Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, is one of those places dubbed a ‘hole’. It’s neither particularly old, nor particularly beautiful. But read on because now there’s a reason to visit: the Oyster Bay Hotel. Renovated in 2007, the hotel is particularly beautiful. It’s also one of the coolest overnight stops in Africa for in-transit honeymooners and those who are en-route, whether to the high snows of Kilimanjaro, the coral sands and historical sights of Zanzibar, the Rift Valley or the Serengeti with its annual migration of two million animals.

The Oyster Bay Hotel is a nine-bed villa with shady colonnades and courtyards. It sits on Oyster Bay, next to the embassy residences and overlooking the ocean. Opposite, huge boats line the harbour (harbour duties are low here) and then set off in twos and threes to deter pirates. The hotel’s interior is in keeping with the new African aesthetic: tribal, organic and chic. It has a large, minimalist open-plan space with muted colours and materials that you want to touch (think jute, fur and hemp), plus artefacts that tell a story. There’s a Kudu-horn lamp musical instrument used in ceremonies to communicate with ancestors; interesting lights, such as raw rattan hanging shades and a Buri palm leaf floor lamp; tribal-chief-sized beds, village-sized bathrooms and free-standing baths. ‘Such a cool vibe,’ scribbled Harpers’ editor Lucy Yeomans in the Visitors’ Book.

I was there in transit to meet friends at Lake Tanganyika – the second deepest lake in the world and the world’s longest freshwater lake – where we were picking up a Lady Lori helicopter (East Africa’s numero uno heli company) to fly to the Serengeti. In the meantime it’s only the style-addicted like me who feel content to go to Africa and just revel in a hotel’s interior. So in pursuit of areas beyond my World of Interiors mindset I decided to spend my few spare hours on the island of Zanzibar.

The ferry trip to Zanzibar involved my travelling companion, Maretha Wemtzer, the (endlessly helpful and hospitable) white South African big mama of the Oyster Bay Hotel in lengthy cross-cultural negotiations. There were ten strangers who, offering their assistance, accompanied us from the taxi to the harbour-side ferry booking office. After a small tree’s worth of form-filling, animated chats about ‘Muzungus’ (white people), residents’ rates and charges for tourists and lots of gesticulating and hand-waving, finally a deal was struck: $80 for my return trip and substantially less for Maretha because she’s a resident. We were accompanied on the two and a half hour ride by cheerful Tanzanians and narcoleptic backpackers who slept on the ferry floor.

When you arrive in Zanzibar by sea, you pass the old dhow harbour where outrigger canoes chug up and down in turquoise waters bordered by golden sands. On the shore, there’s the old Arab fort and House of Wonders (a 19th-century ceremonial palace) of Stone Town, a World Heritage Site. The Aga Khan, spiritual leader of the Shia Ismaili Muslims, has poured development money into Zanzibar. The dollars show immediately on its manicured sea front garden – Forodhani Park – where, on the day we go, someone also happens to be wrapping the trees in red fabric, in readiness for a party. Better than a yellow ribbon round an old oak tree, any day.

We walked through Stone Town, Zanzibar’s old quarter. In Zanzibar, Portuguese rule was followed by that of Omani Arabs. Omani sultans made Zanzibar the seat of their Imamate, and their home. It then became a British protectorate in 1890. Little has changed since the 1850s; Stone Town is a maze of alleyways, mosques, bazaars and high-walled buildings with teak door frames and the Koran’s scripts and symbols: from the lotus (denoting reproductive power) to fish (for fertility). A roadside vendor was selling cane sugar juice and barbecued cassava (like sweet potato.) Around him, a few men sported the traditional kanzu (ankle-length robes) and some women wore bui-bui (black gowns). But the hot fashion item is still the men’s crocheted hat.

We visited artefact shops selling Coca-Cola cans fashioned into toy cars, beaded necklaces and bags and dresses made by women’s communities from kikoi fabric. Zanzibar Gallery, a wondrous book shop sells endless tomes on African art alongside photographs, carvings and textiles. At the fish market there are piles of unidentifiable blue fish, flailing yellow Piscean prototypes and octopuses; the vegetable and spice market has spiky ‘ugly fruit,’ cashews, pungent cloves and cumin – all taken away after purchase in bags made of old newspapers. At lunch we sat in a restaurant overlooking the ocean and ate the delightfully named pilli pilli perch, steamed with lime, chilli and garlic.

