Before I started blogging, or carrying a digital camera, I watched sunsets from places such as the Altiplano of Bolivia. The North Slope of Alaska. Maui. Santa Monica. Bocas Del Toro. From a sail boat in the middle of the Caribbean. In the Montana mountains. These are just the sunsets I remember as spectacular. I would want any one of them back, at least once.

A sunset is a supurb way for the day to say ” fare-the-well, see ya on the morrow”.  Even if it was just a so-so day, a wonderful sunset can send you into the evening with sublimity.

Traveling offers the traveler this sublimity many times a day. It guarantees it at that recurring time of day called sundown.

OK, that is enough of my sophomoric philosophical blabbering. Sit back and enjoy some good photographs with some quotes provided by writers with far more talent than I.

To get the slide show, and the entire quote laden caption, just click on the first photo

I hope you enjoyed my sun sets. Do not expect any sunrise pictures, I do not get up that early.

Please share with FB friends. Please be the first to comment and say, “wow, what a sunset!” See, I even wrote it for you!

So, do you have a beer open right now?

Please comment. Please subscribe. Please enjoy your beer!

Julie Fox is very accomplished. I am a bush leaguer. You might want to explore around her blog when you get there!

A national symbol of Portugal.

OK, Have fun, say hi to Julie for me!

A very common site while you are in Zanzibar. The ocean is a myriad of blues. The island is almost totally surrounded by coral reefs, which keep the waves to a minimum. The breezes are almost always perfect for the Dhow traffic. This local seafaring craft has been continuous since man discovered wind and that wood floats.

Where should I start?

The weather? Zanzibar has an almost perfect climate. Just enough rain to keep it green. Trade winds that come from either the north or the south, depending on the time of year, keep it just the right temperature.

History? Well, those trade winds enabled early trading vessels to arrive and depart easily. They left behind a richly mixed culture. I had a taxi driver who gave me local’s view of the contemporary history of Zanzibar. It was fascinating.

Zanzibar for all the history it has weathered,  has never had an earthquake, a Tsunami or a typhoon. The longest war it ever fought (they lost) was 45 minutes long.

English is the official second language, taught in schools, which makes tourism easy.

Mary Ann and I took a self guided tour of Stone Town and paid for an “official” tour from our hotel. I covered those in my two previous posts.

Of course my wife was on a well deserved vacation. I am always on vacation. She wanted a spa visit. I wanted to see more of the island.

This trip I was using a guide book on my Ipad called The Rough Guide to Zanzibar.  These Rough Guides are available for many countries. I recommend them because they are irreverent. While being informative, they are edgy. Just right. Just my style.

In my rough guide I found a reference to a another type of spa. The Kidichi Persian Baths. When I hired a taxi driver for the day, and told him I wanted to go to Kidichi, he was  amused, thrilled and surprised. No one much goes there. Indeed for the long leisurely hour I spent meandering around the baths (with a local young man from the village who seemed to know a lot, I tipped him well) I was the only person there.

Kidichi is a Persian bath house built in 1850. Although it can be classified as a ruin today, it is actually in very good condition. The baths were built for Sultan Said. He owned land in this part of the island, and he and his second wife, Binte Irich Mirza (also called Schesade, more often written Sherazade), would come here for hunting or to oversee the work being done on their plantations. The bath-house was constructed so that they could refresh themselves after the journey from town. Schesade was a granddaughter of the Shah of Persia, so the baths were built in the Persian style, with decorative stucco work. An underground furnace kept the water warm. I inspected all of the facility and I declare that with very little work it could be reopened and made a very unique experience for travelers “Come bathe where Sharazade  bathed”

This is the ceiling inside the bath house main room. It is typically Persian.

The walls are adorned with Persian style carvings, much like a Persian rug. This is a very small detail of one wall depicting the tree of life. In their time, they were brightly painted. Now they get whitewashed to keep the mildew down. This is right over the massage bench.

Another place I went, “off the tourist trail” was The Ngonga Cave.

This cave has a very long history as a place where spirits live. It is also one of the coastal caves where people hid out in the 1964 revolution. We descended a wooden ladder to get down into the cave. We only saw a small portion of it. Apparently it is connected to many other caves along the coast.

