Two Wheel Trekking in the Tropics
Zanzibar. The name alone is pure genius, rolling off the tongue like a sultan’s declaration of war; instantly conjuring up images of hovering burnt orange suns, perspiring cocktails, endless tropical days, long sweaty nights, and exotic locals. The spice island is a diver and snorkeller’s’ haven, surrounded on all sides by idyllic white beaches. It is also now just a quick hop, skip and a few grand away from the busiest airport in Africa.
I had decided to play it safe, and a few hours before departure I booked my first night’s accommodation in the archipelago’s biggest city, Stone Town. Sure, it was the soft option, but unlike the few hundred resort-bound honeymooners that would be canoodling on the plane next to me, after that night’s $20 reservation, I was a free agent and Zanzibar would be my oyster.
An old school mate would be arriving by ferry early the next morning, and after our rendezvous, the plan was fairly simple: Walk the winding alleyways, scour the local markets and find the cheapest bicycles we could get our hands on. Barter to the point of exhaustion. Sling them on the back of a north-bound taxi, and then spend the next nine days cycling the main roads, back roads and beaches from Nungwi, at the very northern tip of the island, as far south as we could make it.
By the time we had bundled our two solid steel, single gear bicycles off the back of the taxi and onto the sand outside our budget beach bungalow in the overly Lonely Planet-ised and backpacker-heavy resort town of Nungwi, the sun was already plotting its spectacular finale, and so we cared not that our pokey room smelt of damp and lacked a bathroom door. Instead, we dropped our bags on the creaky pine beds and floated towards the travel agent brochure outside which slowly came to life before us: An azure blue ocean sparkling invitingly in the thick afternoon humidity, speckled with a few dozen iconic East African fishing dhows, quietly going about their late afternoon business.
This, I thought, is what everyone’s been talking about.
As it turned out, though, one night in the north would be enough. This despite the fact that the water here might be one of the few places on the island still swimmable at low tide, that the fresh marlin braaied next to us on the beach the night before was superb, and that the party we had found and exhausted at 04h00 somewhere on the edge of the village was probably worthy of the next morning’s hangover!
We set off late the next morning and discovered that sticky, midday, hung-over cycling is not to be taken lightly, and so, embarrassingly, we gave in to cocktails, lunch, dinner and ultimately two cheap comfortable beds at Kendwa, just a few kilometres away. Such is life on a tropical island. But we rose early the next morning, loaded up the bikes, and pointed their plastic baskets in a southerly direction, before cutting inland toward Mtemwe, on the east coast. We were determined to put some distance between us and north.
“Jambo!”, “Mambo!”, and the fantastic response to both of “Poa!” rang out from knee-high school kids giddy at the sight of two mzungus on local bicycles. Like miniature cheerleaders they egged us on, and the promise of a night in the luxurious Azanzi Beach Hotel pushed us through the rising mid-morning heat and over the occasional inland hill. Before we knew it, we had sliced a fifth off the top of the island, and were standing sweaty and dusty in the tranquil reception area of the air-conditioned, four-star haven.
Tempting as it was to live the resort life for the next eight days, it took just a single evening of whispering honeymooners and South African accents at the albeit impressive dinner buffet, and a quick glimpse of the vast eastern coastline a few sandy steps from the resort swimming pool, to put pay to this temptation. We knew instantly that the only way to continue south was in the shallows of the Indian ocean listlessly lapping up against the chalk-white sand.
It was easier fantasised about than done, and the next day was to be the longest and hottest, as we did battle against the ebb and flow of unpredictable sand and rocky coastal outcrops.
Occasionally, we would coast past fishermen waist-deep in the surf casting their nets, abandoned dhows, rustic straw beach umbrellas, deck chairs, hand-in-hand couples, and a half dozen beach boys harassing them. But mostly we were alone, wedged between palm trees and the turquoise ocean, weaving in and out of the waterline, with our destination – the small finger of Pingwe – taunting us in the distance.
Sun burnt hands, tired legs and the eventual disappearance of rideable beach sand forced us back to the main road. When we eventually pedalled up to the private villa awaiting us at Upendo, we had ridden just 40 km since leaving Mtemwe that morning, but felt strangely satisfied with our achievement.
Chefs at the on-site lounge and restaurant cooked up fresh calamari and prawns with true Zanzibari flavour, and after an hour floating in the cool evening breeze on the swinging beds on the villa patio, it was time to lather the hands in lotion and call it a night.
Our next few days would be spent in the island’s second biggest backpacking town of Paje, at the unpretentious but charming Teddy’s Place. Here we drank Tusker, Safari, Serengeti and Konyagi with mango juice with the local barmen, fishermen, and some tourist-friendly Masai. We lazed the afternoons away on the idyllic beach, and bobbed in a hand-crafted wooden dhow with a patchwork sail to snorkel the crystal clear waters, populated by a lifetime of brightly coloured fish and sea creatures. We slept in rustic beach bandas made from woven palm leaves with beach sand floors, for only a handful of US dollars a night, and for a moment time stood still – as it tends to do in Zanzibar.
With a day to go we reached the southern tip of the island, and rode through to Kizimkazi, the dolphin capital of Zanzibar. In all, we had only clocked around 100 km, but given a few more days and some more land, we would have gladly done a hundred more.
The next morning we rose early to put our hosts’ promise of dolphin sightings to the test. We stood on the edge of the resort’s finger-like pier as it jutted far into the coral-infused ocean and sleepily watched the water, until, right on time, they appeared. Two dozen dolphins frolicked and leapt just beyond the shallows and into the salmon pink morning sunlight, taunting us, until we quietly put down our cameras, stripped down to our shorts and gently waded out to join them, in what is surely one the world’s most accessible paradises.
Places to Stay
Azanzi Beach Hotel: 0861 010 200, www.azanzibeachhotel.com
Upendo Villa: +255 777 244492, www.upendozanzibar.com
Dolphin Bay Resort: +255 777 868 385, www.zanzibardolphinviewresort.com
Teddy’s Place: +255 776 110 850, www.teddys-place.com
Story by Andrew Thompson
