Monsoon in Zanzibar

And, no, I'm not talking about the impact of Steve Wehmeyer and yours truly arriving in Zanzibar, but rather that we arrived in Zanzibar during the tail end of the monsoon season.  The summer I spent teaching in India overlapped with the monsoon season so I've seen some pretty crazy reasons, but Zanzibar's monsoon doesn't have to take a backseat to anyone.  We arrived on the ferry on just about the hardest sustained rain I can ever remember; the kind of rain where you think it can't possibly rain any harder, and then it kicks into an even greater torrential downpour, and it keeps up for hours.  Arriving into the port at Zanzibar is always a madhouse, but it was definitely kicked up a notch during the apocalyptic rain.  Happily we were met by the excellent Kombo Bakar's team so we didn't have to walk (swim) all the way to the Flamingo Guest House.  Because of the weather Kombo's team was delayed a few minutes so Steve and I pushed through the army of touts and found a relatively dry safe spot under an overhang.  A guy, who was also doubtless looking to give us a ride, was still nice enough to loan us his phone several times so that we could call Kombo.  Eventually we made it safe and sound and soaked to the Flamingo and then walked through the flooded streets of Stone Town to Lukmaan's for the first of several great meals (more on that later).

The view as we pulled into Stone Town. Despite the downpour the trip from Dar to Zanzibar was smooth, unlike the roller coaster ride back.

The relative chaos of the Zanzibar port (I say relative because the madness of the Dar Es Salaam port puts it to shame).

The luggage coming off the ship.  I'll have to find a way to post the video I took.  Two guy push the luggage cage out of the ship and another guy rides it down backwards, in this case a slick ride with the rain.  It picks up speed until it is caught by a ship rope laying on the ground, shortly before it would have toppled out into the water on the other side of the dock.

Relative sanctuary from the rain as we waited for Kombo.

You can get a little better sense of the rain, but, truthfully, the picture just doesn't do it justice.

The walk to Lukmaan's after we dropped our bags at the Flamingo.  You can see Steve and Kombo on the left on what passes for a sidewalk in Stone Town.  I was wearing sandals and was already soaked, so I just waded through the rushing water.

And a river ran through it, at least temporarily.