Mombasa, Kenya February 12, 2007

This city is famous for these crossed tusks as you enter the city. Below, a common sight!

There must be 20-30 of these places to work. We walked all around & ownly saw 2 women.
This is just 1 man creating a piece for tourists to buy.

Mombasa, Kenya, Feb 12, 2007

As we had recently been on extensive safari in Kenya & Tanzania, we chose to go to the Akumba Cooperative (the Arts & Crafts Village) outside of town where ,it seemed, hundreds of men & women carve wooden images of animals and warriors principally out of mahogany . They work in thatched roofed open ended shelters. The result was a purchase from their show room of a bread basket with an elephant motif and a necklace with small wooden animals for Barb.

After a quiet afternoon at the pool on deck 11, we left the ship and boarded a bus for a different wonderful experience titled “Arabian Night on the Tamarind Dhow”. We drove through Mombassa old town and a series of even older towns each with a different religious group at its core. The streets were teaming with people mostly selling things-all kinds of things. The road through Mombassa & those villages was being repaired in preparation for the 2007 World Cross Country Challenge. Kenyon runners currently hold both male & female fastest times & world titles.

We arrived at the Tamarind Hotel located next to the Tudor Creek, an extension of the bay from the Indian Ocean. The restaurant is famous for its seafood culinary. About 50 of us filled the dhow and sat at the flower decorated tables on the deck. There were even tables on the upper deck where the dhow’s captain in Arabian dress sat under the furled sail. We cruised the bay moving by old mansions of Arabian design. The guide pointed out the old English Club where Karen Blixon (Author of Out of Africa ) walked in (the movie) in search of her lecherous husband. We were offered a seafood stew Swahali style, grilled giant prawns, steak, or lobster and a range of pre & post main course delights at candle lit tables under the stars on this balmy night. There was a 5 piece local band which played a wide range variety of popular music. To top the evening off, the constellation Orion was clearly visible overhead.