The best time to visit Tanzania is during the drier months from May to October. However if you are planning on going on a safari to the Serengeti you might want to come during the rainy season and see the migrating heards. Tanzania has a tropical equatorial climate modified by altitude. The north has two distinct wet seasons with the longest from March to May and the shortest from November to December while the rest of the country has one wet season from November to May. Around 50% of the country receives an annual precipitation of 760 mm with the maximum being 2,540 mm at Lake Nyasa and the minimum, 510 mm on the Central Plateau. The prevailing winds are the NE and SE trade winds. Average temperature ranges in Dar-es-Salaam are from 19c to 31c all year.

the five years since it opened. It has more character than opulence or luxury, and the steepest, biggest stairs I've ever climbed. No wonder some of the staff are so gorgeously fit. Americans, Thomas Green and his partner Emerson own the hotel, which doesn't sell itself as being gay. But it's nice to know that the staff won't be shocked by two men sharing a bed. Although it seems this shouldn't be a problem in other hotels either. "Here in Zanzibar, homosexuality isn't closeted," says Alan Stafford, the hotel's food and beverage manager. It's not up-tight. It's all very relaxed." According to Alan, homosexuality is, quite accepted but not condoned", just as it is in many other Muslim countries. Not condoned in most walks of life, that is. But there is a culture of cross-dressing traditional singers. Taarab - ancient, religious, meditative music traditionally sung to an accompaniment of zithers, violins, neys and the like -

ZANZIBAR. It really is a place not a café, bar, club or any of the many other businesses that have used its name. No marketing firm could come up with a better word to evoke an elusive magical paradise. What is it about the word? Perhaps it reminds us of Xanadu? If you were to blend the decayed grandeur of Lisbon, the commerce and religion of Morocco and the exotic spiciness of Southern India and set it all on an island with Bounty -advert beaches, you might just get Zanzibar. It's a zany place. No wonder this island of nearly one million people, a ninety-minute boat ride from the coast of mainland Tanzania (of which it is a part), has become an increasingly popular tourist destination. It now attracts nearly 90,000 visitors a year.

has seen a resurgence in recent years. Now modern Taarab is popular in the nightclubs - spawning Taarab and other cross-overs - despite it not being a traditional dance music. Some clubs also have live performances. On a Sunday night, I followed a new friend, Ibrahim, a rather handsome waiter at Emerson & Green, and took a taxi to a club. Perhaps the 25p entrance should have told me it wasn't going to be flash. There were no bright lights, no interesting decor, not even a roof. We sat at tables in a sandy-floored courtyard open to the stars, drinking big 60p bottles of Kilimanjaro beer. On a small stage, a slight man with shoulder-length henna-ed hair, wearing slingbacks, high-waisted white trousers and a sheer black shirt, sang passionately - accompanied by the modern Taarab orchestra of keyboard and electric guitars. One very drunk man danced, stumbling about in front of the stage, waving a bottle of beer. But most of the appreciative audience sat

Stone Town, the ancient capital, is decaying grandeur at its most decrepit. Lanes too narrow for pavement cafes are navigable only by foot, bike or moped. Rubbish and rubble are strewn down alleys. It is almost medieval in its raggedness, but there is always something to see. Zanzibar has been a centre of commerce and communication between nations for centuries. Iranians, Arabs, Indians, Portuguese and British traded and settled here with the local Swahili people. Spices gave way to the more heinous business of slave-trading - a trade that was brought to an end in the 1870s. If you want to go somewhere with a happening gay scene, this is not the place. Homosexuality, as in all of Tanzania, is technically illegal. Despite this, no-one in Zanzibar seems to be working on anything connected with gay rights. And although there is a dearth of people willing to identify themselves as gay, everyone I spoke to seemed to think that "it's not an issue". There's even a well-known gay-run hotel in Stone Town. Emerson and Green is a restored palace, once the home of a wealthy merchant, that has built a good reputation for itself in

 quietly at the tables. Ibrahim pointed out a few people that he knew to be gay. Not many. He also told me a bit about the singer. "His name is Sabri Bachan, but he refers to himself as a woman," he said. "He doesn't have a boyfriend." Nightlife is not Zanzibar's main attraction. Unless you like it extremely wacky. I missed the main night in Stone Town. "There's a disco at Bwawani Hotel where all the gays and prostitutes go on a Tuesday," said Ibrahim. "Everyone dances to Taarab music." Gay men (the ones who are happy to identify as such) and women sex workers seem to befriend each other. This is something observed by a group of Non Governmental Organisations calling themselves the "Aids cluster group" - a group that seems to be not quite on the ball. 'We haven't yet done any education among the Msenge (the Swahili word for gay men)," says Asha Aboud, project co-ordinator, "but through talking to the sex workers we have identified some of the men who have sex with men." The organisation educates through videos and theatre, but she says that "talking about condoms openly is difficult". The organisation sells condoms.