Trip 2: Island hopping

22 September 2011

Well we are leaving Unjuga and heading to Pemba Island. It’s an island northeast of Unjuga and one of the three main islands of Zanzibar Archipelago. I’m pretty excited because we scored the deal of a century and are going to an AMAZING place. Fundu Lagoon. It should be added to your bucket list. www.fundulagoon.com. Learn it, live it, love it.

I woke up early and tried to finish up all of my coursework since I wasn’t sure if we were going to have Internet for the next few days. Then, finished packing up my stuff and took a shower. Liam slowly pulled himself out of bed and packed up his stuff. Headed up to breakfast and then back to the room to finish the last little bit of packing.

Migrated down to the lobby and met our cabbie, Rashid. The airport is not that far away but we needed to get copies of our boarding passes. We didn’t have a way to print them after booking them a few days ago.

Show up to the airport. Try to go to the ticket counter and the guys wouldn’t let us in the area because we didn’t have boarding passes. So, we had to schlepp to the other side of the airport (I say that like it was so far. It was about 25 m away. But, we had 4 bags and it was hot – so it might as well have been 10 miles. Oh and did I mention, I was wearing that stupid wool sweater again. It’s not traveling to hot places anymore).

We get to the Coastal Aviation office and place our bags down and decide who is going in to deal with our lack of boarding passes. Liam goes in because I couldn’t fit through the door with my pack on. I could have taken it off, but once it’s on, it’s comfy. He was lost in there for at least 20 minutes. Apparently, it takes that long to print a boarding pass in Zanzibar. Just in case you ever needed to know that. Lesson #5647 buy all plane tickets before you leave your house in Dar to facilitate printed copies of all boarding passes. This eliminates chaotic frustration from an already frustration filled journey. But, TIA. And we are still on the slow learning curve of African living.

Go back over to the gate check to check in. The boarding gate guard was really starting to piss me off because he was being such a jerk. But, whatever, gave him my boarding pass and got in line to check our bags. What a cluster. Seriously, if one more person tried to cut in front of me, I was going to snap. You would think a series of people would fall into a line and wait there turn. Oh no. It’s more like 10 lines merging into one randomly with people cutting in front of you and then 2 more airlines start checking passengers in the same airline booth. Yep, cluster.

Make it to the front of the line and I’m not joking - checking in involved one employee writing our name down on a sheet of paper in pencil. Jesus. What I have gotten myself into. Hand over our bags and proceed to walk through the security gate. Walk into the seating area to see a world of Italian tourists. Apparently, there was a gigantic plane from Italy landing and then leaving. Lesson #5648 make sure big tourist planes aren’t leaving at the same time you are leaving from an African airport. It was hot and there were 300+ extra people hanging out in the waiting area. We walked outside hoping for a breeze. No such luck. Just hot, beating sun.

Covered in sweat, I decided to head inside get a bottle of water and take a bathroom break. Took Liam a bottle of water and saw what looked like our plane landing. It looked so tiny. As it got closer, I realized it was that tiny. Crap.

Watch our bags head to our plane and follow them. Get to the door of the plane and realize there are a lot of faces in the windows. Walk up the steps. Put the camera bag in the back “carry-on baggage” section and look for a seat. Started to freak out a little because I was REALLY hot (damn wool sweater in 100 degree weather. Again, not the brightest crayon in the box sometimes), the plane was really tiny, and I started to get queasy. Of course, the closest seat to the door was beside a VERY nice man with a butt as wide as mine. But, I decided being closer to the door was more important than how much my butt was sticking out into the 12” wide aisle. And, I didn’t think I was going to be able to walk any further into the plane.

Spent the first 15 minutes of the flight trying not to puke from being so hot. Then, I start freaking out about being in such a small space. Not really sure what was going on there, but I’m going to chalk it up as I was just really, really hot and needed to get out of there and cool off. How I’m going to survive rainy season is going to be interesting.  

Finally, the runway was fast approaching and I let out a sigh of relief. Liam was sitting in the seat in front of me and had no idea of my inner angst until we got of the plan. We walked a short way to the “baggage claim.” I use this term loosely. There wasn’t a carousel in site, just one guy handing us our bags through a hole in a stone wall currently being stuccoed. I would have rather grabbed my stuff from the guy as he wheeled it to the building, rather than take the risk of it being covered in stucco. But, then again, I’m a picky American.

Nothing like a little fresh stucco to spruce up an suitcase.

Why they couldn't just hand us our bags outside, I still don't understand.

Walked outside after Liam grabbed all of the bags – I was on the verge of passing out  - and met the van to take us to the lodge. Had about an hour drive through some pretty sharp curves. Thanks to an ice-cold bottle of water and a nice breeze, I was finally starting to feel human again. Arrive at the port and meet the boat that is taking us to the lodge. It was about a 20-minute boat ride through some rather rough seas. But, the fresh salt-water air felt amazing!

Arrived at the lodge and it was everything and MORE! We fell in love from the first moment. Pulled up in high tide against the Jetty. Nice wind blowing. Signed in and got a tour of the lodge. Walked to our banda. Well, we were upgraded to a suite. We had two bandas. One was our bedroom and the other was a living room/wind shelter. Learned about the padlock to keep the monkeys out, because they have figured out how to unzip the tents. Then, there was our private pool. Again, I got the “Only this guy” speech. But, you know what? I could have cared less. Because, he’s right. We have a pretty amazing life. And for the first time in months, we were going to be able to relax and enjoy this beautiful place.

Our private pool on the beach.

The wind shelter with bao board.

One of two mini fridges in our banda.

The bedroom & bath tent.

A view from the beach.

Took quick showers to get out of our sweat soaked clothes. Then, we migrated to the main dining room for lunch. While we were hungry, we were not prepared for the culinary delights being placed before us. Bar none. The best food we have had in Africa to date.

After licking our plates, we headed back to our room for a nap. Woke up from our nap and went to the main lodge pool to enjoy a pre-dinner snack and a few cocktails. Took a walk along the beach to get some shots of the beautiful sunset.

Went back to the main dining room for dinner. The food just gets better and better. They serve a starter with every meal. The starters are usually soup. Delicious happy soups. We made a decision then and there. We are reintroducing soups into our diets. As starters. It’s a missed opportunity in the States. Every meal should have a small serving of soup.

After dinner, enjoyed a few drinks at the bar and managed to get a wee bit intoxicated. After being attacked by the mosquitoes, we stumbled to back to our banda for a night of fantastic slumber.