sail away in pictures

Cavtat Croatia - beautiful small town

Crkva Sv. Matije, near Kotor Monetenegro

very good restaurant in Kotor Cesarica

our sailing yacht

entering the port of Brindisi IT after a looooong night 

sail away - join the crew

My first sailing trip took me from Dubrovnik in Croatia to Brindisi in Italy.
It took one week. We stopped in Montenegro, Albania and Italy.

Lets start from the very first idea of this trip. A friend of mine has a sailing yacht that had to be moved as the rent in the harbour of Venice was too expensive. So he decided to bring the ship to a cheaper place somewhere south in Italy. As the trip takes several weeks he asked friends to join the crew. Five friends including him as the captain/skipper sailed from Dubrovnik with several stops to Brindisi.

The initial route was: Dubrovnik (Croatia), Kotor (Montenegro), Bari (Italy), Monopoli (IT) and Brindisi (IT). According to the wheater and the time we had left we ajusted the plan each day. That was actually very interesting. The whole crew planned the journey each evening. Most of the days we did not have enough wind to sail so we had to swich on the engine. In the middle of the week we realised that the wheater is going to change and a big thunder storm is going to hit us. We decided to change the route and sail/cruise further directly from Bar (Montenegro) to Durres (Albania). That was quite exhausting to be on sea the whole day long. In Durres we stayed for two days and explored the city and bought a lot of food and water.

In the evening of the third day we started our journey to Italy. One hour after we left the thunderstorm begun. Luky as we were the storm stayed on the albanian coast. So we did not have any rain.

We had two teams to work in shifts during that long night. 3h working 3h sleeping. It took around 12h to reach the italian coast.

Enough routeplanning, geopraphy and technical details. It is not possible to describe the feeling you have when you are sailing.     -     Freedom! Peace! Relaxation!   but well I gonna let pictures do the rest.

Stonetown - living history

After the Pemba trip we continued our journey to Zanzibar and its main city and old town Stonetown.

Zanzibar Town 

A vibrant city peppered with historical buildings, an interesting museum, colorful markets and so on

If you have one day or even less to spend in Stonetown I recomend you to do a city tour. During the day you can easily do that on your own. Certainly you will be asked if you need a guide every other minute. There are german speaking guides as well as french, english....

former embassy of Germany

You should at least visit the museum about slavery and the market. Zanzibar was an important city centuries before. Spices and fruits were and still are the main export goods. As the infrastructure was good they began to export slaves to countries all around the indian ocean. The museum tells the story and you can see the cave were they waited.....

The market is just nextdoors. Get some spieces and honey I sad to myself. And I did :-)
There is also a night market next to the harbour. It is all about food, meat on a skewer. Good fruit juices and sweets.

After a few hours we returned to Switzerland. So I have to come back and explore the rest of the island. And more of Stonetown. I love this city!

so more tips will be postet some day.....

Relaxing days on Pemba

The reason for my short trip to Tanzania was the opening of a hotel on Pemba Island. I was invited by Constance Hotels and Lets go Tours. Constance Aiyana is quite new and during the rany season they took the oportunity to invite some travel agents to see and get familiar with the new resort.

I do not want to talk to much about the hotel. Follow the link and explore the hotel for yourself.

We had a spacious room next to the beach and enjoyed some peacefull days.

my terrace

What to do on Pemba? Well there is not much to do to be honest. Ride a bike to a village and go to the market. Pemba is well known for diving and snorkeling.
We took a change and made a boat tour to the mangroves. Another trip took us to a sandsank for lunch.

The food was amazing an the staff was very warm and friendly.

sandbank

You see we had lot to do ;-)

Thanks again for this amazing trip, the hospitality and the great food!

breakfast will be seved shortly 

Pemba island - heaven on earth

Sitting in the cockpit :-) 

Wow! Quite, green, authentic and a luxury hotel. A dream!

Pemba means green and so is the island. There is actually one main road leading north. It is like the hearth of the island because everybody lives next to it.

Only three hotels are on this island so there are no masses of tourists.

You reach Pemba with a domestic flight from Stonetown on Zanzibar. A small plane approx. 13 seats flies you there in 30 minutes.

on Pembas lifeline 

From the airstrip we drove 1.5h to the very north were the hotel is located. The last 30 minutes is a gravel road that leas through Ngezy Forest a protectet forest.
So quite a long trip but I can tell you it was worth it.

preparing to leave and explore

Hi Folks
It has been a long time since my last journey. Too long!
I have to change that. I am going to leave this night from Zurich heading the south.

Pemba Island is the destination. A small island in the Indian ocean. It lies north of Zanzibar and belongs to Tanzania.

Bags are packed and there are some blank pages left in the passport. I am happy to see and explore. Can't wait!

Leipzig vs Dresden - do not ask me

I love Leipzig. It is a cool and diverse town. The people are friendly and the food and drinks are good an cheap. It is a lively town but not noisy and dirty. Not too many people although it grows.
We took a car ride to see some other place like the airport (mostly freight) and Porsche fabric.
 
The city is surrounded by three lakes. In the city are a lot of parks and small rivers. It is very green and colorful.

My advise for you: go in spring or summer and enjoy not only the city but as well the nature in and around the city. By bicycle it wont take long to the lakes were people sail, swim and just enjoy each others.

first and last picture of Dresden - Katholische Hofkirhce

Dresden? Well to tell you the truth we stayed there for only a couple of hours. The opera, churches and cafes. As I felt sick I was not in the mood to explore another city. I have to come back.

As our friends live in Leipzig we will come back. Thank you for having us around. It was great.