The day after Simon's birthday, the 23rd, we spent the day lazing on the beach at Zanzibar. We went for a walk down the beach to the lighthouse and turtle sanctuary, and were approached by a local guy called Moses who chatted with us and told us about his brother who lived in Coventry! Amy taught him a new English phrase - "lovely jubbly", much to our amusement. In the evening we had dinner at the local restaurant, the Fat Fish, although the waiter tried to rip us off by just giving us a random price, and then when we questioned him he shiftily brought us a bill made up of random price! After working out what we thought we'd spent, the waiter hastily accepted, and scuttled off.

The 24th was our last full day on Zanzibar, and after pizzas on the beach we left the northern town on Nungwi for Stone Town, about 45 minutes south. We checked into our hotel room which was very nice, and then had a walk around Stone Town. Stone Town is a really old colonial-style sea port, whose history is heavily linked with the spice and slave trades. One of the things we noticed was that all of the buildings are pretty run-down, which some say adds to the charm of the place, however you can imagine how nice it must have looked in its heyday. The buildings also have these amazing old mediaeval style doors, giving the place a real sense of grandeur. We met the rest of the group for drinks at Mercury's, the tribute bar to Freddie Mercury who was born on the island, although it wasn't as themed as you might imagine! From there we went to the night market, which is basically a street filled with food vendors selling their stuff under lamps. The local speciality appeared to be "Zanzibar Pizza" which is made up of a sticky dough, filled with some sort of mince, veg and eggs, then fried. It resembled more of a pie though than a pizza! We were pretty hungry and fancied a sit down, so after some disgusting falafels we headed off to find a restuarant. We found a great Indian place which cost us about 15 pounds for the whole meal and drinks, which is expensive here but cheap compared to back home! It had amazing silk draped from the ceiling and was a great example of how the buildings in Stone Town can look.

On Friday 25th we walked around Stone Town and went to Africa House, the former British club, which was very swish, and then the "House of Wonders" which is basically a museum and was quite nice, although pretty rundown again.
This was probably the hottest day so far, and really felt like we were in Africa - there's been so much rain recently it's been like back at home! In the afternoon we got the ferry from Stone Town to Dar es Salaam after Amy got her LPC results, which she happily passed! On the ferry back it was pretty choppy, and it was made worse by the choice of the film - Rambo - which was pretty gory!