you, you, you,you,you,you!!!!!!

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Took us days to cross into Ethiopia, going through semi arid desert landscapes and passing through frontier towns Marsabit and Moyale in Kenya. We have to pick up 2 armed guards to protect us as we drive towards the border town of Moyale. Immigration processing was a bit slow and a laugh and a half for all of us, after getting stamped you go to this next person who manually writes infos from the passport, when it came to occupation he spells almost all wrong, he writes what he thinks sounds like and so lab tech came to be "lap take", we just let it be so we can get to it and leave! Srove through a very green countryside, rain is threatening, cold and a bit windy, we found a bush camp amidst dense bushes, the greens look good against the red clay soil, immediately the locals came and watched us set up then left us alone after awhile, a herd of camels came through and threatened to step on our tents but nevr happened thank god. Another bout of migraine as i try to take a photo of the camels, I peek through the lens and soon enough I started seeing spots again, went to bed early due to this. the rest stayed a while in the campfire.

Next day drove to the town of Sashemene where ther is a hot spring, we stayed in a hotel for the night called Souht Spring Hotel, it was a crappy hotel but nice to chill out and have a dew beers at the local bars, that night Chrissy was on a mission to find Tej, a local honey wine, Helen had it earlier, but it turns out at night they dont sell it as they have to make it and only available during the day, we searched high and low even attempted to bribe the loclas to no avail. We went back to the bar and got drunk with St.George beers and Dashen. the hot springs was full of locals, 2 pools one mdium hot the other very hot, there is also a pipe shower coming from the spring and it is extremely hot, but that's the only way we could clean ourselves after days of no bath.

From there we drove to Addis Ababa the capital aout 250kms. We stayes at Hotel Itaigue(cant spell) an old historic place, our room was large but only one bed for me and Craig good thing it was very big. It was cold and rainy in Addis. The next day we try to sort out visa for the last 2 countrie, the Egyptian embassy is closed due to protest from the Eritreans blocking the embassy so we try again the next day, the Sudanese visa can only applied for once we have the Egyptian visa, so we just filled up forms, for Americans 150US, 60US for others. Took a taxi to Edna Mall in center of town to see movies to pass the time by, we saw Panda Kung Fu and Hancock. Across from the mall is a Coptic church with some ceremony going on, something to do with St. John the Baptist i think, lots of people with colorful umbrellas and white garbs walking in and out of the area. Back to the hostel that night we had dinner at the Italian restaurant called Castelli, very good food but a bit expensive. Brad pitt's photo is on the wall with the owner, he must have gone here when they adpted their kid.Every time we get out of the hostels, some locals follow us and try to talk to us and sell something, quite annoying and wont let up one of them i have an altercation with and gave him a stare, i got annoyed as he keeps interrupting me when i talk to the guys, later he told Chris he was scared of me because he thought i can do karate, and so Chris added i work out and can kick his ass. That did not keep him from harassing the others though. Also if you wonder what the title of this blog meant, this is what we hear all the time from the locals especially the kids, at first it was funny then got too irritating as they dont let up, us on a big truck passing through villages yells of you you you everywhere, we started countering and doing the same chants to them, they stop for a moment then go on again.

Culture day the next day went to visit Lucy at the National Museum then the Holy trinity church to see the Haille Sellassie tomb and another museum next to it. This we did after filling up the Egyptian visa forms, then lunch at Blue tops Italian restaurant which was very good. lots of good italian here. had to buy pair of flip flops as my crocs(fake) died on me. At night we decided to go the the Topia Tej Beat, a popular place where they serve the honey wine called tej, it was very sweet and a bit thick, it is an acquired taste it tastes no better than the Russian mead which i detest. The good thing about this is they served meat to line your stomach, they gave us roast goat meat, it was fabulous!!! Had pizza then back to hostel, felt nauseous, too much tej, ain't touching the thing again...

Next day our mission is to do some food shopping to be ready for the next leg had lunch at an Armenian restaurant called Alladin then bought lots of snacks and water. We had dinner at Top View restaurant, quite cheap for the good quality of food, this is the best for me here in Addis, the location is perfect as well up on top of the hill.

Ghion hotel for the day to have a swim at the big pool and they have diving boards which got Craig excited, this dud likes to jump from them, it was high so I tried the bunny jump. The water is quite cold, Chris came with us and we decided to check out the Sauna and massage as well, I was the first one to be massaged while they go to the gym to kill time as there was only on masseuse, it was a full body massage, everything off, skirting your juke box as she work on you, no happy ending though, imagine the reaction of the boys when I told them what is coming up for them, they felt molested after the session but we all had good fun, that was the boys'(Chris and Craig's) full body massage!! Afer the session off the the Chinese restaurant next door, very good, then back to hostel. it rained hard that day. for dinner off to Juventus, another italian restaurant. we also saw Happening at the Edna mall cause we are bored, the worst movie i have seen in years.....

After almost a week in Addis sorting out visas and eating out a lot we are ready to move on. on a very rainy day we left. It was very cold and stopped for lunch onside of the road the locals watching us have hot soup, and a few you you you chants from the kids... It was a long drive then finally arrived at Debra Markus and stayed at the rooftop of a big hotel as there were no rooms, we look like refugees, toilets are crappy as usual..