Inside the cave there were a couple of these. This might be called a stalagmite, but it really is not. It is a very rare type of stone. The locals believe it can make you healthy and young. Therefor I wrapped my arms around it, I guess not long enough.

A kilometer or so down the beach from our hotel was a small village with the name of Cairo.

Cairo was on the beach and located between two resorts, so of course it had some souvenir stands. Here is my wife learning how to play aboard game. The wood is ebony, and the pieces are seeds. It is a fairly complex game. The vendor let my wife win, although she had no idea why she won. Anyway he made a sale. I know about ebony, ok?

In Cairo we ran into a group of young Australians working for an NGO. They were building a water pipeline into the town.

Zanzibar is known as The Spice Island. There are numerous spice plantations you can visit. Spices were introduced here by the Omanis from places like India, Sri Lanka and the Seychelles because the soil and weather are perfect for them, and because the trade winds made it easy to transport. Indeed, today, cloves are the biggest export item of Zanzibar,we saw container ships being loaded with tons of it. After our tour, our guide crowned us king and queen and even made me a tie.

How can a guy with a blog named The Other Side of the Coconut, pass up a coconut. If you have never had fresh coconut juice, do not pass it up when you get a chance.

And now, for the Baobob tree.These trees are very important to the cultures in areas where they are found. The trunks are mostly hollow and they retain water for drinking in a drought. I could go on for a long time about this amazing species but I suggest you take a minute and learn more here.

This is my guide, the “history teacher” holding up a Baobob fruit for me. He told me that homesteading is still possible in Zanzibar, and one of the first things they plant are mangoes and Baobobs. Doesn’t he look like Eddy Murphy?

If you educated yourself by reading the link above you learned that the fruit is highly prized. I ate some of this fruit and was pleasantly surprised.

Time to say goodbye, with a full moon over Zanzibar. Sounds like a song title.

I hope you enjoyed reading about Zanzibar. Please subscribe if you have not already. I promise to post lots of cool stuff. Yes, I enjoy comments! Hint, there is a share button lower down,see it? Share this with your FB friends so Ican make the big bucks.

Abu Dhabi hosts the third largest mosque in the world – after the ones in Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia.

This fabulous building has visiting hours every day except Friday. The American University of Sharjah, where my wife is employed, ran a tour including free transportation. There is no entry charge at the mosque.

They also provide free abayas for the women. Men just have to dress respectfully, so I had to leave my cut off jeans and Grateful Dead T-shirts at home. Doesn’t my wife look cute in black?

The courtyard has a total of 1,048 columns. The entire mosque is made with white marble. The decorations on the columns are meant to emulate a garden. The Arabic word for garden and heaven are the same, so they emulate heaven as well.

This is a detail shot of one of the heavenly flowers. They are all inlaid with semi precious stones. The blue here is Lapis Lazuli.

This is the entrance to the main prayer hall. Some 41,000 worshipers can be accommodated in the mosque, 7,126 in the main prayer hall. Again, the foyer is made to look like heaven. Our guide was well educated and speaks English as well as I do.

Before a worshiper enters the mosque they must perform the ablution. This is a ritual to assure your body is clean before you pray. It is quite involved and must be done in a certain way. This is interesting enough for you to look at HERE

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Another astonishing feature of the mosque is the over 5,625 m2 large carpet in the main prayer hall. It has been hand-knotted by about 1,300 Iranian craftsmen out of 35 tons of wool and 12 tons of cotton. With a total of 2,268,00 knots, the carpet is the largest in the world. Its estimated value is about  US$30 million.
Colored with 25 natural colors, the green color is predominant as it was the favorite color of the late Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan. 
In August 2007 the Iranian masterpiece was dissected and brought to Abu Dhabi, where it was fixed together again in the mosque.

Included into the carpet are horizontal lines which are slightly raised over the primary carpet-height. These are for the worshiper’s alignment. The effect of the special knotting-technique is that the lines are not visible from a distance, but only for the worshipers. Look closely, the line is tough to see, but it is there. If you have ever watched a prayer service in a mosque you will see that the men are lined up perfectly, shoulder to shoulder. The proximity is to prevent evil spirits coming between the worshipers. Women use a different prayer hall to prevent the men’s attention from being distracted. The only thing I was distracted by was the beauty of this carpet and how it felt on my bare feet.

