11/30 - Webb Camp - Day One - Part Four

11/29 - Webb Camp Arrival

Webb Camp really was a camp. We had to walk the last hundred meters or so, but there was our luxurious campsite with our sleeping tent, a dining tent, a cook tent and tents for the staff. Counting our guide and our driver, there were probably eight people working there so that we could explore in comfort. We've tried camping on our own before, decades ago. The air mattresses deflated, the tent blew away and our safety lantern ignited a small grass fire that was only suppressed thanks to quick action by more experienced campers at the site.

Did we mention the waterfall? Our campsite looked out over a waterfall. The dining tent had an excellent view of the waterfall. Then, exhausted from travel, we went to bed.

11/28 - Simien Mountains - Day Two - Part One

As we climbed, the country changed. It was grassland and drier. The views were spectacular. We even had a little adventure getting through a muddy patch. We walked a bit to lighten the load, That patch was a problem for others as well. Many people in Ethiopia get around by minibus, but, here, they had to stop, get out of the bus, take the baggage off the roof and help push the minibus through the mud.

We climbed even higher, and there they were, the ibex. They were huge antelope, and the males had dark beards and massive horns. The country was grassland, and dotted with lobelia, tall plants that look like some kind of palm tree. The ibex were calm, so we had some great views.

11/27 - Simien Mountains - Day Two - Part Two

11/26 - Simien Mountains - Day Two - Part Three

11/25 - Simien Mountains - Day One - Part One

We set off for the national park. We stopped by the office in Debark to pay our admission fee. Our guide knew everyone there, and they knew him. We drove to the park entrance where we picked up our guard, armed with an AK-47. We climbed higher into the park and had teasing views of one of the escarpments, a canyon wall, surprisingly green.

We took a good long walk. Our plan of working our way up from Addis Ababa at around 8000 feet to the Simien Mountains at 10000 to 12000 feet meant we were comfortable enough with the thin air for hiking. As we walked, we were surrounded by a familiar scent. We looked down. We were walking on wild thyme, a common ground cover.

We wandered a fair ways, across fields, into wooded valleys. We had spectacular views of the escarpment and the valley below. Then, there were geladas. There was an entire field of them. They didn't seem to be bothered by us, so we watched as they whole troupe ate and groomed and did the usual primate things. There were horribly cute babies and rambunctious teenagers. We felt right at home in the Simien Mountains.

11/24 - Simen Mountains - Day One - Part Two

We headed on, and there were even more spectacular views. The Simien Mountains are canyon country, but there is a lot of rainfall. Everything is lush and green, all but the steepest canyon walls.

11/23 - Simien Mountains - Day One - Part Three

Back out the lodge, we spotted an eagle perched on a tree. He or she was most cooperative, so we have a few good photographs including one in flight.

Then, we heard some commotion outside. We had visitors. A group of geladas were right outside our room. Geladas like to sleep at the base of canyons to discourage birds of prey. These were heading down and paid a call while passing our perch.

11/22 - Simien Mountain - Sunrise

11/21 - Simien Mountains - On to Limalimo

Then we headed on to the Simien Mountains. Our road quickly took us out to the countryside. We headed into the hills and quickly gained elevation. The skies turned gray. We kept on our way, through towns and through countryside. Then, as we neared Limalimo Lodge, where we would be staying, the rain burst into hail. It clattered on our windshield. The driver turned up the heat in our car.

Our lodge was welcoming. We arrived late, in time for the sunset light and the dramatic moonrise.

11/20 - Lalibella - St. Neakuto Leab Monastery

There was already a bit of a crowd at the church. One of the priests showed us a wonderful illuminated manuscript that was one of the church's treasures. Then, we joined the drummers and singers, all men. The women were in another area outside. This was a less monumental church than some of the others we had visited, but it too was carved into the earth and away from the world.

11/19 - Lalibella - Morning Drive

11/18 - Lalibella - Yemrehanna Kristos

Inside the cave was a church carved from the rock and intricately decorated. There was a group of mumies in the cave behind the church. We didn't spend long there. The church itself was beautiful, a hidden jewel cached in a unexpected setting.

11/17 - Lalibella - Church of Saint George

11/16 - Lalibella - Further Explorations

11/15 - Lalibella - Just A Few More

11/14 - Lalibella - Day One - Part One

It is hard to capture the sense of surprise and mystery at Lalibella with just a bunch of photographs. One looks down from ground level and below there is a church of church complex. Descending, one enters another world where the sky is only visible in part. The light is different. Trees grow from the ground above. The buildings are the size of cathedrals and connected by passageways.

Our guide led us around from church to church and complex to complex. We only saw part of everything. Inside each church there were murals, painted ceilings, rich fabrics, paintings and sacred artifacts. The pictures in this post and other posts from Lalibella only give a sense of what we saw.

