Paradise in Africa

We had an absolutely amazing relaxing time on Zanzibar, and ended up spending nearly twice as long as planned. We spent a week at the beach where the most strenuous thing we did was an all day snorkeling trip. The snorkeling was fabulous, with some very interesting fish. Then we sailed back on the dhow to our beach resort, ah...heaven.

After a week we decided to head back to Stonetown to explore a little bit. The main thing here was a spice tour. The spice farms were not at all what we expected, seeming more like how you would grow plants in your backyard. The vanilla (which is a vine)was grown using acacia trees, or whatever else was around. Cardamon grew in the shade of clove trees. We tried all sorts of fresh herbs: ginger, clove, pepper, cinnamon, cardamon etc. Also fruits, where my favourite was undeniably the cocoa!!! The flesh is white and surrounds the beans, you don't chew only suck (this was said very firmly) and the taste was very like mangosteens. We now have lots of photos of us eating cocoa fruit.

On a more serious note we were taken to the slave cave where hundreds and thousands of slaves were held after slavery became illegal. They were dumped down into the cave to await a boat, when it arrived they were taken through a tunnel to the beach for boarding to be shipped around the world.