We went for our evening walk along the beach and, on the way, got accosted rather unpleasantly by a man selling bracelets. He was quite aggressive and walked along, rather too close, as we were about to go down a narrow and hidden path, lined with tall fences and bush, so I turned on my […]
Truly dire
An astonishingly poor meal today from a very expensive restaurant. One of the only times (perhaps the only time ever?) I sent a dish back. This was at one of the expensive beach resorts so I didn’t have very high expectations of the food, but I was surprised when my fish tacos turned out to […]
Hunt for a beach
After a bit of work, we took a rickshaw south to a fishing collective we’d been recommended, there to have lunch. I do like this way of travelling around: just amble out and in less than a minute a rickshaw will arrive and take you off. We undoubtedly get overcharged, but it’s worth it for […]
Joining the 21st century
The GF and I decided to join the 21st century today by opening an MPesa account. We also got our mobile phone SIMs, of course. But the MPesa is what is exciting. We went to a mobile phone shop where I remarked to the GF what a pleasure it is sometimes to see a really […]
Change of fortune
We’re in Kenya, much to our surprise. Our taxi driver arrived, our airline existed, our various COVID tests and documents were correct, our visas went for a full three months, and there was a guy waiting outside the Mombasa airport to whisk us to Diani, where we are for the next couple of weeks. It […]
Chaat soup
Today we tried urojo, which is a mango coconut soup with vadas and crispy chatpatta stuff, drizzled with chilli and tamarind, and topped with a skewer or two of grilled beef. It was the first food we had which was tasty, distinctive and local, a trifecta that has largely eluded us (getting even one has […]
Both negative
We went for a careful excursion yesterday, to a cafe which had genuinely good filter coffees. We both had their light roast, I in a kalita wave (in memory of our Cholula cafe, Bartolo – possibly my favourite cafe anywhere) and the GF in a V60. Very pleasant, and it was a nice part of […]
My turn
Today I woke up and realised it was my turn – a fever, weakness, and a heaviness around the chest. The poor GF, still very unwell, had to take over cooking and getting foodstuff, which nearly felled him (it was his first time outside since we arrived, and then he was too out of it […]
Not disaster
The GF’s test result came back and, to both our startlement, is negative, so he does not apparently have corona. He is also a little better today, very weak, but the fever is down and either I have got the hang of the oximeter or oxygen saturation has improved. Nevertheless it was a day of […]
Bad nights
The place we’re staying in Jambiani is one of those that looks really good on Airbnb, and has all that is advertised, but is just dinghier, darker and has other defects that are hard to identify without seeing the place. One is that our rooms are set up so that air circulation is quite blocked […]