Chumbe Island Coral Park, Zanzibar

Dec. 18, 2011
Today we were up early and out the door to Mbweni 7 kilometers from Stone Town where we were to catch a boat to go to the Chumbe Island Coral Park. The boat left from the Mbweni Ruins Hotel which is set in the botanical gardens founded by a Scottish botanist and physician, Sir John Kirk, while he was Britain's Consul General for eighteen years beginning in 1866. Kirk accompanied Livingstone up the Zambezi river.
There are also the ruins of a nineteen-century Anglican mission that housed and schooled girls freed from captured slave dhows and daughters of freed slaves. Interesting place to look around before getting on the boat as all the plants are still pretty much labeled.
We traveled the 9 kilometers to the island in one hour using a small dhow with a 15 HP engine. Chumbe island has an old British light house built in 1904 and a small mosque built at the same time for the Indian light houseman. This island is reputed to have the finest coral gardens in the world. There is now an eco-lodge that provides a day room and lunch for day trippers like us. We were shown to bungalow 3 and instructed on the compost toilet, rain water shower, and lock box for your valuables. There was a Dutch family with 2 young boys who were there as well. We all went on a small motor boat with the guide and a big inflated truck inner tube so that you could hold on if you wanted and to make us more visible. The coral was amazing! Large variety in size, shape and colors. We were very impressed with the marine life too. The parrot fish were so inquisitive and come up to look at you giving one a chance to clearly see their beak mouths and fully appreciate their colors. We snorkeled for an hour and were actually quite tired as there was a good swell in the sea. We saw a couple of blue starfish, lobster with white legs, blue spotted sting ray and too many beautiful fish to name. This day trip was a little over $ 100 per person but worth it. After a nice lunch in the shade watching the waves, and some sun bathing we went on a walking tour of the coral rag forest and through the mangroves looking at the different flora and fauna. Our guide even found a huge coconut crab for us to photograph in a mangrove cave. These are the world's largest land crabs reaching 60 cm to 1 meter in length and weighing 3 to 4 kilos. They are called coconut crabs because they are reputed to climb trees and cut off coconuts which they eat. These crabs are nocturnal so we were lucky to have seen one.
We arrived back in Stone Town a little before 6PM tired but having enjoyed the day very much.
We made plans to spend the next night at Paje on the east coast and stop at the national park on the way. We decided to come see the 2 hotels we were considering in person as both on Trip Advisor had extreme ratings (good and bad). We also made a reservation at El Tempo hotel which is a sister hotel to our current Dhow Palace for our last night in Zanzibar. We arranged for a sea side room we think. Most of our meals have been at a restaurant called "Archipelago" as the food is excellent, the view is great as the restaurant is on the beach and the first floor of a corner so the breeze that comes through is very helpful. Very few places seem to have AC so looking for fans and good breezes is essential to survival.