Then we took in a little history. The slave trade had existed for centuries before the sultans came to Zanzibar, but not on such a scale. In the mid 19th-century, 30,000 slaves a year were bought to Zanzibar. Some were punished by being buried alive in the walls of houses under construction; others were beaten and fondled lasciviously in the market. We visited the dank and cramped subterranean quarters where slaves were kept before auctions, many dying before the sale. Then we walked around the Cathedral which was built on the site of the old slave market; saw the altar, the location of the old whipping post; and a crucifix, made from the tree under which Livingstone’s heart was gouged out after his death, and buried. It was his belief that his heart er, belonged to Africa.

On our return trip to Dar es Salaam in the evening, the ferry was full. Men in business suits, with polyester ties, Africa-sized status and even bigger smiles, stood port side, getting drenched with spray. And laughing. And laughing. It was a very happy moment.

We arrived back to the Oyster Bay Hotel and a Tanzanian feast of ‘bamia’ (okra), nyanya chungu (white baby aubergine), and spinach. All dishes were cooked in coconut milk and delicious enough to turn even the most ardent cannibal into a vegetarian. For pudding there was hot grilled pineapple drizzled with cashew, butter and honey sauce or passion fruit crème brulee. Maretha, a formidable foodie, has her staff of black men in white tunics cooking up a storm.

I looked around the beautiful and homely room; at the festivity drums, ebony veneer tree-like lamp, cow skin rugs and a gong that’s used to warn villagers against thieves; at the attentive staff and flickering candles. And I listened to the haunting music of African chanting. Dar es Salaam may not be particularly old, nor particularly beautiful. That’s certainly true. But with the re-opening of the Oyster Bay Hotel it would be hard ever to call Dar es Salaam a total hole again.

In the Masai Mara the animals are so used to people that they pose for photos. Find something exciting like a kill, and you’ll have to share the experience with a fleet of four wheel drives. So it’s a pleasure to stay in Ol Seki – a luxury tented camp situated idyllically in the heart of Eastern Koiyaki – on the edges of the Mara. It’s where the animals are timid and humans scarce. At night, guards with poison darts patrol the camp’s perimeters, ready to defend against marauding buffalo and hungry lions; and guests sleep, safe and sound, inside the tents with hot water- bottles.

In the lifting light of the morning, wildebeest herds gather with a dazzle of zebra on the plain, for protection against predators. Thompson gazelle speed away from our jeep, tails moving like high- speed windscreen wipers. With mounting excitement, we come across a troop of baboons and then ten hippos in a pool – bathing, going under water, blowing bubbles and reappearing. We stand inches away on the river bank knowing that if we joined them, they’d bite us in two. Later, from the car, we watch two cheetah brothers carefully washing each other. And why not, after eating a baby hippo?

Ol Seki is a no-bricks, no-mortar, 1920s-style camp. Think 12 sided tents like big tops but filled with contemporary cream sofas, African cushions, ethnic furniture and elephant-sized beds. You can sit on a Colonial plantation chair on the groovy circular decking outside your tent and look over the Savannah to spy elephant. Or shade from the sun under the cream awning, with sundowners or steaming mugs of Kenyan coffee in your hand.

We gather for meals at a communal table in the ‘mess tent,’ its tarpaulin curtains pulled back, our eyes feasting on the plains and animals. The food is excellent by any standards, particularly given that nothing grows locally and everything has to be flown in, in Tintin’s plane. Evans, the chef, appears in whites at breakfast with a portable stove on which, by popular request, he makes chilli omelettes. For dinner, we have the world’s best bloody and Virgin Mary’s followed by modern Colonial fare: asparagus, fillet and fresh passion-fruit sorbet. Afterwards we follow the directions of the Swahili words written in chocolate on the coconut cake, ‘Goodnight, sleep well.’

Ol Seki attracts French women in giraffe-high heels, couples and bonused-out bankers, here to sweat out the credit crunch. People dropped off on the tiny airstrip in one-pilot planes or spirited here in Lady Lori helicopters, Kenya’s finest fleet and known for its celebrity clientele. No wonder they come here: Ol Seki is a place of superlatives and not just for the game drives. Although we go on one drive, and then another and another. Animals and plains as far as the eye can see and just us, our children, and our guides Daniel Koya and Betty Maitai, who are the most knowledgeable I’ve encountered in six safaris.

But when I’m safari-ed out, Ol Seki also appeals to the Guardian in my soul. Rakwa is the local mud village, authentic to its last twig- filled cow hide mattress and fly-crawling child’s face. A brisk 45- minute walk away is the school, Olesere with 270 children and four teachers. There are wooden board classroom walls with gaping holes and wall posters bearing legends like, ‘Water is Life’ and, ‘Sanitation is Dignity’. ‘We used to be caned on the hand and under the feet and then have to walk to school bare foot,’ remembers Betty. ‘Now teachers just hit with a ruler and pinch. No wonder the children don’t behave so well’.

