Ethiopia

Well it wasn’t really downwards, more upwards into the mountains. We crossed the border, some 10 metres away from the Sudan side. We got our temperature taken and a lecture on Ebola from a doctor outside the passport control. We had a few questions… does Ethiopia have Ebola? No. Does Sudan have Ebola? No. So why are we getting our temperature taken? Preventative measures. And everyone else who seems to be passing through unchecked? He just shrugged. Oh well, at least they’re doing something?!?

We walked through Metema, a town lining the road from the border to the bus station. We had read on blogs and lonely planet guide that it was best not to stay on the Ethiopian side the night we arrived by the border as it was a bit seedy and a few muggings had been reported. As we wandered through the street in the early morning we could smell the empty beer bottles being piled up from the random nightclubs. After being in a sober state for the best part of 2 weeks, I was looking forward to a drink already! I had done half of dry January without even knowing it!

Gonder

We managed to pile onto the second minibus to Gonder, after nearly being squashed by the mass of people trying to cram onto the first one. Completely different to Sudan, we didn’t have to wait around for people to join the bus, there were more than enough people for each journey. The 4 hour drive felt like forever, but the view was incredible of the mountains and huts around every corner. As we climbed higher, we had to stop several times to avoid hitting goats, cows, chickens, donkeys and children. Finally making it to Gonder, we climbed out of the bus and reclaimed our bags from the roof, having been sat on 5 bags of coals which were picked up along the way. We bid farewell to a guy from Addis who had been on the same journey as us since Khartoum and stretched our legs from the cramped journey.

We worked our way round the town using our 5 year old lonely planet as best we could to finally come across a double room with bathroom, Wifi, TV and breakfast. We fell into the luxury of it like a duck to water. And after the awful bus journey to the border I was determined to get a good night sleep… for the next 3 days (minimum).

After been covered up in the last 2 countries with my ‘sexy’ travel trousers (you know the ones that zip off to make shorts) and long sleeved tops, I was relieved to find that the local women were wearing t-shirts, short skirts and no head scarves. As much as I wanted to be respectful and cover up in countries where deemed appropriate, in this heat it’s just unbearable. So t-shirt and skirt on, we went for a wonder round the town.

That evening we found a restaurant that served the most amazing mango and avocado juices, and pizzas the size of the table. Frankly I could have gotten excited about anything that didn’t bare the resemblance of falafel! I was going to like it here.

The atmosphere in this country was just so different from 4 hours down the road to Sudan. People were more relaxed, the community felt closer, the women integrated at the coffee shops with the men, it felt more like we were living in the same century. The views were also incredible and it was nice to watch the sunset from our balcony as it went down behind the mountains.

Unfortunately there is a water shortage in the city, evident from the lack of nearby water sources, and after near on 2 days without a shower from the long journey we had just had, we were desperate. I couldn’t face another wet wipe wash. Fortunately the spa downstairs had showers that were working, and it was hot water! The small things in life! With Ethiopia’s notorious 13 months of Summer, I can just imagine how bad it gets over the hottest months with a lack of water, poor guys.

 

After a well deserved lie in, we had a potter round the other side of town, picking up some amazing mangos along the way. A number of wedding parties whizzed round town in their cars, waving flowers and sitting out the windows whilst the drivers beeped in tune. Outside the church the wedding parties gathered round the bride and groom jumping up and down and singing. The atmosphere was electric, and everyone stopped to watch on, taking it all in. We had a wander to the North side and stopped for a beer at sunset at the Goha hotel- one of the hotspots for an evening drink. The view was incredible as it revealed the vast size of the town and the mountains enveloping the landscape. Through a gap between the mountains, we could see for what seemed like forever away. It was breathtaking, and the music pouring out of the hotel from a wedding party (possibly the same from earlier) just added to the mood. Even the mosquitos looked like they were dancing away.