Major international companies specialized in the manufacturing of crystal chandeliers garnished the mosque with seven gold-plated chandeliers in different sizes, made of Swarovski crystals. This the largest of the lustres. It was the largest in the world when it was installed. The largest now is in the grand mosque in Doha.

Time for us heathens to leave. The mosque is, of course closed to non worshipers for prayer. Muslems pray five times a day. The time for prayer changes every day, and in every geographic location. It is based on the position of the sun. So, you ask, why are there six times on this clock? The top one is the time of the sunrise.

When we left I was again impressed by this magnificent mosque. I hope you are as well.

I owe you one more post from Zanzibar, so stay tuned. If you have not subscribed, please do so. Also, I really like comments, hint hint.

In Zanzibar, they make a truly outlandish effort at having wonderful doors. They even sell little door replicas as souvenirs.

Also, if you read my last two posts you remember me explaining that Stone Town is a maze of narrow alleys that go every which way but straight.

Not another word, just some photos, enjoy.

Right in front of the hotel. 50 feet later we were lost!

An alley on the way to our hotel. The cab had to park about 4 blocks away. The nicest hotels in Stone Town share this quality!

The next few photos are typical doors in Stone Town. I loved it!

Shiny and well kept!

Just a normal portal.

This door is to a house of wealth. The extra “armor” is to keep elephants out! No elephants in Zanzibar, it is an Indian tradition.

Thanks for taking a walk around Stone Town with me. Next post, a cave and the coolest temple on the island!

Please share with a friend or two or a hundred.

Make a comment!

]]> http://www.theothersideofthecoconut.com/2013/02/28/zanzibar-doors-and-alleys/feed/ 0 http://www.theothersideofthecoconut.com/2013/02/20/uzi-island-zanzibar/ http://www.theothersideofthecoconut.com/2013/02/20/uzi-island-zanzibar/#comments Wed, 20 Feb 2013 10:29:28 +0000 Forrest Walker http://www.theothersideofthecoconut.com/?p=4133 No, not that kind of Uzi!

Uzi Island lies of the southern tip of Zanzibar

It  is six kilometres in length, making it the second largest of the smaller islands which surrounds Unguja, Unguja is the main island of Zanzibar.

It is connected to Zanzibar, at low tide, by a miles long causeway through mangroves. The road was built to alleviate the need for travel by boat.

We decided to go there because it has a unique economy. Strangely enough the economy is based on women collecting seaweed.

The women wade out into little lagoons at low tide and pick the seaweed.

This is a day’s harvest. After drying it the ladies sell it to a wholesaler, whom I suspect makes the largest profits. When I asked this lady if I could take her photo, she laughed and said yes. Then I asked her how much she was going to sell all this seaweed for. When she told me, I paid her that much as thanks for letting me take her picture.

The seaweed is used for everything from perfume to pet food. Like I said, it is the mainstay of the Uzi economy.

Of course the main town on the island, perhaps the only one, is called Uzi.

We always visit schools when we can. The school in Uzi was quite large.

Large in student population that is. Look at how many students were in one classroom the day we went. My little sister is burdened by having 30 kids in her classroom. Try 71!

Of course schoolbooks do not exist. But I picked up a notebook kept by a kid in the front of the class. I read his notes. I was amazed. I could not comprehend the math problems he had in it, but I could never even balance a checkbook. But when I went to the social studies section, he had an incredibly deep perception of democracy. I do not think American kids can define democracy like this until college. It gave me hope for if not the entire third world, at least Zanzibar.

The children were quite beautiful. Very well behaved.

The kids do not see many  Wazungu, plural of Mzungu, so we were a distraction to the classroom activities, and what kid isn’t happy about that? Mzungu is a word for white Europeans  all over East Africa. It is not meant in a derogatory way, it is just a greeting. It comes from the Kiswahili word zungua which means to wander or to  travel.  At least they do not call us what they used to…iloridaa enjekat. That term was inspired by the trousers worn by white Europeans and means, those who confine their farts!

They think Wazungus are mostly from Australia, Germany or England. They wanted to know where we were from. When we said America, they would yell out OBAMA!

