TAN: Nature's Breadbasket

I had made arrangements the previous day for our driver from the port to conduct a tour of the spice plantations for us. While getting the DTP logo off the Internet in the hotel lobby, I ran into the driver, who had a story about being unable to lead a tour for us today because he needed to get some medicine for his son. He was at the hotel to introduce his brother who he hoped would suffice as a stand-in. We negotiated a price and a time for him to come back.
With the DTP logo in hand, I quickly produced another build of the DVD and burned a copy. This one would go back with Julie and Gabriel to be shipped from San Francisco to Bruce in London. We gathered all of our stuff and at the last minute decided it would be a good idea to leave it at the hotel. Some repacking ensued and we were finally underway at 11 a.m. Stopped at the port to get ferry tickets back to Dar es Salaam. The only ferry out was leaving at 3:30 p.m. that would leave us with hardly any time to see the island. We opt to see about flights back. Precision Air was $60 for the 15-minute flight back to Dar. It was leaving at 9:30 p.m. so we decided to take it. Our next stop was at a local produce market. Lots of colorful fruits and vegetables, but none of the mounds of spice that were rumored to be there.

After a final detour for a permit to leave town we were underway at 12:30 p.m. Our first stop was at an overlook with a view back over Stone Town. It was not much of an overlook and I started to have misgivings about our driver.

Leaving Stone Town. A lumber yard.

Things started to get a bit more interesting once we got out of the urban area. Our driver, Muhsin, was keen to point out all of the notable plants in the area and was good about stopping for us to take pictures. We eventually arrived at a government run farm. Some negotiating went on between Muhsin and the local guides, after which, we were set for a spice tour.
The tour began very slowly with dry presentation of the plants in strangely broken English. Some other youths joined our procession and I began to wonder when they would begin asking for a hand out. As we moved along, the youths began to craft various accessories for us out of the vegetation. We received bags, purses, bracelets, rings, glasses, hats, ties, and necklaces with frog pendants.
The tour picked up as we got into some of the less pedestrian vegetation and our guide began to have us guess what things were from a sniff or taste. We were shown mandarin, coffee, banana, plantain, pineapple, nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon, cardamom, turmeric, breadfruit, jackfruit, coconut, clove, cocoa, and ginger.

Some out of control coffee and pineapples.

Nutmeg

Cloves

Cocoa.

Jackfruit.

Breadfruit and cardamom.

The fabled “passion” baths that turned out to be Persian baths. One of Chantal’s many suitors, flowers in hand.

Styled by nature.

This youngster scampered up the palm tree to get us some coconuts and Gabriel thought he would give it a try as well. Needless to say, he didn’t quite make it to the coconuts.

Pepper and a giant snail.

Just as we were coming to the end of the tour it started raining, a little at first and then a torrential downpour. We were soaked running 10 yards to some shelter. The shelter turned out to be a stall of spices for sale. We each bought a little something and tipped our guide and outfitters before heading on our way.
On the way back to town we stopped at a little hotel to get something to eat and relax. Muhsin had to go and get some medicine for his children, three of which are afflicted with malaria and typhoid. He agreed to come back and pick us up later in the afternoon. He returned and we headed back to the Tembo Hotel to get our gear and slip into the pool. We had a nice swim and I went to get some samosas for a light dinner. Muhsin came back to deliver us to the airport. There was some worry about whether a plane would arrive to carry us back to Dar. Some earlier flights were cancelled. We made it back in good order and sat with Julie and Gabriel a bit before they had to go and check in for the 12:30 a.m. flight to Amsterdam. We were sad to see them go.

We got lots of stares from the other passengers in the airport terminal. A sad farewell to our traveling companions.