Fasilada's baths

The next morning we awoke at 6am to a guy on a speaker. Call to prayer? No… it was confusing, I didn’t know what it was, and 3 hours later I still couldn’t figure it out as he spoke, shouted and sung, like he was a cockerel letting everyone in town know that it was the morning. Perhaps it was a Christian mass, it was a Sunday after all. We decided to have a look at the Royal Enclosure which was right in the middle of the town. It contained several castles and palaces dating back to the 1600s. It was pretty cool as we clambered through the ruins around the enclosure, unaware that some sand flies were feasting on my left leg, ouch! Included in the ticket was a visit to the Fasilada’s Baths, a large pool used for religious ceremonies back in the day. As we wondered around it alone, in the quiet of the town it was incredible to see, with a building taking centre place which was thought to be a Royal residence. Snake like tree roots lined the edge of the pool and the entrances, giving it a mystical feel. Once a year apparently they fill the bath with water from a river some distance away (so far in fact it takes a month to fill), for the Timkat celebration. And all the locals jump in, with laughter and shouts filling the area. I tried to imagine it, and the chaos of it just made me smile.

Simien mountains

Gelada baboons

So  many kids getting water

The following day we got up early to take a bus journey North to Kossoye, a viewpoint we were told was incredible and that you could see some Geleda baboons from there. These were monkeys which you could only see in the North. And it didn’t disappoint. It was definitely a highlight so far; the mountains stretched for miles, and it was a moment that just wouldn’t reflect itself in any photo as well as standing there and taking it all in. We were standing outside an eco-lodge that had recently been set up by a woman called Jasmine, an Ethiopian lady with a strong American accent, adopted as a result of her husband Ed from Washington. A lovely couple who had lived together in south Ethiopia for 8 years and just recently moved up North. Ed filled us in on all the stuff that he thought we’d never hear from tour guides- about how bad malaria was in the south, the ‘bandit’ road from Ethiopia to Kenya, and how you feel when you get typhoid fever. After that confidence building talk, we went for a walk around the mountains with Kenaw, a teenage boy from the area that Jasmine looks after. He was on his school holidays and I think she wanted him to practice his English so sent him on with us. He was a great guide and took us to some amazing viewpoints, and pointed out gelada baboons from a distance. What incredible eyesight! I initially thought they were rocks from that distance until a couple moved. Luke also couldn’t spot them, and in his boldness (ahem cockiness), he told Kenaw ‘no, I don’t think that’s them, but those might be…,’ pointing to some dots further to the right. Kenaw’s frank reply was ‘no… those are goats.’ And we both burst out laughing at Luke. Leave it to the experts! To get closer, we had at least an hour’s walk, but we powered on, emerging from the shrubbery at the other end, passing some amazing plants including some with the most incredible thorns on their leaves. The baboons up close were amazing, and every now and then there were high pitched screams as they had little fights (the baby baboon seemed to start them all). Around 40 of them, they didn’t seem frightened of us so close by despite hearing that the local children we had just met tending to the cattle usually throw stones at them. We hitched a ride back to town and decided to enjoy a couple beers back at the Goha hotel, a reward for a 3 hour trek! Don’t mind if I do.

The next day was a rest day, a much needed lie in, but we still managed to have a walk around town. Apart from the obvious tourist cafés, sleek hotels and big banks lining the road, there were vast contrast everywhere of the rich enjoying a juice, beer and a westernised meal compared to the small children in ragged clothes shouting ‘you, you’ ,’money money’ at you. On top of this it seems that Wednesdays and Fridays, being the countries fasting days (only veggie food eaten) meant the beggars were out in full force liming the streets. I assume the Orthodox church preaches to the locals about giving to the poor more so on these days. It was obviously difficult to see, but reminded me of India and the massive divide between the rich and the poor. There are so many children around, if you give some money to one of them, about 20 would flood round you all at once demanding the same. We had to pick and choose our moments carefully!

Bahir Dar

Injera

We took a bus the next day to Bahir Dar, a town on the corner of Lake Tana, known for its boat trips to the monasteries round the lake and the hippos around the outlet of the Nile. The minibus was pretty good, and I managed to get a bit of kip, not having to share my seat with a goat or someone throwing up, as is often the case. On arrival, we quickly found a hotel for a decent price but unfortunately didn’t have one with a shared bathroom, only an en-suite. Now, I might sound like I’m trying to save money here, but I’m not. I’m trying to save myself from mosquito bite number 20, and 21, and 22…you get the picture. Rooms with attached bathroom tends to have more mosquitos due to the standing water. Evident from the room we eventually took, with about 40 mosquitos which I could swear I heard saying ‘you, you’ ‘food, food’. After swatting the life out of the room and turning the pinkest of walls into a polka dot mess of squished mosquitos, we mounted the mosquito net as best we could. Luke decided that after a 4 hour journey that we were up for a good walk, one that I told him would take 4-5 hours in the morning and would be much cooler weather to do it in. But his eagerness to find a hippo had us heading out in the peak of the heat that day. 4 hours later, and to no avail, we headed home with no hippos being spotted. We did however see some amazing birds which made the journey worthwhile… just. Taking advantage of fasting Wednesday, we ordered a mix of everything which comes on injera. Injera is their staple, like a pancake, a bit like a dosa in Asia with a bitter taste. Not great on its own, but with the variety of food they place on top, it was delicious. Next fasting day on Friday… unfortunately it’s rare for a restaurant to serve this everyday of the week, just the fasting days.