Thanks for reading. Share on Facebook please. Make a comment you iloridaa enjekat!

We were headed for Dar es Salam, in Tanzania. When we checked in at the Dubai airport, I found out for the first time that the country is not pronounced as I have always pronounced it TanzanKNEEa. No No. TAHnZAHNia.  It took some getting used to, but we had to fast because our flight out of Dar es Salam to Zanzibar was delayed for five hours. Nothing to do but drink beer!

A safari beer in Tanzania.

Eventually we boarded an ATR puddle jumper. The puddle was a small part of the Indian Ocean. It was a very quick flight over some very blue water.  Zanzibar is surrounded by coral reefs, so it is quite photogenic, but I did not have the window seat, so you will just have to take my word for it.

ATRs such as this are used by numerous East African airlines.

Once we arrived in Stone Town we  were in an entire community designated as a World Heritage site.

The streets are almost all quite old and very narrow. Most hotels in Stone Town are not accessible by taxi, you have to walk you luggage in from a few blocks away.

However once we got to the hotel we were quite welcome.

The hotel had a wonderful rooftop bar and restaurant with a view of the harbor.

The bar also overlooked a very old Muslim cemetery. Zanzibar is over 90% Muslim because for over a hundred years it was ruled by the Sultan of Oman.

We then set out exploring the town. In Stone Town, that means getting lost!

We found some market streets such as this one.

We also meandered down many streets that were just residential and led nowhere!

A walk around the town will reveal many gems. Here is my wife in a wonderful little tea shop.

After a few hours of purposely getting lost in the amazing streets of Stone Town, it was time for another local brew.

The next day we set out again, there was still much to see. Before I visited Stone Town, I did not know the difference between Freddy Mercury and the planet Mercury. In case you don’t either, Freddy Mercury was born with the name Farrokh Bulsara, in Stone Town, and went on to become the lead singer for the rock band Queen. Fitting a guy from Stone Town would become famous for a song called We Will Rock You, eh?

Stone Town is quite proud of Freddy and they have a wonderful restaurant named after him.

The food is pretty good, but you pay for the view. This is the main drag of Stone Town from our table.

The dark part of Stone Town history is that it was a major center for slave trading. Led in part by Dr. Stanley Livingston, the slave trade was abolished. There is a large Christian church built over the slave market. and a sort of museum is maintained so people do not forget.

This was a holding room for slaves before they went on the block for sale.

Part of the museum commemorates the ugliness of the business.

This, the largest Christian Church on the island, sits over the slave market.

That covers our first 24 hours on the wonderful Island of Zanzibar. Next post…well come back and see!

For my long time readers, please comment on my new theme. Do you like it?

The first plane I remember flying on was  a North Central Airlines DC- 3 My father worked for North Central so we flew non-rev, meaning free. We called these planes puddle jumpers.

There are still small operators with DC-3s in revenue service and as cargo aircraft. The common saying among aviation buffs and pilots is that “the only replacement for a DC-3 is another DC-3″. The aircraft’s legendary ruggedness is enshrined in the lighthearted description of the DC-3 as “a collection of parts flying in loose formation.” Its ability to take off and land on grass or dirt runways makes it popular in developing countries, where runways are not always paved. This was indeed the case when I flew on DC-3′s in Bolivia in the early sixties. The runway was not paved. More exciting was that the ceiling (maximum height the plane could fly) was below the altitude of the Andes mountains we were flying through. So, we weaved our way between the mountains, and could look out the windows at peaks far above us.

For a short while the DC4 flew, and I remember being on one flying to Chicago. It was a big deal because it had four engines!

Very few DC-4s remain in service today.  There are a couple nostalgia airlines still flying them, and I would love to take a trip on one again.

The DC6 came around and became the work horse of many airlines.
I flew on DC-6s all over South America on LLoyd Aereo Boliviano. I flew over the Andes and across the Amazon jungle to Brazil. I swear I remember flying over a native village in the middle of  the Amazon rain forest, looking out the window, and seeing natives angrily waving spears at the giant silver bird. Remember, this was 1964, we were flying at about 5000 feet, and I was 10.

