A Vacation on Zanzibar

I was clean, well rested, and today, well today I have nothing to do, finally a day of rest, a day to attempt to turn off the mind.


I could not do that yet and walked north to the local fishing village to see them head out this morning.






I have seen this shot someplace before…. Maybe we are all really not that different after all….


While it took most boat owners a while to ready their ship, this guy was not so lucky.


I was invited in to their village, however, no shirt, no shoes, no service, and I had to decline. I had walked down the beach without concern until I got to the village and started seeing all kinds of broken glass and other things to cut my feet on. It screamed of Hepatitis C and God knows what else so after a few pictures I decided to return to Fumba and catch some rays.


So with a heavy coat of sun screen on I shut down the mind, or at least I tried to. But my mind was racing with everything that I had seen and everything that I had done, it could take a life time to process. And then as I watched the tide go out my mind cleared, and I again understood, it was a single thought. “Yeah, life sure don’t suck”.


I watched the locals search the coral in low tide for everything from sea cucumbers to clams as they were all edible.


I lasted about two hours, and anyone who knows me knows that is pretty good, but then I got bored and had to get up and do something. Much the same way I feel after 4 holes of golf, ok so now what? So I again headed down the beach to see what the fisherman would return with. What is their day like. They came in and proceeded to smash the hell out of the octopuses they had caught by slamming them against the rocks. They were already dead and the language barrier was too much for me to understand why they were doing this. But that meat had to be tender when they were done.


They all had found something.


Something that could be eaten.


I then headed south of Fumba, and found nothing really.




After a few hours I returned to Fumba, it was beautiful, so many places to explore, so many places to just relax.




And then the angels were calling, there is a bar around here someplace, oh look there it is! And it is shaped like an old boat!


Ancient bones from Olduvai, echoes of the very first cry, who made me here and why, beneath the copper sun....






And so I watched the sunset, something I have seen many times before, but today was the first time I actually watched it. Yes, Africa was wild, untamed, and emotional.


It’s amazing how such a simple image can invoke such emotion, it’s nice to be on vacation.


This is the local dog, Simba. I think he was concerned when I left Fumba as he followed me the whole way, and then hung out in the shade while I soaked in the rays after my return.


What a great companion, although he is not much of a drinker. I know how he feels, it seems like we have been traveling for ages. While sitting at the boat bar I looked out over the ocean and saw lights were I did not think I was suppose to see lights. Turns out that the mainland curves in more then I had thought and I was seeing the edge of Dar es Salaam.