Best value romantic travel packages for Zanzibar

 

 

Want a romantic holiday to Zanzibar on the cheap? Here are two affordable travel packages, including flights, accommodation and food.

Sea Cliff Resort, Zanzibar

This new kid on the Zanzibar beach resort block is jostling for business and offers good deals for all the luxury that comes with a top-end establishment of 120 rooms, most with sea views. There’s a deck on stilts in the ocean for that special sundowner and a rim-flow pool overlooking the sea runs the length of the lounge, dining and bar area, so you can work off some of the calories gained. A second pool on a lower level is served by another bar and there’s also a kiddies’ paddling pool. It’s a five-minute walk to the hotel’s beach where guests are free to use the sea kayaks and pedalos (high tide only).

Facilities at the Sea Cliff Resort are free to all guests and include a sports centre with squash and tennis courts, snooker, table tennis, gym and bicycles, while spa treatments are extra. There’s a children’s play centre (ages 3 – 10) with a supervised activity programme and babysitters can be hired for a fee.

Everything is brand new in the rooms, from the fine cotton bed linen to the flat-screen televisions. The safe is large enough for a laptop and you stock the mini-bar fridge yourself. Air con, fan, tea/coffee station, internal phone, mozzie nets and free wi-fi are standard.

South Africans will feel right at home at this Tanzanian-owned resort as some of the managers are South African and will greet you in Afrikaans.

Food

Breakfast starts with juice and a fruit platter, followed by muesli, cereals, breads and pastries, plus eggs and cooked trimmings. Lunch is your choice from an à la carte menu, while dinner is a set four-course meal with a number of options for starters, mains and desserts. The full-board rate includes a range of cocktails, beers and spirits.

Nearby activities

Spice farm tours, Stone Town and Prison Island.

Cost

R9 656 a person sharing includes a return flight from Johannesburg to Zanzibar, airport taxes, transfers to and from the hotel, and DB&B accommodation in a garden room. (Full-board and sea-view options are also available.)

Contact

African Encounters tel 011-880-3079, email info@africanencounters.com, www.africanencounters.com

Review

Best pool with a view.

Getaway reader special
 

To get a 10 per cent discount on land arrangements, quote the code AEGM01 when booking.

Dream of Zanzibar Hotel

You could easily be in the Caribbean as you mingle with a cosmopolitan mix of guests from Europe and Russia at the Italian-owned all-inclusive Dream of Zanzibar resort on the palm-lined beach at Pwani Mchangani in the northeast. With 157 rooms, it is geared to handle large numbers and has four restaurants and three bars serving a menu of inclusive drinks and cocktails around the large main pool (other drinks cost extra). There’s an organised entertainment programme, from morning stretch classes to Masai dancing and moonlight dinner parties at night.

Thatched, double-storey bungalows of eight suites each are perched on a hillside and linked to the public areas by a long flight of steps – a bit of enforced exercise after indulging in too many cocktails and large buffet meals (the infirm can ask for a car). Rooms are furnished and equipped to a high standard, with flat-screen televisions and DVD players, air cons, fans, safes, tea/coffee stations, stocked mini-bar fridges and double vanity basins in the en suite bathrooms. Sea-view rooms cost extra, as do wi-fi, water sports and use of the gym and spa. A second swimming pool in the garden suites area is geared for families.

Food

Delicious buffet meals in the main restaurant provide a wide range of choices to suit all tastes, from a healthy salad bar to decadent desserts. Meals at three smaller themed à la carte restaurants must be booked in advance and dinners at the seafood one beside the beach cost extra.

Nearby activities

Spice farm tours, Mnarani Turtle Conservation Project, snorkelling at Mnemba Island.

Cost

R11 850 a person sharing includes return flights from Joburg to Zanzibar, airport taxes, transfers to and from the hotel, seven nights in a garden room, meals, snacks and selected drinks.

Contact

1timeholidays tel 0861-111-345, email bookings@1timeholidays.co.za, www.1timeholidays.co.za

Review

Best buffet.

Getaway reader special

Book a de luxe garden room before 31 July this year and get a free upgrade to an ocean view junior suite when staying in September and October. (Offer cannot be combined with any other special or discounted rate.)