One day we drive to the local Nkoilale village, in the middle of a plain. En route, we pass Masai tribesmen – noble, lithe and carrying spears – walking to market in their red kikoys to scare off lions. In the village, there’s a Mother Teresa Clinic and near it the Empiris Shop, which sells Fanta, loo paper and flour: nothing else. Women with huge earrings, beaded hair and wearing orange, yellow and red garments sit on the ground selling potatoes, maize flour and cabbages. Others sell beads or goats. They perch in front of huge sacks of snuff and piles of second-hand clothes laid out on blankets. Best of all are the ‘1000 mile shoes’, made from tyres that have driven a thousand miles. (If you have a rubber bit sticking up purposefully between your toes, it shows you’re not married. Jimmy Choo take note.)

Afterwards we visit the restaurant, a place with a concrete floor and corrugated roof. It serves only chicken. Then we go to a pub in a breeze-block hut, with a frescoed wall of a tribal scene. Men with spears and knives sit in a line along the wall drinking local maize and barley beer, and spirits straight from the bottle. Afterwards they walk back to their village to stagger into the wrong huts.

These people believe in Enkai, a God who descended from the sky to give them cattle. They do cattle raids on other tribes to reclaim what seems rightfully theirs. For them, cows are moving banks. Indeed Daniel has to give his parents ten cows as a fine for having chosen his own wife. ‘Otherwise they will hate me and put a curse on me,’ he explains. Fresh cow dung is used as an antiseptic by ladies when they’re expanding their ears with huge earrings.

We return to the animals, to another fabulous game drive, and another. We’ve seen some of the Big Five – lion, elephant, buffalo, leopard. We’ve seen many of the Little Five – insects. Now along the dry river bed, a baboon has killed a leopard. Later vultures scavenge over a cow. We see giraffe, zebra, impala, buffalo. Rising dawns and setting suns. Then a huge male lion sits on a rock, surveying his plains. The sound of playing impala fills the air. The lion slides down his rock and walks very slowly towards them…

I’m sped from the airport by a James Bond-style driver dressed all in black. He plays New Age dolphin music, the sort that normally goes with massages and crystals. Is he getting me into the mood for the Sha Wellness Spa, the world’s first five-star macrobiotic spa, on the 50 minute drive from Valencia, Spain? Soon the spa looms like an ocean liner stranded among the Sierra Helada mountains, with the Lego tower blocks of Benidorm in the distance. Outside, one of the first of its endlessly solicitous staff welcomes me with a hot flannel. Then we enter the 28,000 square metres of white marble, water features and calm.

The clinic offers a fusion of Oriental and Western natural therapies, anti-ageing and non-invasive techniques. Sha is based on the ideas of Michio Kushi, a macrobiotics guru who believes that food is the key to health and health the route to peace. It was started by a property developer called Alfredo Bataller Parietti, after he was rid of a tumour and realised the body’s potential for curing itself with a macrobiotic diet and natural therapies.

A macrobiotic diet involves lots of grains, beans, fresh fruit and vegetables and avoids processed foods and animal fats, plus it includes the correct balance of acid and alkaline foods. If it’s good enough for Gwyneth and Madonna, I reason, it should be alright for me. Sort of.

First I’m shown round the spa. There’s a heli pad, chapel, gym, Aqua Lab (for water therapy treatments), Oxygen Bar (with bottles of oxygen to suck from while you’re waiting) and reception area with a display cabinet. Instead of Rolex watches or Dior handbags it contains soba, sea vegetables, nori flakes and spelt grains. Nearby signs indicate that the clinic offers ‘Sleep Medicine’ and ‘Anti-tobacco medicine’. Then I’m led upstairs to my suite (the spa has only suites), a Japanese-style oasis.

Next is a lunch of modern macrobiotic haute cuisine – think Heston Blumenthal with sea-weed (the chef, Pablo Montoro Fernandez trained at El Bulli). The dining room has mother-of-pearl look nightclub walls, a lotus pond, a floor of Arabesque white marble and Japanese dark wood tables. It’s also full of cashmere clad singletons treating their bodies as temples. I’m served lobster and sprouts in what I suspect is mud, followed by little black flying saucers of squid ravioli, then ice-cream decorated with beetroot crisps. The macrobiotic way is to chew each mouthful 54 times: I wonder why they don’t just serve it ready-masticated.