The following morning we headed out at sunrise, on another of Luke’s hippo seeking journeys, Apparently, it’s best to spot them in the morning or late in the evening. I think we were a bit too late unfortunately. So back to the hotel it was for Luke to get a bit of shut eye whilst I had breakfast and by my third cup of tea, was buzzing about the rest of Ethiopia I had just planned from the lonely planet!

papyrus boat

Later that day we took a stroll down to the lake and did some more bird watching, spotting some amazing hornbills and ibis, and some tiny birds with tails a foot long. Some of them also sounded like a pack of monkeys in the trees. Tomorrow we’re hoping to catch a boat to see the monasteries round the lake, the outlet of the Nile and for the love of God, hopefully some hippos so that Luke will stop banging on about them. It seems despite a guy saying that a fisherman was killed by one just last year, Luke is adamant that we spot one on the river… in a tin boat… in the middle of the largest lake in Ethiopia! I’m just glad he didn’t suggest taking a papyrus boat that the locals use; I’m sure the hippo would just snap it in half using just a toe!

So, up early in the morning we headed down to the lake. Running too late for breakfast, but Luke didn’t seem to care- there was only one thing on his mind… you guessed it, hippos! We headed off around the lake with a group of people, some of whom were Ethiopian holiday makers and others tourists. It was beautiful and really calming, something that I needed after discovering bite number 40 this morning, I mean, where are these bloody things coming from, I can’t see these phantom bitters! We stopped off at 4 monasteries but were told before heading out that only one or two of them were worth seeing, so we went into the 2^nd one which was pretty cool! They’re wooden huts full with paintings on the walls and apparently have manuscripts locked inside. Then it was off to the Nile outlet, famous for hippo spotting, but usually just before sunrise and around sunset. As luck would have it, we managed to spot 3 hippos! And everyone on our boat was aware considering Luke belted ‘HIPPO’ from the depths of his lungs before anyone noticed them. Finally, we could move on from this hippo obsession, but oh dear… his camera battery ran out before he could take even one picture. I’m only going to charge him 5birr for each photo he steals (apparently that’s the standard price when you take pictures of the tribes further south), only fair right?

After getting off the boat, we decided to head for a late lunch/early dinner. So we went to the same place we went on Wednesday for our fasting food. We ordered 2 of the fasting dishes and the waitress ran off. Luke was pretty certain he heard her shout PASTA before she left. So on her return with the beers, we clarified what we wanted, to which she said there wasn’t any fasting food. What did she think we ordered in the first place? So I ordered a different Ethiopian veggie dish and Luke spaghetti with vegetables (which always turned out to be carrots and cabbage). Again, she shouted PASTA and ran off. As we decided to just see what turned up, a waiter emerged from inside and said there wasn’t any bread available for the side of our 2 spaghetti with meat! We clarified to him what we wanted and he returned to the kitchen. 5 minutes later, we were presented with… you guessed it, 2 plates of spaghetti with meat. After our 4^th order, our food finally emerged and we did wonder whether the waitress had spat in our food considering the scowl on her face. It seems she was insistent on us eating, what’s it called… PASTA!

