Category: Ethiopia

Today we set out for what we hoped would be a shorter drive to our next stop, Jinka but before leaving town we made sure to visit the local market which is held on Mondays and Thursdays.

The market is usually attended by four tribes from the area, the Hamer, Ari, Konso and Benna. They sell honey, fresh vegetables, shoes, cloths and of course the tourist souvenirs which overall were of very good quality but you still wonder if they were in fact made in a factory in Adis or Chi..

About 500 metres from the main market the men have a cattle and goat market. Very few women attend this, they aren’t really allowed but women who have been widowed are allowed to attend and continue the family business.

The area is a huge sand/dirt field with several groups of tribes with their animals milling about.

At the animal weigh station the men try to get their goats into slings and then hung on scales to determine their weight and asking price. The goats, although fairly docile animals don’t particularly like to be strung up.

The drive to Jinka was scenic and chaotic as usual. The road is good for a short distance and then littered with potholes. If you aren’t negotiating the pot holes then you’re negotiating the constant herds of cattle and goats.

Before checking into our hotel in Jinka we paid a short visit to a local Ari village. The day had been very rainy so the walking paths were quite muddy and slippery. The village was quite spread out so we only spent a short time visiting.

Today was a very interesting day. We were originally supposed do a two hour boat trip on lake Chamo to see crocodiles and hippos. After such a long day yesterday we had absolutely no desire to spend another 10 hours travelling so we ditched the boat ride (we’ve seen many hippos and crocs in our travels) and headed directly to Konso.

We arrived at 10:30 am and had three hours to relax before heading out to visit Gamule Konso Village, another UNESCO World Heritage site. The village is approximately 800 years old and is known for their wooden statues known as wakas which are erected in honor of dead heroes and respected members of the community. The village is circled and fortified by stone walls, some up to 5 metres tall. The Gamule village has three circular walls. As the community grew outside of the original wall, another wall was built to encircle the outside communities. It was an incredible site to see.

Before ending our day we visited Gesergio Rocks, also known as natural New York village. Erosion is an amazing artist.

I forgot to mention in my previous post that the roads, so far, in Ethiopia are almost as bad as those in Madagascar and Zambia, sometimes just as bad so travelling relatively short distances takes time but the scenery is beautiful so it makes up for the bad roads.

After our hippo cruise we departed Hawassa and backtracked through Shashanane and made our way to Senkelle Swayne’s Hartebeest Sanctuary where we picked up a park ranger and went looking for the Swayne’s Hartebeest which is endemic to Ethiopia. The sanctuary is 58 sq.km and consists of wide open grasslands. The sanctuary, located in the Oromia region is dedicated to the protection of the Hartebeest which at one time numbered 3,000 animals but has dwindled to about 800 due to poaching.

After a total of about 10 hours of driving covering less than 300 km we reached Arda Minch just after sunset. Arba Minch is bordered by mountains and is home to two of Ethiopia’s largest Rift Valley lakes, Lake Chamo and Lake Abaya. Our lodge was perched high on a hillside and had amazing views of the lakes and the distant Nechisar National Park. We were disappointed we missed the view of the lakes with the sunset behind us but we did get sunrise views in the morning.

Our original plan was to take a two hour boat trip to view the abundant crocodile population in Lake Chamo but we have seen many crocs so decided to cut this portion out so we could hopefully arrive at our next destination before sunset and with some time to unwind from what we knew would be another long day of driving. It’s not just the condition of the roads that are a challenge. Some roads aren’t too bad but the roads are used as a walkway for herds of cattle and flocks goats and there are literally thousands of goats and cattle that block every step of the way along your journey.

 

We arrived into Addis Ababa on the 26th, had a snack and had an early evening.

The next day we prepped for the next 9 days of driving, relaxed a little and then headed out for some very excellent traditional food and entertainment at a restaurant nearby. The food and entertainment was superb and we were looking forward to more good food throughout the rest of our journey.

Before hitting the road in the morning we needed to get a SIM card and data. When we arrived in Addis we figured we had all day Sunday to look after this and save time on Monday when we were heading off to Hawassa.

The only telecom provider in Ethiopia is Ethio Telecom (government owned) and they are not open on Sundays. Damn!

We were picked up by our Driver, Sophie, at 8:45 Monday morning and off we went to the Ethio Telecom office to get our communications lifeline organized. It was your typical government run organization and after 45 minutes of discussing our needs, a photo of me for their records, passport info and only 4 days of data (data plans work from the 1st of the month to the last day of the month, not for one month from the day you start). I left the office with 1Gb of data and was assured their network was 4G.

Traffic was horrendous and this city of 7 million is very spread out and suffering the same auto pollution and traffic issues (chaos) as most African cities. It was about 10:45 when we finally hit the outskirts of town.

We had three stops planned before our final stop for the night in Hawassa.

Tiya, an ancient stelae (grave marker) site and UNESCO World Heritage Site. Adadi Maryam, an ancient rock-hewn church and Melka Kunture, a prehistoric tool making site.

Luck wasn’t on our side. Melka Kunture was closed for “renovations” and a large funeral was being held at Adadi Maryam so we couldn’t visit that site so we had a short 1/2 hour visit at Tiya.

We arrived at our hotel just before sunset. We had a very late lunch so after we checked in we had a beer and some nuts, skipped dinner and decided to crash early after a long day of driving.

Hawassa is located on the shores of Lake Hawassa and our hotel room balcony had a nice sunset and early morning views of the lake.

The next morning we drove a short distance to the local fish market to check out the catch of the day then proceeded to a boat launch for a one hour “hippo viewing” tour on lake Hawassa, saw a few hippo heads and then headed back to start our journey to Arba Minch, our next stop.

Wow, our seven weeks in Madagascar sure flew by but we are looking forward to our next and last three weeks exploring Ethiopia before heading home to Vancouver. We departed Antananarivo October 26th for a 4 1/2 hour flight to Addis Ababa. Tomorrow we head off for the southern Ethiopia part of our travels.