Curt & Laureen - Africa 2023: Tour Day 14 - Arusha Airport and Zanzibar

Pictures were added at a later date due to poor internet access at the time]

[Friday, August 11, 2023]

It was a little hard to believe that this day had arrived. After two weeks of being on tour in two East African countries we had landed on our last day with our Tanzanian guide, Renatus. It was an early one as we had a rather long journey ahead of us out of the Tarangire National Park heading for Arusha. This is where four of us would hop on a Precision Air flight to Zanzibar (Yvonne, Ara, Laureen and me) and two of our safari family would say goodbye and head back home (Willi and Wendy – from Toronto). We were up and having breakfast before 7:00 AM and were ready at reception for 7:30 AM. I’ve lost track as to how many times we’ve packed/unpacked now. Seems like a lot.

While we were waiting for the now daily ritual of Suitcase Tetris, we found out that Willi and Wendy had a bit of a rough night. It seems Wendy was having a bit of a stomach issue and threw up in bed at close to midnight. They tried to clean up as best they could and didn’t want to bother any of the hotel staff, so they just managed for the evening. She was still not feeling well and attributed it to the amount of bouncing they were experiencing in the back of the Land Cruiser. If I had not mentioned this before, this second vehicle had far less room between the seats, so it would have been impossible for me to fit in the back (as opposed to the last one where the back seat was higher than the others). Renatus was moving things around so that Wendy could sit in the front seat for this last leg of the journey. She made sure to have a bag with her, just in case she needed it. Our driver indicated that there would be about 30% of our journey today on the rougher National Park roads (a process he called an “African Massage”), and the rest on tarmac.

We headed out and enjoyed a bit more of the wildlife on our trek out of the reserve which included a hollowed-out Baobab tree, a lover bird (which I didn’t get a very good picture of), and another type of antelope that we did not see before called a Grant’s Gazelle (a bigger version of the Thompson’s Gazelle.)

We make a quick pitstop as we left the main park entrance and began the less-bumpy version of today’s trek. I captured a photo of what we commonly saw as we drove down the highways of both Kenya and Tanzania in the form of the Maasai herding some of their livestock in the wilderness.

We drove a while longer and Renatus stopped at a shop where we could use the washrooms. These places are always filled with intricate carvings and all kinds of trinkets for sale. We didn’t buy anything there (not that we didn’t want to mind you as I could come home with A LOT of gorgeous stuff) as the room in our suitcases is quite minimal. We have been talking about purchasing another carry-on type of bag when we get to London to transfer a bunch of the items that we already have. This might give them a better chance of survival on the way home instead of in our checked bags. We did take a photo outside of the building though as there were two rather large carvings in the entrance way that were impressive. Back into the vehicle on our way to lunch at a fancy hotel in Arusha.

Before we arrived at our lunch destination, we stopped at a grocery store as Ara was looking to get some local chocolate to take back to Miami. We had experienced these individually packaged chocolates in the boxed lunch that we had while visiting the Ngorongoro Crater. Since Renatus is from the Arusha area, he knew exactly where to go to find a supermarket that might carry these. I wish I had taken a picture inside that grocery store because when I stepped inside, if I didn’t know I was in Africa, I would have sworn I was somewhere in Canada or the US. The place was probably one of the cleanest and neatest grocery places I have ever been in.

We made our way to the candy/chocolate isle and started looking for the local chocolate. It just so happened that there was a store employee stocking the shelves in that isle and Renatus showed him the wrapper that Ara had kept seeing if they carried the product. He shook his head no. It was interesting to note that 75% of the chocolate in the isle was Cadbury, an English company. I decided to buy a Fruit & Nut bar which we would share later. Back into the vehicle to our lunch destination which was a coffee plantation and lodge.

We arrived and were escorted to our table where we were met by Jordan, who was the Somak representative in the area. Somak is the tour operator hired by Trafalgar to provide the tour services in the area. He had a questionnaire for us to fill out asking about the hotels we stayed in along the way. The form had 10 blank lines for the hotels – so we were supposed to remember them all by name. Seemed a little like the last leg of an Amazing Race journey. It might have been better if they pre-printed the names of the accommodations given, they would have had to book them all for us. It was a little disorganized and almost as though this was just something he needed to give to us and really didn’t care about the actual result. We dug up the names as there were a few we wanted to comment on.

There was also a bit of confusion regarding the lunch. They brought us menus like we had received several times in the near past which described the 3 or four course options you had. We all thought they were going to come and take our order for each – but the menus were just to show us the options at the buffet. Sigh. We had about an hour before we needed to be at the airport, so once we figured out that we just had to get up and get our food, we felt a little more at ease.

Unfortunately, things did not go well for Wendy as she got sick at the table. We got the staff’s attention, and they brought stuff to help clean her up and to mop up after. Clearly, she is not feeling better. They had one night in Arusha before flying out to Nairobi and then home back to Toronto. I sure hope her stomach settles down before that long trip home. I touched base with Willi later that day through WhatsApp and he said she was resting and that it seemed that things were on the mend.

Just before we left the lodge for the airport, we took a selfie with Renatus. What an amazing guide he has been for this portion of the trip.

We then drove to the airport and stood in line behind a larger group of people for Precision Air. While we were pulling our luggage out, we heard an announcement about a flight to Zanzibar being delayed a couple of hours. As it turns out, it was not our flight. Whew! We had our luggage weighed and then a porter pulled them about 30 ft to the x-ray machine where everything was scanned (including our carry-on items). Then he expected at tip. I almost told him not to eat yellow snow, but instead I reached into my pocket and pulled out my Tanzanian currency and gave him something. Does it say “ATM” on my forehead?

We then proceeded to the “waiting” area for a short time while our plane arrived and was prepped for boarding. Laureen saw a Tanzania flag hat, so I went over and bought one to match the Kenyan one that Hamisi had given Willi and I at the end of our Kenyan portion of the safari. Now I have one from both countries we had visited on this trip.

We boarded the plane which was a turboprop containing two seats on either side of the isle and about 24 rows for the just over an hour flight to Zanzibar. The flight itself was uneventful and I had actually tried to type a bit of the blog for the night before while we were in the air. My knees were touching the back of the seat in front of me, so it was a snug ride. Thankfully it was a short flight. We arrived and deplaned onto the tarmac and walked a short distance to a bus that took us about 100 ft to the terminal. As we entered the terminal, we walked up to an agent who basically asked us if we just got off the flight from Arusha and we said yes. There is no separation for passengers arriving, so I guess he just believed me when I said that I had my visa already. It took a few minutes to get our bags off the conveyor, and then we headed for the exit where our luggage and carryon were x-rayed/scanned on the way out. I mean, what are you going to find in my bag that was not found on the way in?

Walking outside of the airport we were then confronted with a sea of people holding signs with names of their party. It took a bit, but I finally saw the guy holding a sign with my whole name on it and a number 4 beside. This was our ride to the Ocean Paradise hotel and included Ara and Yvonne. The ride from the airport parking lot to the hotel was just over an hour. Once at the hotel, we were assigned our rooms and we settled in for the next couple of days. YEAH! I don’t have to repack my suitcase for a while. We also called Nathanial to wish him a happy birthday (well, he called us actually).

The resort is quite beautiful and the sand on the beach of the Indian Ocean is white and like powered. A short walk on the beach and we were approached by two different people trying to sell us something. We did not stick around much longer to be accosted by others. Dinner was at 7:30 and we sat with Ara & Yvonne.