11/13 - Lalibella - Day One - Part Two

11/12 - Lalibella - Day One - Passages

11/11 - Tigray - The Road to Axum

We had flown into Tigray at Mekele, but to get to Lalibella, we flew out of Axum. That meant getting up at dawn and seeing more of Tigray, if only out of our car window.

11/10 - Tigray - Abrahem Atsebena

It took us a while to get used to artistic style, but our guide pointed out illustrations of the story of Adam and Eve and, a common theme in Ethiopian religious art, St. George slaying the dragon. It is hard for the photographs to show just how high the ceilings are and the haunting sense of age and solidity in the interior.

11/09 - Tigray - Iglesia Johannes makata or perhaps Maryam Bahera

Consider this afternoon in Tigray. We have a GPS track of our visit to a wonderful rock hewn church, but which one? Following the GPS track and zooming in on the map reveals a landmark called Iglesia Johannes makata. Google has THREE hits on that three word sequence and about 98 if the order of the words doesn't matter. None of the links is particularly informative.

We do know, from the GPS track, that the church was north of Hawzen as are many churches in Tigray. According to the Bradt Guide, one easily accessible church - about our speed - in the area is Maryam Bahera which is noted for having as one of its treasures "an ancient Ge’ez scripture". The priest did show us a fascinating, heavily illustrated and ancient religious book written in Ge'ez, the writing system used in this part of Ethiopia, and the exterior of the church did have a picture of Mary, or Maryam.

It probably doesn't matter exactly which church we visited. It was both amazing and fascinating, an ancient space carved from living rock. One can feel both the sacredness of the space and the sense of time, neither of which can be captured all that well by a digital camera.

11/08 - Tigray - The Road From Mekele

There was a long drive from the airport to Gheralta. It was farm country and relatively dry. Various cactus like plants were cultivated as natural fences. The harvest was in. There were great stacks of grain and grain laid out for threshing. We pulled off the main road down towards what looked like nowhere. We approached a hill and were soon exploring a church, Wukro Chrikos, carved from the rock in a hillside.

The church grounds were green and peaceful. Inside the church there was a quiet sense of age. The carved walls were painted. There were signs of the fire damage from when the church was burned by Judith the Falasha and her armies. We could only peek past the curtains into the holy of holies, the most sacred part of the church. Ethiopian Christianity is one of the oldest branches of the religion and shares much with the Coptic church and, as we later learned, Jewish tradition.

We also stopped at the mosque in Negash. It was a place of refuge early in the history of Islam. The prophet sent twelve men and five women, one his daughter, to seek refuge in Ethiopia during the hegira. The mosque has endured, and has recently been remodeled with funds from the Turkish government.

Our drive was not yet over. We had a way to go, but we were already getting a sense of Tigray and of Ethiopia.

11/07 - Tigray - First Afternoon

This part of Tigray has great red rock formations, eroded and fascinating and evocative of America's southwest. Still, everything was different, the plants, the birds, the fields and the place. Korkor Lodge was beautiful and a labor of love. We settled in comfortably.

After lunch, we set out down another country road and walked across fields towards the higher region at the edge of the valley. Here was another church carved into the hillside, Maryam Papaseit Church. This was a darker church and beautifully decorated with murals. It was too dark for many photographs, but there was a powerful sense of being within the earth.

11/06 - Tigray - Birds of the First Day

11/05 - Welcome to Addis Ababa

We're staying at the Sheraton which is sort of a halfway house for people who want to immerse in Africa slowly. It is a first rate international hotel and a favorite with governments, NGOs and businesses. Unlike many luxury hotels around the world, everything works. We are able to make our room cold, dark and quiet, so we can sleep as much as our jet lag allows.

The grounds are wonderfully landscaped. The pools are at the center of a beach club popular with the international community. There is a playground and children's village. There are restaurants, bars, lounges, meeting rooms, an executive club that brews fantastic coffee, gift shops, a bank and just about any amenity that one might want without leaving the grounds.

We have managed to walk two laps of the little jogging track that runs around the grounds. The elevation is over 8000 feet, but most of our trip is higher, so we'll have to get used to the thin air as well as the eleven hour - thank you, daylight savings time - time difference. En route, we flew over the Canadian Rockies. Most of those snow capped peaks topped out near the lobby level of our hotel.

11/04 - Why are we in Vancouver?

There aren't a lot of flights to Addis Ababa from this hemisphere, and some of them only run every other day. We wanted a minimal number of stops and to avoid flying out of our way, for example, via Dubai. We chose Lufthansa which code shares its Ethiopian flights with Air Canada, United Airlines, Ethiopian Airlines and several others. It's ten plus hours to Frankfort via the polar route, then another seven hours or so to Addis Ababa, so stay tuned.