Up at 4am, 10pm their time (I’ll come back to that), we packed up and headed for the bus. Not before spotting a second bedbug, which had me believe that pretty much all the bites I’ve had so far are from these nasty little buggers! Hopefully not carrying them around.

colours for paintings

The bus was the sleekest bus we’ve been on so far, and we’d booked it for safety reasons as the minibuses go way too fast and aren’t always licenced. Unfortunately, whatever bus you seem to travel on in Africa, sleek or shabby, there are always going to be those weak stomachs clicking their fingers for some plastic bags. Ewww. It was a ten hour journey so we just had to suck it up and hope that they didn’t run out of bags! The journey took us through incredible scenery- local villages, long drawn out green landscapes, valleys with the Nile cutting through, and unfortunately the odd accident. We spotted two overturned lorries (one recent as it didn’t look like the sacks of goods had been removed yet), one car turned on its side and what I believe was a child who had been run over that morning. With the latter, there were locals on the side of the road, and as our bus slowly moved round and everyone was peering out to see what had happened, they all started making the sign of the cross. It was awful to see, but I’m sure with minibuses and trucks darting down the road in the pitch black, it happens more often than I’d like to think.

Addis Ababa

We arrived in Addis Ababa at a reasonable time in the afternoon and immediately booked our ticket out for two days time on the same coach operator to Harar.

Trying to catch a minibus east to a cluster of hotels seemed to be more difficult than any other search I’ve had travelling. Although most people spoke broken English, it seemed that road names weren’t something that helped them get about- something our lonely planet had forewarned us of, but gave us no solution. After one minibus trying to charge us double the price of a taxi, another having boarded to just turn instantly in the wrong direction and several just rejecting us completely, we actually ended up in the car of a nice young man who was headed in that general direction. We couldn’t find the street we were looking for, but an Aussie/Ethiopian girl pointed us towards a cheap, clean guesthouse she was staying at and made sure that we weren’t charged a ‘faranji’ price!

Addis is known for a bit of robbery and bag snatching, so well aware of this, on our way to dinner, Luke caught the reflection of a man in his 50s in a baseball cap close on his tail. Luke turned around and looked straight at him. This guy was so indiscreet that he stopped as well, rather than just continuing to walk past. And he just stood there! It was quite comical actually, with the guy looking like he’d just remembered that he wanted to cross the road. With another spaghetti dinner accompanied by good old doxycycline, to bed it was… and hopefully no bedbugs this time. With all these kids asking for ‘pens’ when you walk down the street, I could just give them one and have them play ‘join the dots’ on my legs- it would keep them occupied for hours!

With only one day in Addis, we were keen to get to two museums in particular. One was the National museum which held the skeleton of Lucy, a 3.5 million year old little woman. And I mean little- she would have made my mum look like a giant (sorry Mum). It was a pretty cool museum for all the ageing skeletons it held in the basement and the stories of how they came about them. The other museum was the former palace of Haile Selassie, the Ethnological museum, which showed Ethiopian life from birth to death. It had a string of stories told to kids (including one hilarious one about a cow, an ox and a placenta, and another about a husband not realising that his wife had a vagina and thinking it was something she carried around with her?!?). Educational!

We got up at 4am to get down to the bus stop for 5.30am. We had banked on the fact that there would be no taxis around, and that if they were they’d charge us more than the price for the bus we were about to get on taking us 9 hours, so behold, a nice early morning stroll with backpacks and all for 40 minutes! Another sleek bus, but yet again, sick bags were being handed out right, left and centre, which clearly the woman behind me needed (despite pausing for a phone call midway through). The scenery was beautiful and darted around were monkeys, camels, donkeys, goats, vultures and flamingos. And in neat little rows were chat plants which the guide book mentioned to look out for. Chat and coffee are Ethiopia’s main commodities. I’m sure most of you know the effects of coffee and the need for it at that ungodly hour on Monday morning. Chat, for those of you who don’t know is a plant with hallucinogenic properties where the leaves and stems are chewed by Ethiopians on a daily basis so freely like weed in Amsterdam. Sold on the streets by kids, it’s just as common here as grabbing a cup of coffee (we just have to cross our fingers that our bus driver doesn’t want to pull over on the ride to pick some up)!

