five things i loved about traveling in zanzibar and five things i really
didn't love about traveling in zanzibar coming up
and if you're new here welcome i'm christine with where in the world is cL i make travel videos
every week tell me get up get out and go travel so if you like to travel consider subscribing the
intent behind this video is to help you plan ahead for yours the ends of our trip so you can have the
best trip possible and it really is a phenomenal island so let's start with the things that i love
number one is the diversity of the island there are three main signs that you can travel on
you have nungui in the north where you can find beautiful beaches a lot more of the larger format
resorts and then on the east side you can find jambiani and pajay where it's amazing for water
sports and it's a much more poli-poly chill laid-back vibe and then you have so much culture
in stone town which is a really neat place to get lost in the alleyways so i love the diversity of
this island and by the way i have individual videos about each of these places if you want
to dive into each spot number two is the beaches which obviously the beaches are beautiful it's an
island but what's really unique about zanzibar are the extreme tides it creates a phenomenal visual
between high tide and low tide and one of the things you cannot miss are the sunsets and my
two favorite spots to catch the sunset one is at kendwa beach kendall rocks is a really fun resort
to go grab drinks at and watching the sunset on this beach really is phenomenal the second one is
on the other side of the island you're watching the sunset over the water over the land but the
extreme tides at cave beach and cave funk beach bar super fun and it becomes a dance party at
night you can't miss these two number three is the amount of culture and history on this island stone
town is a unesco site there are messiah people all over the island and there are experiences
that you can have that can really immerse you into tanzanian culture and you can learn more
about the history of zanzibar it's a really phenomenal place that has a lot of interesting
history and even if you just want to learn of more about tanzanian food i loved experiences
like going to emerson tea house where they have a set menu and they will walk you through each dish
and some of the information and history behind each of the foods that's being served to you
this next one i love because i love adventure the amount of water sports on this island is
super super fun you have on the john biani page side you have kite surfing you have the ability
to ride bikes on the beach there's scuba diving in the north nungui was my favorite
place to get into the water but the amount of water sports here super fun this next one is
the prices it is very very affordable to travel in zanzibar right now i'm in oahu in case you
want to come to the other side of the world to a beautiful beach i have tons of videos on this spot
but as a point of reference i will just compare some of the prices of zanzibar last month versus
oahu right now i traveled to zanzibar in february 2021 and it was high season and i was booking
everything days before arriving there so to give some perspective around prices i paid around
80 to 120 for the hotels that i stayed at again in high season which is a really great rate versus
i'm in oahu during low season i've paid 120 dollars a night for a really not so nice place
another example is activities scuba diving in nangui i paid 100 for two scuba dives out there
the same dives in oahu would have cost me 150 when it comes to food in zanzibar i was paying
anywhere from 10 on the low side to 30 for really nice meals with drinks per person in oahu 30
will barely get you lunch without any drinks which by the way if you want my full zanzibar itinerary
click the link in the description below all right let's jump to talking about the five things i
didn't really love about zanzibar and it starts with the prices and tell me in the comments below
what kind of traveler you are are you the type of traveler that loves a good negotiation are you
the type of traveler that really just wants the posted price for me i i'm okay with haggling but
i don't want to do it every single time i want to do anything and one of the things that is a
challenge in zanzibar is the prices vary based off of what you look like and what they think
they they can get out of you and again relative to other places i've traveled it's so affordable
even if you're paying at the high end but for me it's never a good feeling that i just know the
person next to me is paying half the price that i am for something like taking a private boat
out to namba island to go snorkeling in the water we paid this very affordable rate to go do this
activity but we also know that we were paying significantly more than other people and the
original price that they were trying to get us was this so that's just one example of
something i didn't really love the second thing i didn't really love is the amount of [ __ ] on
this island and what i mean by that is because tourism is the main way that people on the island
make money you are constantly constantly being sold something and if you just want to go for a
walk on the beach or sit down and watch the sunset for just a second you can't do it without somebody
constantly trying to sell you something every two seconds and it's just it gets exhausting after a
while constantly asking people to leave you alone and for some people it doesn't bother them at all
but for me it was really difficult to do anything on this island without constantly being approached
and the other thing about it is that i also was just exposed to a lot of scams and so
if you've made it this far in the video i have a secret video that i'm making that it's not about
exposing these scams but just talking about my experiences and what i saw because the intent
behind these videos i loved zanzibar but this video is to help you travel smarter to the island
this is the video i wish i got to watch before i went there that's what i'm trying to do here and
if you can understand that click the link below and tell me you want that video and i'll send it
to you maybe i'll make it available to everyone most people on youtube don't understand that this
comes from a good place okay let's talk about the next one all right this next one i didn't
really love is up for debate i had some really phenomenal experiences with the food for example
you cannot miss eating at the rock restaurant so amazing i also loved eating at the fisherman
at the doubletree in nungui but there were so many times i'm using tripadvisor's top-rated
restaurants or google's top-rated restaurants and i had a lot of meals that were not that great i've
been hearing the food hyped up in zanzibar so much and you know what i haven't had a good meal yet
and this island really adopts the holy pole island style life in which meals
take hours i could never have a sit-down meal that didn't take at least two hours
so my recommendation for you is don't show up hungry just go to the restaurant and then you
will get hungry while you're waiting okay let's talk about the next one which is getting into
the ocean the ocean because of the extreme tides can be insanely beautiful and calm and can also be
really really really rough and you know it's the ocean obviously it's going to do that
but be aware and a helpful tip for you is just know the tide calendar and when the tide is in
or out because of those extreme tides you can get extremely beautiful water or extremely rough
water and i wish that i was watching that more closely before i would do things like get on a
boat this last one just comes from it being a underdeveloped island and that's fine but be
aware that one of the things that i didn't love is that service and wi-fi generally suck on this
island and helpful tip that i gave in my zanzibar overview video is that getting a sim card specific
to the island versus tanzania mainland will help you to have better service but a lot of the places
a lot of the resorts a lot of the hotels out here don't have the best wi-fi connection so just
something to be aware of and the other thing that would be helpful is i personally would not drive
on this island myself i was really thankful to have a driver because a lot of the roads
especially near the beach are very underdeveloped and also because using gps is not exactly
easy on this island having a driver is something that can combat that zanzibar i loved it i have
so many videos about the island make sure you check the link in the description below
and also check that link in case you want that secret video it might be interesting i'm here
every week with new videos i'm gonna go enjoy oahu and i'll see you in the next adventure ciao