Zanzibar, Tanzania - New Year's Eve & Day

During the day I went scuba diving with a few people from our overland group in Nungwi. It was an hour long bus drive to Nungwi from Stonetown and then a tedious 1 1/2 hour trip out to the dive site. The visibility was poor and the sky was overcast. I declined doing the second dive, which may have been a mistake, since the people on that dive saw five turtles the dive and said the visibility was improved noticibly. Oh well!

We had lunch and drinks at the "Fat Fish" restaurant right on the water and watched a beautiful sunset. Later I had delicious dinner of fresh king fish for dinner and more drinks. We moved to the beach later in the evening for the New Year's celebration. Obtaining drinks from the beachside bar was the main activity, which proved challenging when the bar ran out of glasses. Holes had been dug in the beach sand and set candles down into them, which created a neat lighting effect. About 15 of us from the group celebrated the break into the new year. After saying good by to two of our group, Sean and Jules, and having celebratory double shots of "Springbok", we headed to the bus to take us back to Stonetown. That is all of us except for Gary. We sent out a search party with no luck. As we departed we called his name out the window of the bus. Finally we spotted him in a taxi just ahead of us. Belinda had to do some aggressive negotiating to get $40 US back from the driver, leaving the driver with about $14 for a 5-minute ride.

Next morning no hangover. Hurrah! I had lunch and went for a swim off the beach. It's a beautiful sunny day. A good start for the new year!