Harar

drying out chillis

We arrived in Harar mid-afternoon and we quickly found somewhere to stay. Wandering down the streets of both the old and new town, we passed donkeys, the inevitable weighing scales and shoe shiners that lined the streets, and a lot of kids shouting ‘faranji’ at us. One girl about 10 years old who I’d have to give an Oscar to (not for acting but for best comedy), decided to walk in front of us and pretend to have a fit. She collapsed, with the grace of a Disney princess and then started to foam (ahem, salivate) at the mouth. Good effort for continuing to stay on the floor until we were nearly out of sight though… commitment to the job! That evening we made it to the main event, the reason we bussed it up 9 hours… hyena feeding time! As has been tradition since the 1950s, two groups of men have hand fed hyenas on the outskirts of the old town. It was thought to have been done to keep their stomachs full so that they don’t go looking for little children and their livestock. But the tradition has lived on, although something tells me it’s now more to do with the money they collect off of people to watch!


hyena

We approached a clearing where a couple of cars had their headlights on, and we could make out two hyenas lying down. With howls in the background from local boys drawing another one in, it was quite an eerie night. Then a tourist bus arrived, full of British ‘faranjis’ and we knew the show was on… people to entertain now, paying customers! The men fed them bits of meat from sticks that they held out or put in their mouths. And you could join in too! You could even have one crawl up your back. So of course Luke jumped at the opportunity to feed them on a stick, whilst I just watched from the side-lines. Call me a wuss, but I don’t think I want to chance it with one of the strongest jaws on the planet! Plus, seeing a hyena nearly mistake a woman’s earning for a piece of hanging meat was quite enough to put me off (and I didn’t want to put my rabies vaccination to the test). 



Cave living

The next day we had a walk around the markets, so vibrant and loud it reminded me of India. All the women smiling at us and the kids shouting the inevitable ‘you, you’. We took a stroll up the hill to take in a view of the town in the afternoon with vultures circling above us. We came across a rock face where people had set up a home in where there were holes in it. At one spot, there was a door with a fire going on outside, and a guy said we could have a peep inside. Low and behold there were several people in there watching TV, with a stereo in the background and coffee pots brewing. They even invited us inside for a coffee, but we politely declined! It’s the kind of den you imagined when you were a kid, but less coffee and chat, and more sweets and fizzy drinks to go with it!

We had an extra day to kill before our bus out of town, so we decided to take a one hour bus trip to the next town, Dire Dawa. We crossed our fingers that we would last the journey as the minibus tore through bends round the mountains. Minibuses are usually what we try to avoid for longer journeys due to their overloading of people, their need for speed and where overtaking is a religion. Having made it safely, we treated ourselves to an Indian curry and then strolled around the markets, which were full of all sorts of spices and vegetables, and table football!

Flamingos

The little devils

We caught another minibus back towards Harar that afternoon, but not before stopping at a lake we had passed on the way, to try and get some pictures of the flamingos. We tried to pass through some farmers’ fields and within 5 minutes had gained some followers… in the form of about 30 children. They just followed us for ages, posing for photos every now and then, and not one asked for money. After getting some shots of the flamingos near the water’s edge, we started to head back towards the main road. And slowly but surely I could see these little nodes popping out of all 30 children’s heads… little devil horns! As one was tugging on my watch constantly to give it to him, and they all started pulling at our clothes (my biggest concern being that one of them was going to pull my trousers down), and one started to try unzipping Luke’s bag as best he could. Oh and did I forget the poo lobbing that seemed such a regular game for them when it came to ‘faranjis’, well the back of Luke’s head won’t forget for a while (at least it wasn’t a fresh one!). We hurried back to the main road whilst a local man saw the poo flying and threw a stone at them making them scatter like crazy. With a silent nod of thanks, we swiftly found a minibus and didn’t even bat an eyelid about being overcharged for the journey- just get us out of here!!! It was one of those moments where it actually makes the journey a lot more interesting (if that’s the word for it), and I’m sure that Luke will add it to his blog as well, as soon as the brain damage from the poo to the head settles!

Lake Ziway



Chat market

After a 3^rd night of ‘water is coming’, we thought it was best to leave our hotel the next day and head off to the lakes. We picked Lake Ziway, one of the many lakes forming the rift valley lakes which run through the continent for 4000km which will eventually split it one day. The lake was beautiful and we found a room off a courtyard with nobody else staying there. It was basic but clean and we were just in awe of running water coming out the shower- the small things!

We headed towards the lake and found what we were looking for- a tonne of Marabou storks, known as the bird only a mother could love… and Luke apparently! Every minute he was pointing them out…’ in that tree’, ‘and that one’, ‘and over there’. Yes, they were everywhere, there wasn’t anywhere they weren’t! They’re absolutely hideous birds, with old looking faces and a massive hanging pink neck, but somehow they looked majestic in the air. We saw masses of them in the evening being fed scraps by the local fishermen… catfish heads everywhere!