I flew a Pan American DC8 from Lima, Peru to Miami. before we boarded, there was an earthquake in Lima, which shook the airport quite well. Then, they led a man aboard in shackles. Then, over Cuba, the cockpit filled with kerosene smelling  smoke. Quite the flight!

The DC9 was cool because it was the first plane I ever flew with the tail mounted engines!

The DC10 came along and it proved size does matter. Although the last DC10 was delivered in 1989, some still fly.

Lockheed

The DC10 had stiff competition from this Lockheed L1011. The L1011 was not only prettier with the tail engine configuration, it also used some very modern luggage handling techniques  and in cabin service innovations, including a galley underneath the main floor. Trans World Airlines heralded the TriStar (the L1011′s commercial nickname)as one of the safest aircraft in the world. Indeed it had almost a flawless safety record.

At this time in my life, my father worked for Lockheed. I got to go on a walk-thru of the plane before the first one was built. Then, when they went into operation I was sure to take a flight. It was a very quiet aircraft, also nicknamed the “whisperliner”.  It faced stiff competition from the DC10 and the 747, and proved to be Lockheed’s last civilian liner.

Boeing

Now, onto the Boeing line!

Ahh, the 727. The only thing cool about this plane is the rear passenger exit made famous by D.B. Cooper, one of America’s most mysterious outlaws. I used to fly these PSA 727′s from LAX to SFO to see the Grateful Dead. PSA had a midnight mail run flight for about US$10. The back half of the cabin was full of mail bags and front half full of hippies. We got away with things no one would dream of doing on an airliner today. The stewardesses just ignored us for the entire flight! Those were the days!

The Boeing 737 has been in production and service a very long time. The initial 737-100 flew in 1967 and entered airline service in February 1968. The 737 series is the best-selling jet airliner in the history of aviation. Newer versions of the plane provide a great mid range fleet option for many airlines, including my favorite, QATAR.

The 747, known as a jumbo or a heavy, comes in many configurations and sizes. My favorite flight on one was from Melbourne to LAX. I left at noon on Sunday, and arrived at noon on Sunday. I was in Business class and slept the whole way. It was like being “beamed”. Instantaneous.

Not one of my favorite aircraft. The Boeing 757 is a mid-size, narrow-body twin-engine jet airliner that was built by Boeing Commercial Airplanes from 1981 to 2004. Being a narrow body, single aisle craft with a large passenger capacity makes it a claustrophobic nightmare. It also takes a long time to board and deboard. Not fun

The Boeing 767 is a mid-size, wide-body twin-engine jet airliner built by Boeing. It was the manufacturer’s first wide-body twinjet and its first airliner with a two-crew glass cockpit. Glass cockpit? This means everything is digital, nothing analog. My favorite flight on a 767 was (of course before 9/11) from Toronto to Miami on Air Canada. I was flying first class. The cockpit door was open so I stood there and looked in. The co-pilot said hello. I told him I worked on flight simulator games and was just interested. When he asked which games, I told him and he replied “wow, those are my favorites, step in here” So I spent the next hour in the cockpit. It was a rush. Those guys have a great view! The whole time, they never touched a thing, the plane was on autopilot. I asked if they had to take  control to land it and they said “nah, but we like to”.

The 777ER. This is the plane I find myself on the most these days. ER stands for Extended Range. My favorite seat is 44C. This is a great aircraft, and Emirates is a great airline. The -300 variant of this plane is the longest fuselage in flight. The “triple 7″ set a record for the longest non-stop flight of a passenger airliner by flying 11,664 nautical miles eastward from Hong Kong to London. (Lasting 22 hours and 42 minutes. I’ll bet there were some sore butts on that flight.)

I’ll get back to Boeing at the end of this post for obvious reasons.

AirBus

For now, let us look at the Airbus planes I have flown.

This is the A319. Druk Air, the only airline that can fly you to Bhutan uses the A319. This is a memorable flight, especially the landing. For an exciting look at the most exciting landing on the planet, go here.

Just as Boeing has stuck with the 7 theme in naming its craft, Airbus seems stuck on the 3xx theme.

This is an A320 flown by Air Asia. I have made many flights on this baby. Excellent plane, excellent airline. The carbon emissions of an A320 are less than a 737, and one of the lowest in commercial aviation.

Step up to a the A330. It is a wide body that went into service in the mid 90′s and is very fuel efficient airplane.

