New Year New Beginnings.

 Birthdays, in my opinion, are a time to hit the life reset button. It’s like you get a chance to restart your whole year.  With our birthdays being so close to the New Year, (2 days on either side, Dec 30 and Jan 2), and the rest of the world feeling like it’s a new beginning ,Ian and I,  get to reset along with everyone else.  I know, I know, sounds so cliché.

We decided to take a trip to Mafia Island, off the coast of Tanzania, to go swimming with the whale sharks.

We hop on the 6am bus to Dar Es Salaam, take a room for the night and back up at 4:30am to catch a taxi and another 6am bus to the coast.   

The bus gets in late, and we find ourselves stranded in a little fishing village on the river, our ferry has already left, and it’s the only one for the day.  We’re gonna have to spend the night in this little village that reeks of fish.  Standing in the middle of the road looking around we take in the entire village, and I’m not kidding when I say this.  We find the one English speaker of the village and he helps us get a room for the night.   We make the best of it, go to the New Corner Pub for fish and rice, the only thing on the menu, and sit at the town square watching the young guys play pool for a while. We started chatting it up with the locals who were under the impression that Ian was my boyfriend… haha!! I may look young, but not that young. We decided  to take a nap, we were tired, and we had been up early for the past 2 mornings, something we are definitely not used to.

The day and night, were sweltering.  We were right on the river and hoped sleeping with the door to our room open would provide us a cross breeze… no such luck. 

The next morning we stood watching the villagers load and unload the ferry that would take us to Mafia Island; it did not meet the definitions of a ferry, but was much closer to being a medium sized boat. The refrigerators  that were being used as benches the night before were still laying flat  on their backs, but were now being packed with ice and loaded with crabs, prawns and fish to be taken to the markets in Dar Es Salaam.

our ferry to Mafia Island

 Once the boat was loaded with many goodies from the main land it was our turn to get on board and find a seat.  We noticed many people getting on and laying on the floor but didn’t know why.  Turns out what we thought was going to be a 2 hour crossing was closer to 5.  The people lying on the floor got a chance to take a nap and did not have to encounter the uncomfortable wooden benches.  As we looked out over the side of the boat, we saw what we thought was the horizon, except it kept getting closer and closer.   Turns out there was a line of muddy water, separated by a line of blue water from the Indian Ocean.  It was as if someone had drawn a line that neither waters from the river or the ocean was willing to cross. We also encountered dolphins and were escorted for a few meters with a front row seat to watch as they jumped and flipped out of the water swimming alongside our boat.  About 90 mins into our boat ride Ian started to feel a bit sea sick, thank God for homeopathic Tabacum, it helped in settling his stomach. 

Although a day later than we anticipated, we got to our hotel and were grateful for the hot shower and air condition. We needed some comfort after the past couple day’s hard travel.

Headed out to sea by 8am Tuesday morning it turned out to be one of the few mornings the weather was overcast, this coming on the heels of 2 months of steamy hot rainless weather.  The seas were rough, but this Island girl was hell bent on dipping her toes in the water, after all, it’s not New Years if you haven’t had a sea bath. Wind kicking up and waves fit more for surfing than boating we made our way out to deeper waters to look for whale sharks.  Only a few minutes out our guide starts puking over the side, the boat spings a leak and the Captain’s bailing water while the first mate is trying to plug the hole.  It was comical even though it could have been dire.

fishing boats getting ready to go out on the waters

our boat with the waves breaking and splashing over the side

We kept an eye out for fins breaching the water hoping to see the whale sharks we were pursuing. I saw dorsal fins popping up and yelled to the Captain to turn in that direction.  We were all excited and he said “Today you get the prize for finding the whales sharks”, but it  was only dolphins, their heads bobbing up out of the waves, not jumping or flipping today just swimming like they had someplace they were hurrying off to, so we kept looking. We stayed out on the water for 5 hours searching for whale sharks with no luck. 

Not to be totally disappointed we jumped overboard and attempted to swim and snorkel out on the open waters and were fortunate enough to see some corals.  After only a few mins in Ian and I both climbed back on the boat, the water was too rough, it was knocking us around like a lone sock in a tumble dryer, and it was no fun.

Ian swimming in open water

waves crashing over Ian with the Captain swimming nearby 

So, we were disappointed, but as Ian says, “You don’t always get what you want,” and what we wanted were whale sharks. For a teen he’s very insightful.

close quarter's on the plane

Next day it’s time to head home and we find out the ferry is broken and MAYBE would be fixed and leaving the following morning. With no guarantees we decided to fly back to Dar-Es-Salaam on a tiny 12 seater plane, where you could reach out and touch the pilot, and make our way back home to our cozy lil house.  Our vacation was a bit more effort than it was worth, but it was still good to get down to the coast and dip our toes in the water.