the town sank into darkness, as something went wrong with generator. So xerophene lamps came in hand again. And that it made more mysterious...
Beach boys are the part of reality and sort of a game. Some of them are in corporation with police, so when they sell marihuana to the tourists, the police come around to the hotel and demand to pay the fine! But as we were not interested neither in their speedboats, nor in their drugs, we were soon of a little interest.
But Stephen cannot miss an opportunity to chat and wind them up. However, among the beach boys, we found one decent guy who is generally a fisherman. And he took us on his fishing simple dhow to the Shela beach. His voice was calm and sounded like that water striking against the boat.
Shela beach was a necessary rest and a truly paradise type place to stay away from anything in the world...
I jumped to the water like thousand times. And was never enough...
Couple hours, and we headed back on foot to Lamu. Only now we started to realize the price of vanity. Even though we applied plenty of sunblock, jeeez, we got burned.
Came back to the guesthouse all radiating warmth and red light...
