Getting to Zanzibar

The Trip Advisor online community is a fantastic source of information. Their reviews of restaurants and hotels have helped us somewhat throughout our trip and the online forum is a great way to get some sound advice from fellow travellers who have already been to the places you’re heading. It is often a good idea to heed the advice that you receive from other travellers, especially when a lot of them are saying the same thing. In this instance it was, ‘don’t get a dhow to Zanzibar’. This was the response that I received when I asked about the best way to get to the island of Zanzibar from the mainland. A dhow is essentially a small wooden boat that the locals use to go fishing or take people snorkling. They are rather small, so shouldn’t be used for a long trip like the one across the sea to where we wanted to go. Most people said to go to Dar Es Salaam and jump on one of the ferries. Claire and I, however, were in Peponi. We didn’t fancy taking four buses and six hours to get to Dar Es Salaam before then getting the ferry over to the island. So, we asked the lady running the camp site we were staying at if she would be able to arrange a boat for us. ‘Sure!’ she said, and before we knew it we were booked on a motorboat to take us the four hours across the Indian Ocean to Zanzibar, leaving from Pangani, which was around half an hour’s drive from where we were staying. Claire and I then relaxed for the rest of the week pretty pleased with ourselves that we were able to get a boat ride from where we were, direct to Zanzibar. That was, until we saw the boat. A dhow…

There was only one part of the journey when I genuinely feared that we may capsize, but the whites of my knuckles as I clung to the back of the seat may have been more truthful than I am willing to be here now. I looked at Claire as we rocked violently from side to side, the rain hammering on the tarp that had been wrapped around the edge of the boat, the waves seemingly getting bigger and asked if she was nervous. ‘A bit,’ was her reply. I was hoping she would say ‘no, not at all,’ I was looking for some reassurance. But unfortunately for me, she was being honest.

The ocean was flat when we left…

We had woken up around 5am to get a taxi to the port town of Pangani. We packed up our things in the dark, the singing from the mosque had already begun, and were then on our way. As we arrived at the harbour, the sun was still yet to appear in the sky and the place was lit by the crescent moon. The water in the bay was calm and there were lots of fishing boats making their way back to the shore loaded up with their night’s catch. We were excited about the trip to Zanzibar, unaware when we arrived in Pangani that the boat we’d be taking was nothing more than a wooden dhow with an outboard motor stuck on the back. But there was no turning back now, so we jumped on board.

The first hour of our trip was nice and calm. The crew, which consisted of three guys, were all pretty friendly, and Claire and I sat watching the sun come up over the bay as we left mainland Tanzania behind. Zanzibar wasn’t even visible when we set off, hiding somewhere beyond the horizon. We were pretty confident that the boat would be fine as the sea was pretty calm. However, after about an hour the wind picked up and the rain began to fall. Luckily the dhow had a cover, protecting us from the rain, but the wind was strong which meant it was whipping in from the side and getting us wet. But one of the crew members jumped to our rescue grabbing the tarp and wrapping it around the edge of the boat to shield us from the rain.

As we continued across the ocean the waves began to get more and more choppy and before we knew it we were being thrown about all over the place. The crew stayed pretty calm, which was reassuring, but there were moments where we’d spot a wave a few metres away and Claire and I would look at each other wide eyed. Nervous laughter overtook us both as we chuckled every time the boat went up a wave and then dropped down the other side. Whilst the waves themselves weren’t huge, in comparison to our small boat that was about eight metres long and three metres wide, they felt massive. The hammering rain only added to the suspense. I am sure we were safer than we felt, and I am sure that the crew are used to making this trip in these conditions, but there were a few hairy moments where we held our breath. Though there was something particularly exciting about heading off towards the horizon in the pouring rain on a tiny boat. I managed to catch one particularly close shave on my camera and the video is here.

However, as Zanzibar came into view above the horizon the sea began to calm. An hour later we were pulling up on the white sandy beach in the north of the island surrounded by crystal clear water. As we jumped off the boat into the knee deep warm water and our feet touched the ground, we were elated. And whilst we probably wouldn’t get a dhow across the channel again, it did save us four different buses!