Page 47 - African Safaris eBrochure by Bushtracks
P. 47
ma Pitcher has been crazy about Africa since she was old enough to play with her first cuddly
lion toy. She took off for the Dark Continent at the age of 17, and spent the best part of the next
ten years vagabonding through Eastern and Southern Africa, writing Lonely Planet guidebooks to
Africa, Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, Mozambique and Madagascar, and also authoring over 15
books on Tanzanian style, design, history and culture. These days she’s a freelance travel writer/
photographer based in Sydney, Australia.
So sang Noel Coward back in the 1930s, and today those on ancient bicycles, their catch of silver fish or octopus
of us with a compulsion to travel can still get a thrill dangling from the handlebars.
from a name as far-fetched and faraway as Zanzibar. Women hitch up their colorful kangas and wade fully
A cliché it might be, but Zanzibar is one of those dressed into the shallows to tend their seaweed farms,
words, like Casablanca or Timbuktu, that conjures up gathering bundles of the sea’s harvest to sell for export.
adventure, remoteness and excitement in the minds of Wander along the beach for long enough and you’ll also
most Westerners. The kind of name that figured in your find half buried sacks of coconut shells being softened
dreams when you first decided that
traveling was in your blood. Despite to make coir – a fibrous stuffing for
its legendary status, however, matting and twine.
many people are in the dark about For water sports enthusiasts, the
Zanzibar’s actual position on coral reefs and open sea between
the map. Zanzibar and Pemba are justly
Most accounts of Zanzibar in travel famous for the quality of their
literature and fiction begin with snorkelling, diving and big
a description of the port of Stone game fishing.
Town, the island’s capital, from the When you first arrive, everything
sea. It’s certainly an unforgettable will seem a little strange, a little
sight, and one likely to make even disturbing and very, very exotic. But
the most hard-nosed, jaded traveler the Swahili people of Zanzibar have
“ooh and ahh” with excitement. been welcoming strangers to their
Minarets and graceful, curved country since the first Phoenician
towers rise above the turquoise ships blew into the harbor on the
waters, the smell of cloves wafts on northwest monsoon of 600 BC, or
the breeze, and Arab dhows with thereabouts. They’ve seen Greeks,
sails the shape of the crescent moon Arabs, Persians, Portuguese, Indians,
bob gently in the harbor. Chinese, American and British ships
Culture is here in spades, but if your anchor offshore in the centuries
idea of heaven is to lie on the most since, so not much can faze them.
perfect of perfect beaches, undisturbed by anything Ancient visitors to the island came to trade – gold, silks,
more than the occasional hermit crab, you’ll find tiny, ivory, spices, animal skins and, most notoriously, slaves.
abandoned coves where you can forget the rest of the But many stayed, intermarrying with the locals to form
world exists, and stir only to flop into the bath-warm sea. a culture that’s uniquely diverse, and producing a race
On other parts of the island, the beaches are wilder, of people who regard hospitality to strangers as a
stretching for miles – endless ribbons of sand, decorated sacred duty.
with fringes of seaweed, washed up shells and scraps The word you’ll hear first, and most frequently
of timber. throughout your stay, is karibu (‘welcome’ in Swahili).
The best time for a stroll is low tide, when fishermen use And astonishingly, considering a colorful history of
these beaches as highways, peddling doggedly along conquest, slavery and revolution, they mean it.
1.800.995.8689 | WWW.BUSHTRACKS.COM 45
lion toy. She took off for the Dark Continent at the age of 17, and spent the best part of the next
ten years vagabonding through Eastern and Southern Africa, writing Lonely Planet guidebooks to
Africa, Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, Mozambique and Madagascar, and also authoring over 15
books on Tanzanian style, design, history and culture. These days she’s a freelance travel writer/
photographer based in Sydney, Australia.
So sang Noel Coward back in the 1930s, and today those on ancient bicycles, their catch of silver fish or octopus
of us with a compulsion to travel can still get a thrill dangling from the handlebars.
from a name as far-fetched and faraway as Zanzibar. Women hitch up their colorful kangas and wade fully
A cliché it might be, but Zanzibar is one of those dressed into the shallows to tend their seaweed farms,
words, like Casablanca or Timbuktu, that conjures up gathering bundles of the sea’s harvest to sell for export.
adventure, remoteness and excitement in the minds of Wander along the beach for long enough and you’ll also
most Westerners. The kind of name that figured in your find half buried sacks of coconut shells being softened
dreams when you first decided that
traveling was in your blood. Despite to make coir – a fibrous stuffing for
its legendary status, however, matting and twine.
many people are in the dark about For water sports enthusiasts, the
Zanzibar’s actual position on coral reefs and open sea between
the map. Zanzibar and Pemba are justly
Most accounts of Zanzibar in travel famous for the quality of their
literature and fiction begin with snorkelling, diving and big
a description of the port of Stone game fishing.
Town, the island’s capital, from the When you first arrive, everything
sea. It’s certainly an unforgettable will seem a little strange, a little
sight, and one likely to make even disturbing and very, very exotic. But
the most hard-nosed, jaded traveler the Swahili people of Zanzibar have
“ooh and ahh” with excitement. been welcoming strangers to their
Minarets and graceful, curved country since the first Phoenician
towers rise above the turquoise ships blew into the harbor on the
waters, the smell of cloves wafts on northwest monsoon of 600 BC, or
the breeze, and Arab dhows with thereabouts. They’ve seen Greeks,
sails the shape of the crescent moon Arabs, Persians, Portuguese, Indians,
bob gently in the harbor. Chinese, American and British ships
Culture is here in spades, but if your anchor offshore in the centuries
idea of heaven is to lie on the most since, so not much can faze them.
perfect of perfect beaches, undisturbed by anything Ancient visitors to the island came to trade – gold, silks,
more than the occasional hermit crab, you’ll find tiny, ivory, spices, animal skins and, most notoriously, slaves.
abandoned coves where you can forget the rest of the But many stayed, intermarrying with the locals to form
world exists, and stir only to flop into the bath-warm sea. a culture that’s uniquely diverse, and producing a race
On other parts of the island, the beaches are wilder, of people who regard hospitality to strangers as a
stretching for miles – endless ribbons of sand, decorated sacred duty.
with fringes of seaweed, washed up shells and scraps The word you’ll hear first, and most frequently
of timber. throughout your stay, is karibu (‘welcome’ in Swahili).
The best time for a stroll is low tide, when fishermen use And astonishingly, considering a colorful history of
these beaches as highways, peddling doggedly along conquest, slavery and revolution, they mean it.
1.800.995.8689 | WWW.BUSHTRACKS.COM 45