Scenic drive towards Bahir Dar. We got rooms at the Ghion hotel, 4 in a room. but at least ther are en suite toilets. We got sorted for tomorrow's Lake Tana monastery tour, some of us ordered the local cuisine with the sour dough bread, it is not bad but most of us labelled it bin bread as it seems like made from bin juice, not that we had it before but we imagine it to taste like that, the meat that comes with it is good though, the bread looks like tripes. Having a few drinks we got invited by a group of girls, young british volunteers here in Ethiopia teaching English, one of the is celebrating her birthday, so we hang out and had a few drinks with them, with the manager of the hotel, who has a bit of a dodgy personality, he was trying to set us up with the young girls, Scottish Craig is the only one about their age but i guess he did not fancy anyone, we said bye to them and went to bed.

Off to lake Tana for the monasteries, as it rained last night, in fact almost every night of torrential rain, the tracks in the islands were muddy and the boat that took us there broke down within the first half hour. It was along day, visiting a few sites, ancient scriptures not well protected, monks in sunnies posing with the crosses and books, their tradition and Religion(Coptic) history is quite interesting but not quite my thing, rined threathened so we hurried back to the mainland.




WIKI INFO:


LAKE TANA:

Lake Tana (also spelled T'ana, Amharic: ጣና ሐይቅ Ṭānā Hāyḳ,"Lake Tana," an older variant is Tsana, Ge'ez ጻና Ṣānā; sometimes called "Dembiya" after the region to the north of the lake) is the source of the Blue Nile and is the largest lake in Ethiopia. Located in the north-western Ethiopian highlands, according to the Statistical Abstract of Ethiopia for 1967/68, the lake is approximately 84 kilometers long and 66 kilometers wide, with a maximum depth of 15 meters, and an elevation of 1,840 meters. Lake Tana is fed by the Little Abbai, Reb and Gumara Rivers and its surface area ranges from 3,000 to 3,500 km² depending on season and rainfall. The lake level has been regulated since the construction of the control weir where the lake discharges into the Blue Nile, which regulates the flow to the Tis Abbai falls and hydro-power station.

The lake has a number of islands, whose numbers vary depending on the level of the lake; it has fallen about 6 feet in the last 400 years. According to Manoel de Almeida (who was a Portuguese missionary in the early 17th century), there were 21 islands, seven to eight of which had monasteries on them "formerly large, but now much diminished." When James Bruce visited the area in the later 18th century, he noted that the locals counted 45 inhabited islands, but stated he believed that "the number may be about eleven." A more modern geographer named 37 islands, of which he believed 19 have or had monasteries or churches on them.

Lake Tana supports a notable fishing industry; according to the Ethiopian Department of Fisheries and Aquaculture, 1,454 tonnes of fish are landed each year at Bahir Dar, which the department estimates is 15%!o(MISSING)f its sustainable amount.


Lac Tana seen from Spot satelliteRemains of ancient Ethiopian emperors and treasures of the Ethiopian Church are kept in the isolated island monasteries. On the island of Tana Qirqos is a rock shown to Paul B. Henze, on which he was told the Virgin Mary had rested on her journey back from Egypt; he was also told that Frumentius, who introduced Christianity to Ethiopia, is "allegedly buried on Tana Cherqos." The body of Yekuno Amlak is interred in the monastery of St. Stephen on Daga Island; other Emperors whose tombs are on Daga include Dawit I, Zara Yaqob, Za Dengel and Fasilides. Other important islands in Lake Tana include Dek Island and Meshralia.

The monasteries are believed to rest on earlier religious sites and include the fourteenth century Debre Maryam, the eighteenth century Narga Selassie, Tana Qirqos (said to have housed the Ark of the Covenant before it was moved to Axum), and Ura Kidane Mecet, known for its regalia. A ferry service links Bahir Dar with Gorgora via Dek Island and various lakeshore villages.


BAHIR DAR:

Bahir Dar is a city in north western Ethiopia, and the capital of the Amhara Region (kilil).

Administratively, Bahir Dar is considered a Special Zone, placing it midway between Addis Ababa and Dire Dawa which are organized as chartered cities (astedader akabibi, equivalent to a kilil), and cities like Mek'ele and Dessie, which are organized as woredas

Bahir Dar is situated on the southern shore of Lake Tana, the source of the Blue Nile (or Abay), in what was previously the Gojjam province. The city is located approximately 578 km north-northwest of Addis Ababa, having a latitude and longitude of 11°36′N, 37°23′E and an elevation of 1840m above sea level.

The city is equipped with an airport with paved runways, identified by the ICAO code HABD and IATA BJR; Ethiopian Airlines operates scheduled flights between Bahir Dar and the capital as well as with Gondar to the northwest. The city is also connected through roads (and buslines) to these cities.

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Photos

LAKE TANA
MAN CASTING HIS NET

ADDIS ABABA NATIONAL MUSEUM
LUCY REPLICA BONES

ADDIS ABABA
ITAIGUE TAITU HOTEL ROOM

SASHEMENE
TUK TUK

FIRST BUSH CAMP IN ETHIOPIA
CAMELS VISIT THE CAMP

TRUCK SCENE
SAM AD HELEN

Comments

[mebre]

it is amaizing place .really!!!!!!!