Jafferji House — Hotel in Shangani

You can't judge a place from the front, or from where it's located. This was a little gem of a B & B (for us). We ate out for lunch & dinner, but really enjoyed their breakfasts. More on the service & rooms first. The front desk manager, which varied, was always very kind & attentive to our needs. The rooms were very nice, beds super comfortable, and having a TV was not a necessity until I got a little sick (possibly from eating out at lunch?), and then I could watch sports. Having a safe for valuables was a bonus. I saw some reviews on Google maps that did not put the hotel in a good light, but our group was there for 4 nights and we never had anything stolen, or any bad experience. Just be wise & careful. The rooms were cleaned daily and the working fan & AC were really nice! ||The architecture is really cool with lots of old wood, nice decorations, and interesting design. The rooftop was nice, with a great view of the harbor to the west. It is next to a mosque, but that didn't bother us. We had breakfast up there every morning and they had a couple of juice choices, plus really good masala tea, and bottled water - would be nice if they could not use SO MANY plastic bottles, and maybe get those larger ones & dispense into glass pitchers, but I can only suggest. The freshly made maandazi were amazing and there were several fruit choices, yoghurt, and bread - I've lived in Portugal and really appreciate nice, freshly baked bread and this was just the cheap store-packaged white bread, but bread is not a huge part of this culture. We could order eggs and my omelet was always very good. Coffee is pretty basic, so I did masala tea instead and they also make a nice lemon grass tea. ||As is true with all of Africa where I've lived & traveled, all the staff are super friendly & patient. ||The location is perfect - right next to the Old Fort and Mama Mia (gelato), as well as Forodhani Food Market, but easy walking distance to everything in Stonetown proper. We had a guide take us around & give us a tour of Darajani (the bazaar or market area), the Anglican church and slave market site (very sobering), the Fort, and...

Chose this restaurant for 2 reasons: 1) how beautiful it looked, and 2)convenience, there's restaurant located on the roof top.

Sans the reception area, the hotel is aesthetically pleasing. The garden downstairs, the hallways, and the rooms, photo ops everywhere! My room was the Queen Africa room, and is exactly how it's pictured on their site.

However these are all the pros I can mention about this hotel. The wifi was spotty (like worked in one spot in my entire room, i had to stand to use it), and I could only put one device on it. The shower didn't have hot water, and there was no mini fridge to store water.

The most disappointing part was there was no rooftop restaurant. I was traveling solo and I choose not to wander around at night alone, so I chose this hotel thinking I could grab a night time dinner after souvenir shopping. I asked about dinner start start time at about 5:30pm and was informed the restaurant only served breakfast. I was irritated because again I don't like to travel alone at night when solo. The guy in reception had a friend of his who happened to be passing by try to show me to a restaurant which was a 8 minute walk away but I was extremely uncomfortable with that situation (they asked for a "contribution" when I repeatedly told them I did not want to continue to the restaurant because I was uncomfortable taking the walk back by myself at night); I got lost on my way back. I would have left the hotel if I could have gotten my money back and stayed elsewhere.

I left at 7am the next morning, so I didn't get to see the rooftop "restaurant".

Another issue was I ended up having to use cash to pay for my hotel stay because there was an issue with running my credit card at reception upon arrival. Once again highly inconvenienced. Though my pictures add to how beautiful the hotel seems, I could not recommend staying here. Upon visiting Zanzibar again I would avoid this hotel...

Important to read

No need to comment on the hostel - this comment on the staff is sufficient

We spent 2 nights in the hostel. Coming back from the restaurant on the second evening, the safe was not working anymore (code had been reinitialized) and our suitcases had been opened. After carefully reading some suspicious comments we asked the manager to come and fix it (while he was away) because our passports were inside. While waiting, the staff was suspicious and laughing when I asked if I could trust and the manager them because some comments were reporting weird things.

So basically, here is what is happening in this hostel (and this is confirmed by other comments) - please read it

From time to time - the manager is coming to a room (always before the last night of the stay, so that you won't have time to spend to go to the police) to check if there is money inside the safe with a key that opens every safe Best case scenario - the code is not functional anymore and the manager just pretend that it happens from time to time Worst case - you had money in it and you are done because you had to sign a paper saying that you will not prosecute for any reasons

Fortunately we only left a passport but another couple was stolen 500€ 5 days before (we met them after in Jambiani)

The place is nice otherwise - so the only option if you want to stay in the hostel is to carry all your stuff and luggage all the time, as it's 35 degrees, I guess you won't want to do this

Please stay away from the hostel, the manager is a thief. I guess he will answer the same thing he told me on this night when we strongly argued "sometimes the code change by itself". I am sure everyone agrees that a code doesn't change...