Afterwards, I meet the nurse for a health check in her office. I have dodgy knees (too much competitive running), a touch of eczema and sinusitis (after the flight). But broadly I’m extremely healthy plus caffeine, alcohol and nicotine-free. My aim is simply to lose a few pounds, read Wuthering Heights and go cold turkey on my BlackBerry. The nurse records my blood pressure, weight, lung capacity and fills in a health questionnaire. ‘Headaches, constipation and peeing a lot often happen when you start a macrobiotic diet,’ she warns, before adding that my weight is within normal range.

I’m to follow the spa’s Discovery programme – the price of which includes nurse and macrobiotic doctor consultations, a special diet, daily therapy (shiatsu to massage) and activities from yoga to meditation and talks. My diet will be decided after a consultation with the macrobiotic doctor. I’m anxious that I’m just going to be served minuscule portions of beans.

The next day I see Bill Tara, an American macrobiotic doctor with 45 years’ experience. Using the Oriental diagnosis of Bo-Shin, he considers the colour of my eyes, skin texture and temperature, checks my pulses and diagnoses which organs are under stress (kidneys and adrenal glands, apparently, from overworking). Bill personalises my diet which includes breakfast of miso soup and barley porridge with almond milk plus shitake mushroom tea (a Japanese medicinal tea to help the liver release toxicity) after every meal.

Over the following days, Bill gives great health talks on topics like food and science. At other times, I lie in a flotarium of Dead Sea water with illuminated stars on the ceiling (a waste of time and my head keeps banging against the edge of the pool); have a world-class massage (think magic hands and orange oil); join excellent yoga and pilates classes; and get wet in the Aqua Lab – a brilliant therapeutic water circuit with water beds and jets, pebble bath, caldarium, tepidarium and hydro pool, overgrown taps gushing water to massage your back and a Niagra Falls for pummelling the shoulders.

The rest of my hours are spent on the loo (diuretic, detoxing foods rule OK,) or getting lost looking for loos. Luckily there are four ladies’ lavatories by the restaurant. I’m taken aback when I get a call from reception saying, ‘You must come down for wee’, but it turns out they only want to weigh me.

Recently Bill busted some Sha-ites at the nearby Ben and Jerry’s bar but I follow the programme exactly and, to my surprise, I don’t feel hungry between meals. My Discovery meals are sensible portions of things like carrot soup, beautifully presented vegetables, tofu and barley followed by red fruit jelly. Or leek soup, salmon tartare, quinoa and seaweed then more fruit jelly. I don’t feel bloated afterwards, I have no cravings and feel, if not virtuous, then certainly almost virtuous.

A highlight of the week is a cookery demo with Marlene MacMillan (who spent a week teaching Rupert Everett to cook). Talk amongst the participants is about people who sleep on magnetic beds, how the Japanese don’t even have a word for menopause (because, being macrobiotic, they don’t suffer its effects) and how miso cleanses toxicity from the body. Meanwhile words like ‘shoyu’, ‘tempe’ and ‘daikon’ are bandied, and I learn to make a mean miso soup.

The demo is interrupted for me when I’m called to a colonic irrigation appointment. I had mistakenly thought that the clinic was offering a radical new treatment: a colonic done with coffee. And by this stage, I’m happy to get caffeine into my body any which way but it turns out that it’s just a normal colonic – cappuccinos are only administered via enemas – and simply involves tummy massage and jets of water up your you know what. I watch food that has been chewed less than 54 times leave my body bobbing along water in a clear pipe, and afterwards feel light-headed and less gassy.

To feel any changes and gain scientifically measurable effects, a week is the minimum recommended stay at Sha but I have a good ‘taster’ in four days. If you go for longer, they can do genetic testing to check, for example, if you’re prone to obesity, and monitor things like thyroid function and cholesterol. On my last day the nurse excitedly shows that I’ve lost nearly two percent of my body fat. Then she weighs me. I’ve lost 200 grams. That works out at least £8 a gram. Even at that price, I’d go back again. I’ve learnt 50 things to do with seaweed and I’m keen to make some life changes. I realise I’ve been drawn to the macrobiotic way of thinking when I get on the plane and someone asks, ‘What’s it like in London?’ and the hostess replies, ‘Lots of grain’.

Since my return, I’ve been avoiding wheat, sugar, caffeine, dairy and my cannibalistic tendencies. Plus I had a great follow-up colonic with Caroline Shaw at the Hale Clinic. My Sha experience has left me with sparkling eyes, a glowing complexion and feeling calm. But it has also left me miserable. Now everyone tells me that that’s because I’m detoxing…