The jouney to Zanzibar from Dar es Salaam consisted of 2 ferries - one mad ferry crammed to the rafters with cars, bikes and people (no chickens or goats though which we were sad about!) The other was a very modern air conditioned ferry - which we were also sad about - as we had envisualised standing on the deck of an old style wooden dhow....!

We spent the first day in Zanzibar in Stone Town - a UNESCO world heritage site. The town is heavily influenced by Arab culture and is characterised by winding alleys and crumbling white buildings with massive spiked elephant doors (nb there are no elephants here - so not the most useful introduction to the local architecture!!!) and wooden shutters.

Kim dragged poor Mark round hundreds of bazaars looking for a sarong . Eventually we co-opted a local guy to show us the best places and Kim ended up in a store room where they made them - rooting through hundreds of sarongs in massive piles next to sewing machines and a family sitting on the floor weaving!

Cocktails at the Africa Hotel watching the stunning Zanzibar sunset was followed by dinner in the fish market... a slightly psychotic experience with loads of people trying to convince us to buy their fish. Kim settled on curried lobster and octopus skewers while Mark stuck with slightly more recognisable meat skewers and samosas... washed down with warm sugar cane juice (an acquired taste I think!)

The following day we had a tour of the old slave markets (very sad), the meat / fish and vegetable market (very smelly) and the government spice plantations (very tasty - we sampled loads of tea / fruit and spices!!!!) Lunch was an interesting experience - sitting on the floor of someones house in the local village - eating homemade spiced pilau rice, cocunut curry and spinach with cassava leaves.... very tasty, although braving the swarms of fire ants barefoot to get into the house was slightly daunting! We then headed off for three days on the beach.

One word to sum up the beach - stunning! We had a bungalow on the beach - white sand and palm trees, cocktails and fresh fish for dinner - yum! A well earned break from camping and long days in the truck. The most strenuous activities we indulged in were beach volleyball, massage and a sunset snorkelling cruise on a dhow (passing a Man U victory boat - with locals partying like mad people!)

Yes we did manage to watch the Man U Champions League final... 300 of us were crammed into a bar watching a 14 inch TV....interesting! Marks celebration at winning was slightly psychotic to say the least - though he fitted in with the locals celebration well. Never seen anything like it!