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Trip details | Dates & prices | Itinerary | Tanzania |
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| Zanzibar Diving & Rainforest Safari | |||
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If you have just one week’s vacation, then even accounting for flights and decompression, Zanzibar is a realistic dive destination. Over the course of nine days Saturday to Sunday, you will have time to fit in five days of excellent diving; a forest wildlife safari; explore the Spice Island capital of Stone Town and enjoy some of the island’s best accommodation set beside stunning white sand beaches. If you don’t dive, this holiday provides an enchanting and relaxing getaway in one of Africa’s most exotic islands. Whilst the crowds flow northwards in Zanzibar, we opt for a 60 mile stretch of reef in the south east of the island where you are unlikely to see another dive boat. There is mile upon mile here of reef stocked with some excellent fish life. On the inside of the reefs you can find sheltered lagoons which are nurseries where juveniles and small reef fish live in calm waters amongst the corals. Colourful clouds of angelfish commute as the tide shifts from one coral lagoon to the next. The tidal range is several metres exposing a considerable portion of this lagoon and all of the outer reef barrier. At each low tide huge areas of sun bleached sand are exposed. Within you will find an intense range of turquoises, blues and yellows. Water temperatures can exceed 30oC. Outside of the reefs the waters remain cool, refreshed by the wide open Indian Ocean. This is where we find the best diving. Whilst artisanal fishing continues up and down these reefs, its impact is relatively small leaving plentiful stocks of fish for the diver to observe. You can expect to see a lot of large fish, including numerous ½ metre potato grouper on a single dive. At the specialist deep dive site of the Blue Wall (48 metres plus), you can often see three of the largest grouper you are ever likely to measuring in at 3 – 4 metres each! Groupers aside, you can also hope to see a lot of rays which are likely to include blue spotted rays, eagle rays, fantasy rays even the odd electric ray. Green turtles, hawksbill and loggerheads are often spotted, as are octopus, moral eels, surgeon fish, titan triggerfish, shoals of barracuda and Napoleon wrasse. The occasional oceanic shark will also drift in from the Indian Ocean; and in season, opportunities also exist to see humpback whales, spinner dolphin and guitar sharks. Sightings of bottlenose dolphins are commonplace. Between dives you will be able to enjoy one of Zanzibar’s most comfortable and exclusive hotel resorts. Rooms and living areas are filled with Zanzibari style, as is the food enriched with the island’s spices and fresh fruits. Don’t be surprised to see a Sykes Monkey or hear a Bushbaby calling unseen from a bush at night. Whilst decompressing after your diving, we take you to Zanzibar’s largest nature reserve and only completely preserved area of indigenous forest: the Jozani Forest Nature Reserve. This is home to the Red Colobus Monkey (otherwise known as Kirk’s Red Colobus) which is endemic to the island. Other mammals include Blue Vervet Monkeys and the Ader’s Duiker. The forest also used to contain the Unguja subspecies of leopard, and though a conservation programme tried to save it in the 1990s, it is likely that this animal is now extinct. Of the birdlife here, the most enigmatic species are the Crowned Hornbill, Wood Hoopoe, Olive Sunbird and Fisher’s Turaco. More than 40 species exist here and in the mangrove forests you will visit in Chwaka Bay. Apart from overland transfers, this will be a relaxed walking safari. You will spend your last night in the heart of Zanzibar’s Spice island capital of Stone Town. The windy streets here are full of character and design developed over the centuries as a rich hub of the Omani Arab slave trade.
Unguja Island Dive & Rainforest Wildlife Safari - East Africa Tanzania Scuba - Zanzibar sea breezes – palm hotel resort – baraza - Zanzibar Dive & Safari |
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