The biggest plane I have ever flown on is the A380. An 18 hour flight from central China to LAX. The plane, from a passenger’s point of view (in economy) is not that exciting, but it IS huge.

Now for odds and ends.

For four long years I lived in a backwater called Bocas Del Toro, Panama. The only way in or out of Bocas (other than a chicken bus then a water taxi) was to fly. Two airlines served the airstrip (I will not call it an airport). One was Aeroperlas

Aeroperlas, or as I called it scaryperlas flew these Shorts 360 (or as I called them ‘in your shorts”) aircraft which looked to me like some rail car someone stuck wings on. Someone got this photo after a plane was washed, normally they looked horrible, outside and worse inside.

The other option was Air Panama which used a Saab 340. In the four years I lived there, due to pilot error, two flights crashed. That is what you get when you hire teenagers to fly your planes.

Perhaps the safest plane I have ever flown on are called Twin Otters. I have flown them into a fishing lodge on a river in Alaska, and into a Mining camp in the Andes. They are just great aircraft.

My wife and I trusted our lives to Buddha Air to fly up close and personal with Mt. Everest on a Beech 1900.

I was treated to a flight between Santiago de Chile and Barriloche Argentina on Stephen Bechtel’s Falcon 50. Now I know how the 1% live. The faucets in the head were made of gold. This is in case the plane gets taken by kidnappers, they can bribe their way out of trouble. It was a comfy flight.

And now, the end, the final, the future…

In about 24 hours I am going to board a Dreamliner, the Boeing 787! This is supposed to be the most advanced aircraft made to date, both in aeronautics and passenger comfort! We will see. As you should know by now, I have a LOT to compare it to!

Thanks for reading. Sorry this was so long but after all I have been flying for fifty + years!

I also feel like maybe you would want to see a re-post of some of my favorite photos of the year, so here goes. They are not in any particular order, and if you want to know more about our trips, you can always navigate to them on the top of the page.

My wife in front of the worlds largest beer mug. Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Royal Selangor is a pewter shop. They make jewelry, picture frames, well just about everything from pewter. A great place to visit in KL

A restaurant in Sri Lanka that I just did not want to eat at!

On a tour in a medieval town in Italy, the mayor took my wife, the librarian, on a tour of their library which had thousands of volumes from medieval times. They actually let me hold one! They do not make books like this anymore. The art is hand painted. Amazing.

I have crossed the equator many times in my travels, but this was the most fun. This was taken in Uganda on a tour with Intrepid travels.

In Sri Lanka I visited a turtle hatchery and saw an albino turtle. Very unique!

In what was my favorite city in Italy. A street scene in Assisi.

We spent a few days in Rome, which everyone should do. I became a fan of the sculptor Bernini. His work is all over Rome, and all of it is exceptional. This was reported to be his favorite.

I tried my hand at Bocci. A game even an old guy like me can pick up. The old Italian gentlemen were quite patient with me and I had a great day.

When in Rome, be sure to pay for a good tour of the coliseum. We did, and we saw many things you will not see if you just walk in. This is a view from the emperors seat!

This is the original “senate floor” in the senate building in Rome.

On my safari to see the mountain gorillas in Rwanda, this monkey jumped into the vehicle to ride along. Africa is wonderful!

We also visited the beautiful island of Mauritius. A bit out of the way, but a paradise.

Every year we make a trip to NYC. I think I am starting to like the place.

While in Burma, or Myanmar if you wish, we went to Inle Lake. Besides these fisherman who row with their feet, there are dozens of other unique things to see there, and the rest of Burma.

An extreme bucket list item for the year was visiting the Kingdom of Bhutan, the happiest country on earth.

My favorite shot of 2012! I call her Miss Rwanda. A mountain Gorilla posing for me with a welcoming bouquet!

There were more trips in 2012, and thanks to you readers for reading about them. You can go back and read them again if you so desire.

Please share this with FB friends! Please make a comment.

I am changing my entire look and feel in 2013, but I will still get to you somehow.

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The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

4,329 films were submitted to the 2012 Cannes Film Festival. This blog had 30,000 views in 2012. If each view were a film, this blog would power 7 Film Festivals

Click here to see the complete report.