We felt like we were in paradise with a comfy bed, good food and did I mention the running water? But before we knew it, it was time to move on to the Bale mountains.

Bale Mountains

We jumped on a big bus to Shashemene (a transit town) and on the journey we had to slow down to pass a fairly recent road accident of two trucks. Although the drivers weren’t there, the extent of the accident was so severe, I can’t imagine either survived- both the fronts were completely totalled and the loads were scattered across the road.

Well that really sets your heart going, and you’re mentally driving for the bus driver the rest of the way ‘no, don’t overtake that, you’ll never make it…’.

Bushback

Safe on to Shashemene , we boarded another bus to Dinshu and waited for it to fill. After an hour, we were ready to go- adults, children, chickens and all. We drove through some amazing green landscape as we rose up through the hills to 3100m. We got off at the town, well I say town, it was really just the main road lined with about 40 homes/shops/restaurants on either side. There were two hotel choices- shabby and really shabby. We decided on shabby, and after some overpriced pasta it was clear we were in the middle of nowhere when the town’s electricity went off. Trying to put a mosquito net up in the pitch black, two long bus journeys, and cold pasta isn’t something we had in mind for Valentine’s day! However the stars more than made up for it, I’ve never seen anything like it, it was like they all came out to wish us a happy Valentine’s day, and I mean ALL of them- they just filled the sky as far as we could see.

Colobus monkey

Warthog

The next day, we went to the National Park and decided on just doing our own trek around park headquarters. Apparently you could see all the wildlife there apart from the Ethiopian wolf without a guide or an overnight trek, so off we went. And it was only 5 minutes down the path that we saw bushback deer and black and white colobus monkeys bouncing through the trees. After a few hours trekking around, we saw nyala (large horned deer), a tonne of deer, and a whole family of warthogs! It was pretty cool, and on our way out one of the guides said we were lucky to see the monkeys and nyala! We went for a walk in the other direction of the national park from the way our bus had come from shashemene the day before and ran into some more warthogs, deer and some baboons. Well, the baboons were huge things, and were lined up by the road and ran at the buses every time they went through, most likely hoping for scraps. Oh dear, they saw us coming and started walking towards us… so back we turned and walked as fast as we could back to the little civilisation that lay at Dinshu. We actually ran into some ‘faranjis’ back in town; a German and an American. Both actually working in the town for the last 5 months as an NGO and a teacher. The American teacher planning on staying there for 2 years in that little town! Hats off to her, I don’t think I’d be able to do that! Another early night listening to a mixture of Ethiopian music and Enrique Iglesias whether we liked it or not, pumping from shabby’s adjoined restaurant, we were heading out tomorrow. Hopefully to a shower- this one made Harar’s bucket shower look good, it didn’t even have that here… just a tap.

 

We were told it was difficult to get a minibus from Dinshu back to Shashemene, and that it was easier to go even further back for about an hour on a bus to get one direct from there. Hmmm… adding on a couple of hours to a bus journey seemed counter productive. So we strolled further up the road and flagged down the first minibus that passed us. We got a seat straight away! Well, it wasn’t really a seat, more like a stool big enough for one arse cheek for me, and a little wedge behind the passenger seat for Luke. Three hours later, one numb bum and a hunch back from trying to avoid the girl behind me throwing up all over me, we arrived in Shashemene midday, waiting for the next local bus onwards to Awasa, only half an hour away. And what was that we joined, a queue?? Yes, for this bus, and this one only, there was an orderly queue! Probably the only queue I’m ever going to see in Africa.

Awasa

Multi-tasking

We arrived I’m Awasa, a town positioned next to another of the rift valley lakes. The capital of the south, its streets were lined with palm trees, paths were clean, and the atmosphere relaxed. We checked in to a room with actual running water, not just any water…HOT water! We ended up using this as a base for 4 nights to plan the rest of Africa with our lonely planets. The towns, beaches and wildlife ahead seemed so incredible, it was amazing to think we were going to be in all of those places!

