Matamwe beach village is our finale and we big it up in the rather posh ‘asali’ suite, right on the beach and with it’s on chef, security guard and plunge pool in the centre of the living area this is a room and a half!

We can order anything we want for dinner, cooked & served in the suite – private dining gone mad, we opt for crab and avocado salad to start, followed by fillet steak with ice cream to finish (somehow we have managed not to have ice cream for the past 25 days). The crab turns out to be crab claws – HUGE crab claws, crab claws from a monster crab, the sort of crab that captain Nemo would run from, they taste good.

We make it out to Mnemba atoll for snorkelling, it’s a 40 minute dalla dalla (local bus contraption) to the boat and a 30 minute sail to the reef. The dalla dalla ride is horrific, 2 minutes of entertainment and 38 minutes of spine crunching, ar$e numbing pain – it had better be worth it.

IT IS!

I’ve dived and snorkeled the barrier reef, the red sea, marine reserves in St Lucia and a few other top sites but this beats the lot, the quantity and variety of fish are amazing, the colours of the coral vivid, and the water clarity is fantastic – if this is your thing consider Zanzibar for your next holiday.

In the middle of the Indian Ocean, the air quality is fantastic and the light pollution is zero, the night sky is breathtaking – you can see not just stars but the glow of gas clouds, it's spectacular.

The last evening in Africa was surreal to say the least, Matemwe Beach had a 'curry night' presumably feeding us the British national dish to ready us for home!

Needless to say the buffet was great and the traditional indian band entertaining even when (and here is the sureal bit) they sang 'My bonny lies over the ocean', which we surmised as an old Irish sea shanty had made it over to the indian ocean. then they sang The Beatles yellow submarine!!

Stone Town was the colonial capital of ‘the spice island’ unfortunately since Tanzanian independence 50odd years ago none of the many splendid buildings, balconies and arches have been maintained, painted or even cleaned, apart from the beautiful intricately carved doors (it’s famous for them). When this place falls down (and I’ll give it 10 years tops!) the doors will be all that is left.

Still despite it’s rough and ready feel, we wandered the narrow alleys, browsed the stalls and shops but made sure did not partake in the food on the hawker stalls of the night market (one risk too many me thinks) and generally enjoyed the slightly scary, slightly amusing Afro/Arabic mix.

If you’re ever here try the spice tour, the Shwartz spice rack contents in your kitchen almost certainly started out here and it was more interesting than I expected (that’s the tour not your spice rack), plus you can buy handfuls of vanilla pods, nutmeg and cinnamon for a couple of quid.

Next, Jambiani village to start the beach bit, we arrived via what is locally know as the main road – in reality it’s the gaps between the buildings, there are more cows, goats & chickens than vehicles!

We crash on the beach for 4 days and do nothing. Our laziness is interrupted hourly by the local kids…

“Jambo, jambo, pen for school?”
“Jambo, jambo, chocolate?”
“Jambo, jambo, football?”
“Jambo, jambo, t-shirt?”

This is one of the poorest places in the world, tourism is helping but apart from a couple of places on the island the big hotels and big money has not arrived – just the back packers, the kids are entertaining if not a little persistent.

At low tide the water recedes almost 2 miles, the local ladies come out to harvest the farmed seaweed and collect coconut husk pinned under rocks overnight. We walk out amongst them past stranded fishing dhows and make for the rock pools nearer the waters edge – there are many crabs and little fish around but for the bigger stuff a boat trip is required to get out to the reefs.

Next stop the attractively named Dungwe.