We decided to head down to the lake to check out the fish market. By market, I mean the shore lined with several boats with nets clumped on top, with people on the banks creating piles of fish heads, guts and actual ‘produce’ which I can only describe as muddy covered slithers of fish ready to buy immediately. Fresh hey? We hiked up Tabour Hill. The view of the Lake was incredible and the waters so clear, apart from the marabou storks lining the banks of the fish market. Yes, more marabou storks, eagerly pointed out by their number one fan… Luke. Reaching the top of the hill, we saw groups of people all seated, clapping hands and a few amen being shouted. Oh, and people getting the evil spirits taken out of them and fainting. Time to get back to reality… and an avocado juice in town, so back down we headed!!

Marabou stork....the infamous!

We spent one day in Wondo Genet, a town about an hour from Awasa. It was meant to have hot springs there. We decided to try and walk the 3kms to the springs, and with my Duke of Edimgburgh knowledge of 1km=20 minutes walking, I thought… easy! Turns out our lonely planet was a bit misleading and it meant 3kms from the next town Wando Washa. So 6kms into a 12km walk to Wanda Washa, it was time to hail a tuk-tuk. Finally getting there, the springs were now more of a communal swimming pool than natural anymore, with several bus loads of holiday makers making the most of the cool water in the basking heat. A little bit jealous and annoyed I didn’t bring my bikini, but then again, I didn’t want to be stared at by 50 guys looking at my ‘pale skin’.

We were planning on taking buses all the way from Ethiopia to Kenya, which from where we were in Awasa, down to Nairobi, would take 5 days of buses and trucks (standing up in the back). The border crossing has had its fair share of tribal fights in the past, not to mention the banditry. Not more than a few years ago, buses used to travel the first section of the crossing in Kenya in convoys, speeding down the roads to avoid being targeted. Now it’s not considered necessary, but banditry still causes problems every now and then. It wasn’t a few months ago before we left for Egypt that the news hit the headlines of a bus being pulled over in Kenya with Al Shahaab, a terrorist organisation, pulling people off and asking them to read the Qur’an. If they couldn’t they were shot, and even some Somalian’s tried to object and were shot trying to defend the Christians. It’s so hard to believe that such brutality and disregard for human life is just around the corner from such welcoming friendly people, with both Ethiopia and Kenya being a pretty easy going mix of Muslims and Christians. But the news had already made us start thinking about this stretch of the journey as the one that we’d have to pay close attention to nearer the time.

After much thought, we decided on flying from Addis Ababa to Nairobi, saving us 5 days and deep vein thrombosis! It was time that would come in handy later, but mostly it was the safety aspect- we didn’t fancy getting robbed or into any other danger to save a few quid.

Back to Addis Ababa

So after one long evening of trying to book the flights using some hotel’s WiFi that kept on cutting out so much that I thought I had bought them twice, we headed back up to the capital the next day. We managed to hop on a big bus the whole 6 hours back, whilst watching the conductors chew their way through several bags of chat. Luckily the driver didn’t seem too interested!

I took in the scenery, knowing that this was going to be my last day in Ethiopia- little thatched huts lining the roads, fields recently harvested, lakes full of bird life, cows and donkeys crossing the roads at will, mountains in the background, kids running round barefoot, street vendors dotted along the roads, and of course the inevitable marabou storks!

I was going to miss it. Everything except the bed bugs that is! I think I’ve had 60 odd bites in the last 3 weeks, and I think only 5 of them were actually mosquitos! And god only knows why I’m at 60 and Luke has had none to date? Something in my blood perhaps?

So it was a flight to Kenya for my birthday. A quick dash through security and we were boarded. Apparently on a 2 hour flight you get a full on meal and complementary alcohol! Happy birthday to me! And then two stewardesses turned up with some pink some champagne and chocolate cake and started signing happy birthday at me!!! Thanks Luke, highly embarrassing, but I will eat and drink the goods none the less… can’t say no to that.

The views were incredible, turning from bright green to desert landscape and revealing all the rift valley lakes we had visited. And touch down… goodbye Ethiopia!

Oh yes, I mentioned earlier that I’d explain Ethiopian time. First of all, their clocks are different. Their day starts with the sun (or 6am at least). So our 6am is their 12 o’clock, our 7am their 1 o’clock and so on. They don’t use am or pm, just ‘in the morning/evening’. Very confusing when organising buses! Also, according to the Coptic calendar there are 12 months of 30 days and a 13^th month of 5/6 days. Making it 2007 here! Oh to be young and a fresher again…


 Total spend £235 (£9.90 per day)